Anna Karenina kicks off GBC theatre school’s Season of Plays
The 2024-2025 Season of Plays at the theatre school of George Brown college (GBC) opened on Wednesday, Nov. 6 with Anna Karenina.
This adaptation is written by Helen Edmundson, based on the famous novel of the same name by Leo Tolstoy. First published in 1992, it has since been adapted for stage all around the world.
Stewart Arnott, a veteran of the art form with 40 years of experience and four Dora Awards, came to GBC to bring Anna Karenina to life once more.
Per the usual custom at the Theatre school, third-year students of Theatre Arts – Performance, work with Stewart Arnott to present a collection of well-known plays on stage.
“He always focuses on the audience first and what does the audience think? he’s very detailed … we were hand in hand in the process and it was a great experience,” said Iza Rincon, a GBC student who plays Anna.
More shows will take place over the remainder of the year, so that students are able to have different performance experiences ranging from tragic characters and settings to comic ones.
However, there is a common theme shared by the selected plays; the goal is to address and delve deep into complicated issues, most prominently presented by three elements: love, hate and duty.
All these elements are clearly present in Anna Karenina; the protagonist is a beautiful, intelligent woman, who is admired in high society. Nevertheless, she is caught between her feelings towards her new lover (Vronsky), her duty as a wife and also the love and care she feels for her child and being judged by society. Romeo and Juliet, another one of the selected pieces for the Season, is also rich with these themes.
Juan-Carlos Figueroa, another GBC student explains, “overall in the season, there’s a lot of [questions], like who is acceptable to love?… with Anna Karenina and Vronsky, there’s all that with Levin and Kitty [ at Anna Karenina play]. Am I allowed to love this person? With Romeo and Juliet, the star-crossed lovers… The King and Queen [in Ivona] tried to tell the prince, like, this is a joke, right? You can’t actually want to marry this woman.”
Anna Karenina ran from Nov.6 to 16.
The season continues with the following shows presented in the chronological order: with Munschstock!, (Nov.27 to Dec.7, 2024), The Amazing Cordobas/War of the Clowns, (Feb. 5 to 15, 2025) and Ivona, Princess of Burgundy (April 8 to 19, 2025). Romeo & Juliet will be the concluding show of the Season, which will be performed from April 9 to 19 next year.
For more information about the performance schedule and to book your tickets, you can visit https://www.georgebrown.ca/season-of-plays-2024-2025
