TA’s Down Dangerous Passes Road: A Review

April 1, 2015 · 0 Comments

By Scott Johnston

Theatre Aurora kicks off the spring season with the one act play “Down Dangerous Passes Road”.

Written by Quebec playwright Michel Marc Bouchard, it tells the story of three estranged brothers. One of them is getting married, and shortly before the wedding, they decide to visit a fishing camp in the woods near where their father died many years before.

When they become stranded after their car runs off the road, it gives them a chance to revisit their strained relationships with each other, and with their late father.

While the actors (Michael Mast, Daniel Staseff and Nick May) playing the three characters interact well and show strong emotions, the flow of the story is somewhat disjointed and seems to raise more questions than it should.

Why have they communicated so infrequently for the past several years? Why did they go to this remote area so shortly before the wedding? Why aren’t they making more of an effort to get back to civilization? How could one of the brothers, who knows the area so well, be so lost? Why are they so fixated on the small details of their situation, such as the time, and why are they repeating themselves so much?

Some of these questions are eventually answered, but the explanations, and how we get there, are not as satisfying as they could have been. One gets the feeling that the author of this already short play might have improved it by making it even tighter and more focused.

Although the way the story is written is sometimes hard to follow, the acting is excellent, and visually the Theatre Aurora team has presented it very well. The combination of forest set and lighting are very effective at setting the mood for, and directing focus on the various arguments and discussions.

Evening performances of Down Dangerous Passes Road continue at Theatre Aurora, 150 Henderson Drive, April 2, 3 & 4. Tickets are available through the box office at 905-727-3669.