The Boys In The Photograph

April 30, 2009 at the Manitoba Theatre Centre, downtown Winnipeg, The Boys In The Photograph  made it’s world premier.  After six weeks of rehearsals and workshopping, the cast of twenty five was more than ready for the big night.  Four previews, all with completely different ending variations; the show has been positively worked to within an inch of it’s life.  Every bit of musical editing that could have been done, had been.  Lines have been altered and entire scenes have been added and tossed. It has been a six weeks that not one member of the cast or crew will forget. Director Elton, after a particularly responsive audience during preview number one, said to the cast that this, of all the theatre experience, was the most rewarding and exciting of his entire career.  He simply couldn’t be prouder of what this team has created.  It’s been a ten year journey for Elton since the days of creating The Beautiful Game, and the gratification of sitting back and enjoying opening night  was a joy like no other.  

This killer cast has a complete mix of Canadian celebrities and first-timers.  Jacqueline French, Cody Lancaster and Kathryn Ballantine all entered rehearsals directly out of college, where as Richard McMillan, Tony LePage, Tracy Dawson and Brandon McGibbon are well seasoned performers of many theatre genres.  There is in fact, a true Irishman in the show, Richard Harte, born and raised in Ireland, moved to Canada while he was growing up.  Harte still, however, ‘puts on’ the Irish accent for his Belfast born character.   

Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber attended the second and third performances on Friday and Saturday following the opening.  He flew over to Winnipeg from London in his own personal jet and watched an eight o’clock pm performance which was actually a one o’clock am performance, London time.  There were numerous technical difficulties during the performance and the sound from the pit completely cut out for twenty minutes during the first act.  In order to fix all that had gone wrong, there was an extended intermission that took over a half an hour. All this added to an already two hour and forty five minute show, made for a long evening indeed.  He did however, stay through all of it and assured everyone he loved it.  Sir Webber surprised the cast by making an appearance in the green room back stage before the performance.  The cast was a spread of dressing gowns, hot rollers, half made up faces and street clothes; not the way any of them pictured their first introduction to the ‘Dark Lord’ (as Elton refers to him).  

Opening night was a complete success, all went smoothly and the audience was with the cast all the way.  Th Boys In The Photograph promises to be a great run and who knows where it will take off to next!

Photographs taken by Bruce Monk.

Manitoba Theatre Centre

          The Manitoba Theatre Centre, or MTC, was founded in 1958 by John Hirsch and Tom Hendry.   Hirsch was the Artistic Director of the theatre from the time it was built until 1966; almost ten years.  Today, there are about twenty large theatres in the downtown Winnipeg area, but the Manitoba Theatre Centre, John Hirsch Mainstage is one of the oldest.  In fact, it is Canada’s oldest English-speaking regional theatre.  Theatre in Manitoba, however, began quite a while before this particular building was established.  In the mid 1800’s local literature lovers would gather in a room they called Red River Hall.  There, they would perform for a small audience who would be asked not to applaud for fear the reverberations would cause the building to collapse. 

John Hirsch was born in Hungary in 1930 but moved to London, England with his mother, father and brother.  During the Holocaust, his entire family was killed and he was swept off to the Budapest Ghetto by a maid of the household.  Years later in 1947 he moved to Manitoba and he began to find his way in the theatre world, directing and  eventually founding a children’s theatre. In ‘57 he founded Theatre 77 with his long time friend Tom Hendry.  

The Manitoba Theatre centre is located at 174 Market Avenue, near the famously windy intersection of Portage and Main in the very heart of the city.  It puts up ten works per season with a 789 seating capacity in the John Hursch Mainstage plus the Tom Healey Warehouse with a capacity of 286.  The Manitoba Theatre Centre rates as third  highest next to the Stratford and Shaw Festivals for highest annual attendance.  

The current artistic director of the Manitoba Theatre Centre is Steven Schipper who is now in his twentieth year of working under that title.  The 2008/2009 season has brought some classic favourites as well as some brand new work to the stage:  Pride and Prejudice, Medea, Jitters, The Blonde, the Brunette and the Vengeful Redhead, Doubt:A Parable, Scorched, The Price, Bad Dates, Bleeding Hearts and of course The Boys in The Photograph.

Ben Elton

          Benjamin Charles Elton was born on May 3rd, 1959 in Catford, London England.  After a time at and Godalming Grammar School and Manchester University he began performing stand up comedy. His quick wit and incredible knowledge of the English language launched him into a career in comedy writing for life.  His first big hitwas a British comedy series called The Young Ones which ran from 1982-1984.  In ‘85 The Young Ones won the BAFTA TV Award for Best Comic Series.  Soon to follow was another hit comic series called Blackadder which he co-wrote along side Richard Curtis in 86,87 and 89.  During this time they worked along side such UK comedy heroes as Rowan Atkinson (‘Best Light EntertainmentPerformance’, BAFTA) Tim McInnerny, Hugh Laurie and Stephen Fry.  Elton joined the Blackadder team in it’s second season and continued to write two more after that.  It won several BAFTA awards including ‘Best Comedy Series’ for Blackdder The Third  in 1988, ‘Best Comedy Series’ for BlackadderGoes Forth in 1989. In the year 2000, Blackadder was listed as sixteenth place in the 100 Greatest British Television Programmes.  It also was voted second place in the BBC’s Britain’s Best Sitcom in 2004, almost two decades after it was first written!  Then came The Thin Blue Line.Here, Elton wrote two more seasons for Rowan Atkinson in ‘95 and ‘96 where it won a British Comedy Award for ‘Top TV Comedy Sitcom’.   

           Elton began writing novels in the late 80’s, releasing his first in ‘89, Stark.  Since then, eleven more have been published including three UK number one hits.  Popcorn, published in ’96, received the Crime Writers’ Association of Great Britain Gold Dagger Award for fiction. It was his first UK number one novel.   In 2002, High Society won the WH Smith’s People’s Choice Fiction Award.  One of his books, Inconceivable was  made into a movie called Maybe Baby starring Hugh Laurie and Joely Richardson.  His latest novel Blind Faith, was released in 2007.  Elton is also an accomplished playwright releasing such hits as Gasping, Silly Cow and Popcorn.               

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          Recently entering the world of musicals, Ben has been writing lyrics and books to new and upcoming works. We Will Rock You, a collaboration with the rock band Queen, has opened in London, Toronto, Germany, Australia, Russia, Las Vagas, Spain and even Japan! In 2003 it won the Theatregoers’ Choice Award for Best New Musical and in 2007 Elton himself won a Dora Mavor Moore Award for Outstanding Production of a Musical.  Elton has recently been working on The Phantom of The Opera sequel, Love Never Dies as well as The Boys In The Photograph.
          Married to Sophie Gare, they have three young children together in London. Elton is currently working on a novel, a sitcom, and a musical world premier.  

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Meet The Cast

          Starring in The Boys In The Photograph are some of Canada’s hottest names: four time Dora Award winner, Richard McMillan as Father O’Donnel,  We Will Rock You ’s star player Erica Peck as Mary, and Tony LePage; New Brunswick’s own Frank ‘N’ Furter playing the leading man, John. 

          Richard McMillan is widely known for his roles as Pooh-Bah in The Mikado whom he has played at the Stratford Festival, Toronto and even New York; Scar in Toronto’s production of The Lion King and as Saruman in The Lord of The Rings, The Musical.  His film and TV credits seem endless but to name a few, one can catch him many famous shows such as: King of Kensington, Are You Afraid of the Dark?, Black Harbour and Earth: Final Conflict.  Now, starring as Father O’Donnel in The Boys in The Photograph, he’s commonly referred to as “The Senior Acting Department”  by Director, Ben Elton because of the vast age difference between himself and the rest of the cast.  He is in fact, the only adult character in the entire show!  McMillan, however, does not only keep up with the young birds, but rather, clears the way for them with presence and energy like no other man could.    

          Erica Peck left her second year at Sheridan College for Music Theatre- Performance when she landed the title role of Scaramouche in the Cannon Theatre’s re-make of the London hit, We Will Rock You  (Take a look at the Toronto Cast ).  This young rock star continues to belt out  Queen’s greatest songs in WWRY ’s third year of running.  Now featured in the Panasonic Theatre,  Peck has worked along side Yvan Pedneault (Galileo) since opening night.  The combination of  these  two powerhouse voices takes the audience on a dream ride every single night.  Peck is currently taking a leave of absence from Toronto We Will Rock You to play the leading lady, Mary, in Winnipeg’s The Boys In The Photograph. Check out the Erica Peck Fan Site!

          Tony LePage plays the title role of John Kelly; a teen during a time in Ireland where footballer George Best was the man to beat, and the IRA had it’s clutches upon the country.  LePage has recently played the crazed transvestite Frank N’ Furter in The Rocky Horror Show at Theatre New Brunswick.  He rocked the stage with this cult classic along side Caleb Cosman, a fellow cast member of Boys In The Photograph who played Rocky.  Now, playing pals in Northern Ireland, their friendship takes a very different approach than what one might have caught in Rocky. Not only working all across Canada, LePage joined the Australian tour of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat.

The Boys In The Photograph

           From March 16th until May 23, Ballantine is in Winnipeg working on a brand new musical called ‘Boys In The Photograph‘. Music by Andrew Lloyd Webber and Lyrics and Book by Ben Elton.  It was originally worked under the title, The Beautiful Game in London, England. There, it didn’t meet the full potential that Elton and Webber believed it held, so they teamed up again to re-work the material. Now, under a new title, with a new cast, the Winnipeg Theatre Centre is hosting the six week long rehearsal process as well as playing it for four weeks. Directed by Elton, assisted and choreographed by Tracey Flye, and music directed by Bob Foster, Boys In The Photograph, is sure to be a truly beautiful collaboration.

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