Natasha MacLellan
“For Christmas is a time of both past and present and often the two are imperfectly blended. As we step into its newness we often look behind,” writes Alistair MacLeod in his short story To Every Thing There Is a Season (1977). Alistair MacLeod was born in 1936 in North Battleford, Saskatchewan to parents who had moved there from Inverness County in Cape Breton during the Great Depression. His parents spoke Gàidhlig as their first language, and their family had a long history in this place- arriving in Cumberland Country from the Isle of Eigg in the 1790s, and then moving to Inverness in 1808. When MacLeod was ten he and his family returned to a farmhouse in Dunvegan that his great grandfather had built in the 1860s. Thus his stories, which are gorgeously constructed, are often set, like this one, in the Cape Breton of his childhood. Natasha MacLellan, the Artistic Director of Theatre New Brunswick, is also from Inverness County, and a great admirer of MacLeod’s work. This Christmas an adaptation of To Every Thing There Is a Season adapted by playwright Ryan Griffith, will be on stage in Fredericton from November 18 to 22nd, and then will tour to St.Stephen, Moncton, Miramichi, Dalhousie, Florenceville-Bristol, St. Andrews, and Saint John by November 30th. I had a chat with Natasha MacLellan via Zoom to chat about how excited she is to work on her first adaptation of an Alistair MacLeod story.
“The short story is about a man named James… the narration of it basically is the premise that he’s looking back on this Christmas where everything changed for him, and it’s the final year where he’s hanging on to his belief in Santa and magic,” she says. This is a significant turning point for James where he is brought into this secret of adulthood, and realizes that he has passed into a different stage of his life. “Also the father of the children is very ill, and is sitting there coughing a lot, so it’s them learning lessons from their father when they know that he probably doesn’t have much longer to live.” Since the short story is told as a retrospective playwright Ryan Griffith has imagined the children characters in the future looking back on that Christmas from their childhood. “It’s very sad, but it’s very beautiful. It’s kind of that melancholic, but sad-happy feeling that we often get at Christmas…. It’s a bit of a departure from the Hallmark movies and the standard Christmas things, they lean into the magic. This [story] is about what it feels like to miss people, to still long for Christmas magic, and still feel it and hold onto it, but what it looks like when you’re a grownup and your life is entirely different. Of course Alistair’s words lend themselves so easily to that because they’re so poetic. Ryan Griffith’s writing is so similar to Alistair’s. I think he’s the New Brunswick Alistair. This is his second adaption [of MacLeod’s stories]. He adapted The Boat many years ago when Tom Morgan-Jones was [Artistic Director] here, and Stephanie [MacDonald] was in it, and Graham Percy. It was a beautiful adaptation.” MacLellan says that To Everything There Is a Season might be her favourite story of MacLeod’s though. “It’s stunning.”
The actors in the cast are Burgandy Code, Pamela Halstead, Cameron MacDuffee, and Benjamin Smith, and MacLellan is directing. “They’re doing such a beautiful job,” she says. Singer/Songwriter/Actor Stewart Legere has written original music for the play, which he performs with acclaimed fiddler Mairi Rankin, of Beòlach. “She’s fun,” says MacLellan. “There is a lot of fun being had in this sad rehearsal room… It’s a Cape Breton story, it’s quite funny [too], and there’s a lot of joy. It does contain both, the sadness and the gravitas are not being ignored- they’re really part of the package.”
They have set the play in the late 1970s, at the time the story was published, which means that for Code, Halstead, and MacDuffee, they are reflecting back on the era when they themselves were children. MacLellan says that even growing up in Margaree in the 1990s they got up to a lot of fun. “If we went to Mabou or Port Hood for a dance it was not unusual for us to get home at 3:00am because it’s a long drive- and there weren’t restrictions on when we could drive- we didn’t have to be home by midnight [like teenagers have to be now with their graduated licenses].”
She says that it’s interesting to have this story told by a multigenerational cast. Stewart Legere and Mairi Rankin are in the middle of the age cohort, but they are close to the age of the parents in the short story. The older actors are playing the children, along with Smith, who is in real life the youngest member of the cast. “I love when a rehearsal room can be that [way],” says MacLellan. She says she loves watching the older actors playing the children. Of Code, who MacLellan has never worked with before, she says, “It’s been a joy to watch her work. I love getting to watch actors who I have always enjoyed their performance to see how they get there. That’s really cool. I’ve always loved Cam on stage, and I’d never worked with him either. So, it’s been nice.” Of Halstead MacLellan says, “She should be on stage more often.” She notes that Halstead is from New Brunswick, as is Smith, as even though it’s wonderful having artists from Nova Scotia and New Brunswick working seamlessly between the two provinces, it is always important, of course, to make sure that the work TNB does reflects the talents of New Brunswickers and provides opportunities for the artists who live there.
MacLellan says that initially she, Griffith and Legere were looking for some way to collaborate on a project, so Legere’s music is really at the heart of the story, which is apt, of course, in a story about Christmas that is set in Cape Breton. The genesis of the project has been quick, as well, because they first started brainstorming about these ideas after Christmas last year. MacLellan says that she hopes that the show will be able to be remounted next year and to tour to places in Nova Scotia too, especially theatres in Inverness County. “It’s all so familiar [to me],” says MacLellan of how similar the story is to her own experience growing up in Cape Breton. “You know how in rehearsal you do things like [wonder] ‘how long would this take? So, when they go to church, where did they go?’ In my mind I know exactly how they got there. They went over this hill, and they took this logging trail, and went to this church. It’s wild to know [the story] like that. I don’t think I’ve ever been happier in a rehearsal room. I just love it so much. I’ve loved every show I’ve worked on, but there’s something about this that is like, ‘this is a gift that I get to do this’…. The MacLeod family is from right where I am from. Marion, one of the daughters, taught my younger brother. She taught with my mom. This family, we know them. So, it’s really cool to be the bridge between TNB and Inverness County.”
“If you’re looking for a Christmas play,” she says, especially a Canadian and Atlantic Canadian one, “this is not like anything else on the market.”
To Every Thing There is a Season plays at Theatre New Brunswick (55 Whiting Road, Fredericton) from November 18th (PWYC) to 22nd, and then tours around the province. Performances are Thursday to Saturday at 7:30pm with 2:00pm matinee performances on Saturday and Sunday. Tickets are $25.00 for students or artists or anyone who would like a reduced ticket price and $45.00 General Admission. They are available online here. For accessible seating, please contact the Box Office at boxoffice@tnb.nb.ca. Dates and prices for the subsequent tour are listed below.
*To Every Thing There is a Season is suitable for adults and older children as it deals with the reality of Santa Claus. You can listen to the original short story here or read it here.
NOV 18│FREDERICTON│PWYC TICKETS
NOV 19-22│FREDERICTON│TICKETS
NOV 24│ST. STEPHEN│TICKETS
NOV 25│MONCTON│TICKETS
NOV 26│MIRAMICHI│TICKETS
NOV 27│DALHOUSIE│TICKETS
NOV 28│FLORENCEVILLE-BRISTOL│TICKETS
NOV 29│ST. ANDREWS│TICKETS
NOV 30│SAINT JOHN│TICKETS
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