The sprit moves you: Brookstone Theatre

Performing Arts & Entertainment in Canada, Autumn, 2001 by Karen Bell

IN TORONTO'S DOWNTOWN "ANNEX" NEIGHBOURHOOD THERE SITS IS A BIG, OLD, STONE CHURCH CALLED WALMER Road Baptist. Walk down a little side street to the back of the church, where there's a little sign that says Elmore's Hall. Climb the steep wooden stairs to the second floor and you've arrived at the home of Brookstone Performing Arts.

Formed in 1989 by artistic director Dennis Hassell, Brookstone mounted a production that first year called Theatre Shmeatre that paved the way for many more. Brookstone's stated mandate is to deal with spiritual topics in the broad sense of returning theatre to its roots -- expressing the spiritual to the community. In fact, Brookstone is housed in a Baptist Church complex and the company's focus has mostly been on the Christian brand of spirituality.

Productions go onstage in Elmore's Hall, a dingy-green but friendly 100-seat auditorium adjoining the church. Eleven years after its inception, the company's subscription list runs to roughly 300 people. Perhaps surprisingly, very few subscribers are parishioners of Walmer Road Baptist.

Instead, they come from the broader community and "the 905" (a reference to the telephone area code for the towns which surround Toronto). They come to Brookstone, says Hassell, from surrounding cities -- Saint Catharines, Guelph, Oshawa -- and even as far away as Ottawa. "Some have no religious affiliation," he adds, noting that one of Brookstone's biggest donors is a nonChristian. (Of course, even if Brookstone's audience was all Christian, or even all Protestant, it would still have the scope to be extremely diverse. It is interesting to note that critics of the company's productions have complained either that it is too religious or not religious enough.)

But, for its modest size and plain little venue, Brookstone Performing Arts has mounted a number of impressive productions. Many of the company's 23 shows have been acclaimed by critics and audiences alike. A Dixie Gospel (1994) received a Dora Award nomination.

Tent Meeting in 1998 was an extraordinary little production -- a gospel musical. Written by Morris Ertman and Ron Reed and starring Kent Staines, it was co-produced with Lamb's Players Theatre from San Diego. Tent Meeting was a very special show that combined a simple story line with rousing gospel music, spare but creative staging -- and pure, joyful fun. Audiences loved it. So did the theatre community, rewarding the show with four Dora nominations.

Brookstone's modest, un-air-conditioned venue may hold only a few people, but the presentation of each show is generally professional and smooth. The company pays union scale wages, says Hassell, meaning that, for financial reasons, untried actors make up the bulk of Brookstone casts.

But some members of Brookstone creative teams have impressive credentials; Tom Carson has directed in Vancouver and Montreal. Set designer Eric Summersly has worked for Alberta Theatre Projects, Factory Theatre (in Toronto) and the Charlottetown Festival. Costume designer Jennifer Triemstra has also worked at Blyth, Theatre Passe Muraille (Toronto) and Factory Theatre. Juno-nominated composer Douglas Romanow has created the music for a number of Brookstone shows.

A Dixie Gospel was written by award winner Tom Key, a former Episcopalian who converted to Catholicism and is currently the artistic director of Theatrical Outfit in Atlanta, Georgia. The music for Dixie Gospel was created by Harry Chapin, who needs no introduction.

As for subject matter, British author C. S. Lewis has provided plenty of that for Brookstone shows over the years: Tom Key packed the little auditorium in 1991 with C.S. Lewis Onstage, playing characters from many of Lewis' 52 books. The show was reprised two years later. Then in 1997, Key adapted Lewis' Screwtape Letters, a fictional correspondence between a senior devil and a junior devil, which advances the theory that evil doesn't happen the way you think it does.

Lewis' beloved children's tale The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe received productions in 1996 and 1999. The latter run sold 8,000 tickets. (The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe toured Southwestern Ontario at the end of last year before returning to the Brookstone stage in early January).

There have been some predictable choices over the last decade. Miracle Worker (1997) and Godspell Unplugged (1996) spring to mind. By contrast, however, the company mounted Wind in the Willows (1997) because, says Hassell, it affirmed the power of friendship and loyalty.

"We are not going to do The Miracle Worker anymore," says Hassell, "Stratford has more money to do it. We are an alternative company and we want to reach the audience -- whether Christian or not -- with the spiritual aspect of life. We want to radically reconnect people with spirituality and the way to do that is to do new works. Art should be taking people who are not spiritual and opening up their view.

Hassell himself has written many of the Brookstone plays over the years, including Wind in the Willows. In 1993, he adapted The Sacred Diary of Adrian Plass from a million-selling British book and starred in it himself. The show still lives on as a touring production. He also wrote and starred in The Prospector, a true story (and a powerful play) about real-life local Baptist missionary Archibald Reekie who went to Bolivia to save souls and instead experienced a ruinous culture shock.