Edmonds' Play Delivers as Festival Kicks Off Tuesday Night

The First Light Centre for Performance and Creativity saw a sizable house for the opening night of the Year of the Arts Women’s Play Festival, and I think it’s fair to say that attendees enjoyed the staged reading of I Dropped a Stitch, by Janet Edmonds. The performance concluded with a rousing standing ovation.

Let me say, first of all, I’m a sucker for dramatic readings done well. Companies looking to make a reading a success could take a lesson from this talented group. Petrina Bromley, Una Hill McMullin, Darryl Hopkins, Alexis Koetting and Andrew Tremblett did a stellar job of bringing the words on the page to life tonight. With nothing more than microphones and music stands, the actors (skillfully supported by Robert Chafe reading stage directions) created vivid pictures… of the kitchen, the daybed in the corner, the colourful, knitted scarves and the plot twisting conclusion to this drama.

I Dropped a Stitch is constructed around familial themes: the challenges of parenting, the lasting impacts of lost pregnancies, the loss of community connections, and how far a mother will go to protect her only son. It’s a murder mystery of sorts, but not your typical who-dunnit. Over the course of the one-hour reading, we watched as Melinda (read by Petrina Bromley) tries to pick up the dropped stitches of her family’s life without unravelling all the work she’s done raising son Hayward (Andrew Tremblett). Hayward is suspected of murdering his fiancée Brenda (Una Hill McMullin), but it's Melinda who’s haunted by Brenda’s ghost. Even though husband Carl (Darryl Hopkins) encourages Melinda to stop protecting the wayward Hayward (sorry, Janet, but I couldn’t resist!), it’s RCMP Officer Nicole Jamieson (Alexis Koetting) who helps Melinda realize what she must do in the end – “Take care of your son.”

I’ll say no more, because this play will make it from the page to stage soon, I’m sure.

Before the reading began, playwright and dramaturge Robert Chafe explained to the audience that, other than a few lines here and there, the reading tonight was essentially “the play” as Janet left it before her death in 2017. The actors were reading from scripts which included Janet’s handwritten notes and scratches, a nice touch. Stitch certainly sparkles of her wit and includes clever and intelligent dialogue. Janet even made her presence known at the end of the night. As Artistic Director Jenn Deon was explaining that I would be doing reviews each night, the microphone fed back, and Petrina intoned from the stage, “Janet didn’t like a critic!”

I knew Janet a little. We took theatre classes in university together, and our paths crossed many times living in St. John’s. I think she would have been very proud tonight. Robert Chafe indicated that the play deserves to be staged, and I was pleased to hear Janet wanted him to make that happen.

If you’re not familiar with Chafe’s work, well… you’ve dropped a stitch yourself. From Tempting Providence, to Oil and Water, to Between Breaths, he just keeps getting better and better. His plays (and dynamic partnership with Jillian Keiley through Artistic Fraud) are producing some of the most creative theatrical experiences in this country today.

…Is the next national, theatrical success-story appearing in one of the 16 shows featured over the 12 nights of this festival?

That’s what I find most exciting about this event and the ongoing work of Persistence Theatre to celebrate and provide professional opportunities for women and those facing gender-based barriers.

Tomorrow night there are two featured shows, both by new playwrights. Bottle Neck by Michaela Sheldon is about “…the unidealized experience of a young woman raised by a single mother who struggles with mental illness,”; and Connecting Rooms: A Tribute by Florence Button explores the lives of eight women who worked alongside the men in the Labrador fishery.

Shows start at 7 p.m. See you there!

- Susan Bonnell