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"Backed up musically onstage by the talented trio of Cyndi Carleton, Jane Miller and Konrad Pluta, Elliott’s singing resonates with longing and despair." NNN Now Magazine
| "Elliott has a robust, expressive voice...What Moving Day does right is
present the historical struggles of women to be taken seriously — both
in and out of homemaking roles — with a light but precise touch. There
is a lot of heart in Elliott’s tale of Sharon Sharpe, a 1960s housewife
stuck packing up her family’s home alone on the night of the moon
landing...Elliott gives a warm and believable performance.” Meghan
Harrison, Eye Weekly "Backed up musically onstage by the talented trio of Cyndi Carleton, Jane Miller and Konrad Pluta, Elliott’s singing resonates with longing and despair." NNN Now Magazine |
| Moving Day much more than boxes full of memories Elliott’s one-woman musical destined to be a festival hit By STEPHEN COOKE Entertainment Reporter, Halifax Chronicle Herald Sun. May 4 - 6:36 AM Good theatre should take you on a journey, but in Cathy Elliott’s one-woman musical Moving Day, all the good stuff happens before her journey even begins. Surrounded by cardboard boxes, which also serve to shelter musical director Leslie Arden and her keyboard, Elliott builds up an image of a woman’s adult life, from marriage to motherhood, before everything seems to be on the verge of crashing down around her. It’s July 20, 1969, and Sharon Sharpe has a long night ahead of her, finishing the packing before the movers arrive, while her husband Johnny and their two teenagers have already left on the long drive to the new house. He’s accepted another transfer, and as we learn, it’s been the same story every few years. Unable to establish roots in any one place, Sharon uses her imagination to create vivid personal histories to tell each new group of acquaintances; although lately she’s been turning to booze more and more to make the days fly by as the kids get older. As the night goes on, bits of her life come out of the boxes, reminding her of happier times, when the future seemed so much brighter. Her plan for her "fastest packing job yet" coincides with that evening’s historic Apollo 11 moon landing, and as it wears on, a sense of loneliness engulfs her, and her family seems as far away as that distant orbiting satellite. As Sharon, Elliott fully embodies a woman who’s watching a revolution take place around her, from the death of JFK over five years before to the late ’60s student unrest which she assumes her son Peter and daughter Amy will eventually be swept up in. All the while she’s been at home, fed TV fantasies by Bewitched and I Dream of Jeannie, when she’d rather unleash her inner Godzilla and lay waste to the barriers to her greater fulfilment. Elliott’s energy and natural ability to swing into and out of song mode propel us through this brisk 90-minute exploration of one woman’s life, reawoken by the act of taking it apart and putting it into boxes. The creative staging by Elliott and director Jeannette Lambermont-Morey sees inanimate objects come to life in the actress’s hands, like a folded up hammock or an artfully wadded up newspaper that becomes a fantasy waltz partner. And using only a short stepladder, Elliott creates a sense of being weightless in space in a nice bit of physical theatre. The directing is sure in other ways as well. Sharon’s active imagination is fully expressed without becoming too extreme, while her progressive state of inebriation is subtly realized. Things do get more explosive at the climax however, in a scene reminiscent of Pink Floyd’s The Wall concert, destined to be one of the most memorable moments at Super Nova. Moving Day is on tonight at 8 p.m. as part of Eastern Front Theatre’s Super Nova Theatre Festival at Dartmouth’s Alderney Landing Theatre. For more information go to www.easternfront.ns.ca ( scooke@herald.ca) SuperNova - Day 2 A Truly Moving Day submitted by Kate Watson, THE COAST WEEKLY May 03, 2008 | 10:51 AM If you are a woman over forty, I urge you to pick up the phone and book tickets for one of this weekend's performances of Cathy Elliot's funny and touching Moving Day. That's not to say that this show will not be entertaining to men or younger people, it 's just that she so brilliantly captures the plight of the middle-aged woman that I think the seats should be filled with the people who will be inspired and fired up by it. Although the story is set in the sixties when women had fewer choices than today, she speaks to anyone who has ever felt over-looked or taken for granted. Her clever uses of everyday objects are delightful, and her robust singing voice is a pleasure to listen to. Get your bums in those seats! Performance of a lifetime for Cathy Elliott in Moving Day Article by Jennifer Jaensch Cathy Elliott delivers the performance of a lifetime – literally – in her one-woman musical, Moving Day, making its World Premiere now through April 22nd with Talk Is Free Theatre in Barrie. To say this emotionally charged one-act journey is 'moving' is both obvious and an understatement. More than twenty years in the making, this 90-minute musical marathon is the culmination of Elliott's personal and professional life, the story, music and lyrics all written and performed by Elliott. 1969 - One small step for womankind At first glance, Moving Day is a sentimental journey down memory lane. It's July 20, 1969 and as man prepares to land on the moon, this turns out to be just one small step for womankind. Set on the threshold of the Women's Liberation movement, Elliott delves deep into her personal experience and family history to create what is ultimately a universal story of love, strength, courage and personal growth. Stepping loosely into her mother's shoes in the role of Sharon, Elliott captures the bitter despair of an intelligent, creative and seemingly trapped housewife. Space and Distance and Isolation Alone in front of a towering wall of boxes, we see Sharon packing the last of her family's belongings away in preparation for yet another move as husband John has been transferred once again. He and the teenaged kids Pete and Amy are already on the road (with the television set) and Sharon is alone, digging through the past one box at a time in search of the radio so she can at least listen to the historic moon landing. The theme of space soon becomes one of distance as Sharon 'celebrates' this latest 'fresh start' with more than a few drinks. Drinking and thinking, the everyday sentiments of children growing up too fast and time passing by too quickly give way to a deeper, darker pain, an isolation and loneliness intensified by the inability to make friends or feel a part of any community as move after move continuously uprooted the family. Dream after dream gave way to the bitter pill of reality, a pill best chased away with a good stiff drink – even if it meant embarrassing her family in public. As lies and fantasies replace the harshness of reality, Sharon finds herself 'orbiting' her family from afar, and wonders how to reconnect. A fight with her husband over the telephone prompts Sharon to make ‘The Best Move Yet’, downing a bottle of pills with the last of her booze before packing herself away in a box to die. Crashing into this desperate turn of events is Godzilla Lady – a startling manifestation of that inner strength that pushes all of us to go on – no matter what. Warmth, Humour and Understanding drive captivating performance Despite the fact that Moving Day takes place more than thirty years ago, Elliott paints a picture that is sadly far too recognizable even today. In what is clearly a heartfelt tribute to her own mother, Elliott recognizes the resilience and potential inside all women. She does it with warmth, humour and a tender understanding that holds the audience captive from start to finish. A fresh and easy listening score runs the stylistic gamut along with the emotional content; achieving a good balance between upbeat, up-tempo melodies and belt-it-all-out blues, and edgy, powerful and dark songs. Backing her throughout are Konrad Pluta, Musical Director and pianist and Aaron Solomon, percussionist. Both add back-up vocals as well, yet their unobtrusive presence contributes something more, something intangible, as they manage to interact with Elliott despite the 'home alone' premise. The songs themselves are an integral part of the journey – the lyrics like poetry at times, and almost always metaphoric. While it's more typical for books to be re-written for the stage, this play would be a pleasure to read, there is so much thought put into each word and phrase you want to linger over each carefully selected syllable. 'Weird, Wild ride' you can't help but cheer on! |
 | "Fireweeds: Women of the Yukon is a feminist musical. In fact,
it's an ass-kickin', tear-jerkin', history-tellin' satisfying episodic
musical about women who live in the dark six months a year and survive
-- no, thrive -- to tell about it." -Joanne Huffa, Eye Magazine "It's refreshing to be able to tell you about a songwriter who doesn't shrink from warm, open melodies and who is able to match them with succinct lyrics that mix the sugar of poetry with the spice of reality. That's what you get in the work of Cathy Elliott." -Richard Ouzounain, Toronto Star "No doubt about it: In spinning a musical tale of the Yukon, playwright/composer Cathy Elliott has unearthed a few nuggets...there's good music here--thoughtful lyrics and a whole grab-bag of tunes, all served up with enthusiasm under the musical direction of Noreen Waibel." - John Coulbourn, Toronto Sun |
| FIREWEEDS: WOMEN OF THE YUKON Written by Cathy Elliott. Directed by Laurel Smith. Featuring Julain Molnar, Jill Hayman, Ann Bisch. To Oct. 7. $18-$23. Canadian Stage Upstairs, 26 Berkeley. 368-3110 **** (four stars) Fireweeds: Women of the Yukon is a feminist musical. In fact, it's an ass-kickin', tear-jerkin', history-tellin' satisfying episodic musical about women who live in the dark six months a year and survive -- no, thrive -- to tell about it. Produced by Burning Passions Theatre (a company committed to telling women's stories), Fireweeds succeeds where many other musicals fail: in the songs. Playwright/composer Cathy Elliott has created almost 30 of them to tell the stories of almost as many Yukon women, past and present. While their primary function is to provide the narrative, the songs are more than merely text with musical accompaniment. Some are really catchy; all have strong melodies. The first act -- set during the Klondike gold rush -- is particularly well-suited to these folksy piano-and-violin compositions (played by Jeannie Wyse and Jon Pilatzke respectively). Songs like "Heaven Help the Girl" and the twice-reprised "An Age Ago" manage to evoke both the times and the individual stories. With about 20 characters telling as many stories, actors Jill Hayman, Ann Bisch and Julain Molnar are put to work. Not only do they manage to bring individuality to every persona, they excel at it. Especially striking is Molnar, perhaps the most magnetic personality I've seen on a Toronto stage. Graceful and striking, she lends her characters -- from Belinda, the Irish washerwoman who makes a fortune, to Donna, a contemporary Yukoner who loses her stubborn husband to the unrelenting cold -- an engaging inner strength. In bringing so many women's stories to life onstage, Elliott naturally raises some interesting political and social issues. But more provocative, in the end, than the topics Elliott tackles (unions, Katie Carmack and her half-breed child, dancehall girls) are questions raised by the clash of past and present social attitudes. In Act 1, Elliott presents pioneering women -- women who create their own destinies by leaving their families in hopes of staking a claim in the world and who (in "Heaven Help the Girl") rail against fading away or getting lost in the shuffle. But in Act 2, most of the characters sing of their lives in relation to the men around them -- men who have died, cheated on them, lost their jobs. That's not to say that these women aren't as interesting or as fierce as their ancestors -- in their own ways, they are. But they also show that, while we like to think we're so much more socio-politically advanced than previous generations, we haven't come that far at all. -- JOANNE HUFFA, Eye Magazine |