Jeremy Webb Photo by Andrew Cull
We weren’t able to gather earlier today to watch Artistic Director Jeremy Webb and other members of the Neptune Theatre family launch their much-anticipated 2024-2025 season, as we were, once again, snowed in, with the second heavy snowfall we’ve had in Halifax since Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead opened less than two weeks ago. Instead, Jeremy Webb announced the upcoming season live on Facebook, very aptly revealing what the Snow Queen has been trying to tell us all month: Frozen is coming to Halifax for Christmas.
The Summer Season begins on July 30th with Lindsay Kyte and Mike Ross’ Merritt Award winning show Dear Rita, which was originally commissioned by the Charlottetown Festival in 2021, had a short run there, and then has had two subsequent runs at the Savoy Theatre in Glace Bay. The show very uniquely tells the story of Rita MacNeil through her music performed by a very small ensemble cast- led by Julie Martell (Mamma Mia, Billy Elliot, Beauty and the Beast).
The Fall Season begins on September 10th with Jeremy Webb’s new immersive adaptation of Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream set during Prohibition. There will even be a secret speakeasy that patrons will be able to slip into to imbibe before the show; but you didn’t hear that from me.
The Prismatic Festival brings us King Gilgamesh & the Man of the Wild, playing between October 1st and 6th, which was created by Ahmed Moneka, Jesse Lavercombe, and Seth Buckley, as a co-production between Soulpepper Theatre and Tria Theatre in Toronto. The show received enthusiastic reviews there earlier this year, and chronicles a present-day story of friendship interwoven with the ancient Mesopotamian Epic of Gilgamesh, and the true story of how Moneka came from being an exiled Iraqi actor to a Canadian musician. In November Winter Moons will be in the Scotiabank Studio Theatre. This is a dance piece that follows the teaching of L’nu (Mi’kmaw) women carrying a fire ember through the winter season. It is produced by Nestuita’si Storytelling in partnership with Prismatic and is created by shalan joudry (the Merritt award winning Koqm), and choreographed by Merritt Award winner Sarah Prosper.
At Christmas Jeremy Webb will direct Disney’s Frozen, based on the smash-success 2013 film of the same name. This show has music by Kristen Anderson-Lopez and Robert Lopez, and tells the story of two sisters, both struggling in grief, who, with the help of a charming snowman, eventually find ways to help each other overcome incredible storms, and premature marriage proposals. Rhys Bevan-John will also return once again in Jeremy Webb’s family favourite A Christmas Carol.
Neptune will welcome in 2025 with a new production of Andrea Scott’s play about Viola Desmond, Controlled Damage, which begins on January 11th. This will be in partnership with the National Arts Centre, and the show will be directed by Chrissa Richards. When the play premiered here, just before the lockdowns began in 2020, it was a crowd favourite.
On February 13th Josephine: A Musical Cabaret will be onstage, which is directed and choreographed by Sean Cheesman. It tells the story of Josephine Baker, the first African American international superstar. It is billed as a “burlesque cabaret dream play,” chronicling Baker from her birth in St. Louis in 1906, through her life in Europe beginning in 1924 where she worked in film, had multiple interracial marriages as well as homosexual relationships, performed while wearing men’s clothing, and was even a spy in the French Resistance in World War II, as well as being a civil rights activist, and a mother to twelve children.
Andrea Boyd will direct The New Canadian Curling Club by Mark Crawford, beginning February 25th, a show originally produced by Festival Antigonish. The play tells the story of a well intentioned Learn-to-Curl program organized to help welcome recent refugees to a small town, but when the organizer breaks her hip, Stuart MacPhail has to come in as head coach. Unfortunately, Stuart has some strong opinions about welcoming immigrants.
Jeremy Webb will also direct Neptune’s big Spring musical: Little Shop of Horrors, which will open on March 11th. On the surface a musical about a man-eating plant might seem lightyears away from Disney’s Frozen, but actually, Little Shop was written by Alan Menken and Howard Ashman, the same composers who wrote music for The Little Mermaid and Beauty and the Beast. Little Shop of Horrors dates back to 1982, and has music inspired by the early 1960s rock n’ roll, doo-wop, and early Motown genres. It tells the story of an unfortunate, but well intentioned, botanist named Seymour, who accidentally threatens the preservation of humanity itself in a meek attempt to impress Audrey, who works with him at a downtown flower shop.
The season ends with Casey and Diana, a new Canadian play that was commissioned just last season for the Stratford Festival written by Nick Green. It will be directed here by Heist’s Richie Wilcox. It is set in 1991 at the Toronto AIDS hospice, which is preparing for the historic visit of Diana, Princess of Wales. The play received glowing reviews last summer when it was at Stratford, with Intermission Magazine calling it, “a crown jewel of the Stratford Festival.”
For those eagerly waiting to get their first choice of seats and dates, plus the best savings, season subscriptions are on sale now. Single tickets will go on sale on June 1, 2024. Subscriptions are available to purchase online or by calling the Box Office at 902- 429-7070.
