Canada's Stra rd Festival boasts a repertory lineup
that includes ftur Shakepearean plays,
comic classics of the English stage
and modern-day tales of drama and romance.

SUZANNE CHESSLER

Special to The Jewish News

n actor, an author's adapta-
tion and an activist are
three of the Jewish elements
in this year's Stratford
Festival, the Ontario theater program
that is entering its 47th season of clas-
sic plays and enrichment experiences.
Jordan Pettle, who has three roles
in the repertory season, reports that
Jewish productions have been impor-
tant to his career. David Young, a
Canadian playwright, has included a
Jewish character in Glenn, his
dramatization about the late
acclaimed and eccentric Canadian
pianist Glenn Gould. And Janet
Levine, a leader in the Jewish
Federation of Metropolitan Detroit,
is helping form Michigan Friends of
the Stratford Festival to encourage
support of the theater tradition.
Pettle, in his fourth season with
Stratford, plays Puck in A
Midsummer Night's Dream, Bushy in
Richard II and Snake in The School

•
Are
Made
On'
`Such Stuff As Dreams

Stratford Festival
1999

The year's Stratford Festival season features com-
edy and romance, music and tragedy — in
other words, something for everyone.
Selections include four Shakespearean plays,
from the comedy of A Midsummer Night's Dream to
the romance of The Tempest to the dark tragedies of
Richard II and Macbeth. Skakespeare contemporary
Ben Jonson's The Alcehmist, a satire on greed;
Richard Sheridan's The School for Scandal, an
expose of moral hypocrisy; and Jane Austen's come-
dy of manners, Pride and Prejudice, further pay
tribute to the comic genius of the English. A musi-
cal adaptation of Bram Stoker's Dracula and
Leonard Bernstein's West Side Story bring Victorian
and modern-day love stories, respectively, to the
stage. Finally, the drama Glenn examines the tor-
tured soul of internationally renowned concert
pianist Glenn Gould, who served as a former co-
director of music at the Stratford Festival.
The productions run in repertory through the
following dates:

for Scandal.

"I relate to Puck on a personal
level, his playful side," Pettle, 27,
says about his character in one of
Shakespeare's lighter plays. "I love
the way Puck sees the world, and
I'm thankful I get the chance to por-
,
tray him.
Pettle's parents and grandparents
took him to the theater when he was
quite young, and by the time he was
in his first year at the University of
Toronto, he knew he wanted a stage
career; he was accepted to the
National Theatre School in
Montreal.
"I was lucky to get a job in
Toronto right out of theater school
and was in Twelfth Night for the
Canadian Stage Co.," Pettle recalls.
"I did a couple of shows in Toronto
and then had an audition for
Stratford. I was offered an appren-
ticeship in 1995, joined the company
and then did a year away in Halifax
and Toronto before getting an offer
to come back for my fourth year."
Peale has performed two roles in
different productions of A League of
Nathans, one for the Great Canadian
Theatre Co. and another for Prairie
Theatre Exchange. The piece is about
three Jewish men who grow up
together in Ontario and then have a
reunion after following different paths.
"The play made me look at a lot of
issues and what it meant for me to be
Jewish," Peale says. "I love looking
into those questions, and I really was

5/28
1999

72 Detroit Jewish News

Above: Pat* Peak, right as
Puck in William Shakespeare's
Afidsummer Nights Dreg
"1 re:ZIA,' tO N.P Off a personal

excited when I could do the play for a
second time."
Pettle's brother Adam picked up the
theater interest and is pursuing a play-
wrighting career that has the two col-
laborating. At the '97 SiimmerWorks
Festival, Jordan Pettle directed his
brother's play Therac 25.
"My bubbie and zayde are still avid
theater-goers, and my cousin is study-
ing theater now, so the bug is spread-

The Tempest — Through Nov. 7
A Midsummer Night's Dream — Through Nov. 5
Pride and Prejudice — Through Nov. 6
The Alchemist — June 12-Oct. 30
The School for Scandal — July 29-Nov. 6
Dracula — Through Nov. 7
West Side Story — Through Nov. 6
Macbeth — Through Sept. 26
Glenn — June 11-Sept. 25
Richard II — June 9-Sept. 25

ing in the family," says Pettle, already
scheduled for a winter production of
The Whirlpool in Toronto. "It's great to
share passions with [relatives]."
Passion certainly was part of Glenn
Gould's life, captured in four segments
and by four actors as scripted by
David Young in Glenn — The Prodigy
(ages 6-19), The Performer (19-31),
The Perfectionist (31-50) and The
Puritan (the last days of his life).

Although none of the actors play
Gould's music or acts as if he is, the
sounds are communicated through
recordings, a critical part of Gould's
career and the life of the play.
The character of Larry Lewman,
based on an actual person who worked
with the legendary pianist, is a Jewish
New Yorker, a recording studio techie
who interacts with the man whose
recordings still sell.