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OverviewEverything changes on what begins as a typical day in the life of the aptly named Mr. Mann, a forty-eight-year-old, buttoned-down, middle management type in a pinstriped grey suit, who feels himself losing touch with his job, his wife, his children, and the rest of his urban life. He wins tickets to a production of Chekhov's Three Sisters and realizes that the mid-life cocoon he has spun around himself is beginning to unwind. And Slowly Beauty, first performed in French in 2003, was created collaboratively by Michel Nadeau and colleagues from his Quebec troupe, Thtre Niveau Parking. With the intensity of an electric current striking a reflecting pool, Nadeau shows us how Chekhov's century-old drama about the yearning of three sisters in a dreary provincial town directly addresses Mann's own stifled existence and liberates him from his self-imposed ""gulag."" Mann returns to see Three Sisters a second time, finding that its themes of beauty and poetry lost to the monotony of everyday existence mirror many aspects of his own existence. At the same time, Mann's dying friend realizes that he is for the first time able to appreciate the astonishing beauty of trees outside his window. The irony of such a deathbed admission is not lost on Mr. Mann. With Chekhov's characters and themes coming to inhabit the protagonist's mind and life, emphasized by the repeated image of geese flying overhead these birds do not question the purpose of their journey but find it sufficient to fly in unison And Slowly Beauty speaks eloquently to the power of art to transform lives. Cast of 3 women and 3 men. Full Product DetailsAuthor: Michel Nadeau , Maureen LabontPublisher: Talonbooks Imprint: Talonbooks Dimensions: Width: 13.90cm , Height: 0.70cm , Length: 21.50cm Weight: 0.170kg ISBN: 9780889227866ISBN 10: 0889227861 Pages: 128 Publication Date: 16 January 2014 Audience: General/trade , General Format: Paperback Publisher's Status: Active Availability: Out of stock The supplier is temporarily out of stock of this item. It will be ordered for you on backorder and shipped when it becomes available. Table of ContentsReviewsFinalist for the 2014 Governor General's Literary Award for Translation And Slowly Beauty is a complex, infinitely rich play ... The script's virtuoso ability to balance humour and drama is particularly fine. - Victoria Times Colonist And Slowly Beauty is no simple kitchen-sink drama. There is much laughter in unexpected places and some deftly directed movements that quicken the interplay of action and ideas. Like Mr. Mann at the theatre, 'we were transported'. - Globe and Mail Author InformationMichel Nadeau is an actor, director, and playwright who has long been active in Quebec arts and culture. Since 1987, he has served as artistic director at Quebec City's Thtre Niveau Parking, and has been writer-in-residence at Thtre du Trident, where he directed, among others, Rossini's The Barber of Seville and Lorca's The House of Bernarda Alba. Nadeau has been a professor at Quebec's national theatre and music school since 1986, where he teaches improvisation, dramatic movement, mask work, and commedia dell'arte. is a dramaturge, translator, and teacher. She has also coordinated a number of play development programs in theatres across Canada, including Quebec's Centre des auteurs dramatiques (CEAD) and Playwrights Workshop Montreal. From 2009 to 2012, she served as jury chair for the prestigious Siminovitch Prize in Theatre. Labont has been the co-director of the Banff Playwrights' Colony since 2008, and has been on faculty since 2003, when she began as resident dramaturge. In 2005, she was named program head. Tab Content 6Author Website:Countries AvailableAll regions |