Embrace your inner theatre kid with these performance podcasts
If video killed the radio star, then podcasts sparked a resurrection of audio storytelling. From the stage to your ears, we're taking a trip to the theatre this week and putting live performance podcasts in the limelight.
Even in a pandemic, the show must go on. Social distancing temporarily put a pause on live events, but arts workers used the opportunity to get creative. We'll hear part of the play "Cast Iron," a co-production between Toronto's Factory Theatre and Obsidian Theatre Company. It follows the story of a Barbadian woman who is haunted by the ghosts of her past. This version was produced just for audio, with sound effects performed live by a Foley artist.
Plus: you may know Tony Shaloub from his work in film and TV, but we'll hear his comedic turn as a clam in therapy to work up the courage to come out of his shell. In the tragic vein, we've got a snippet of playwright David Yee's "Carried Away on the Crest of a Wave." It weaves together nine different stories of the deadliest known tsunami in human history.
Let's get this show on the road!
Podcasts featured this week:
Playing On Air: The Clam by Amanda Quaid: After a lifetime of playing it safe, a wistful clam (Tony Shalhoub) decides to come out of his shell with help from a therapist (Kristine Nielsen). His friends are disappearing without a trace, he's lost touch with thousands of his children, and he's desperate for a pearl to call his own. Alternately tongue-in-cheek and deeply identifiable, THE CLAM is a comedy for anyone who's ever felt adrift in their search for happiness.
Cast Iron by Lisa Codrington: From the sun drenched cane fields of Barbados to the sub-zero temperatures of Winnipeg, Cast Iron follows Libya Atwell, a Bajan immigrant, as she wields acerbic wit and humour in an attempt to appease the ghosts of her past. Alone in her Winnipeg nursing home, Libya receives an unexpected visitor from Barbados. Past repression resurfaces, until the tragedy that shaped her life spills from her soul.
Listen To This Presents The Wrong Bashir: Bashir Ladha—wayward philosophy major leaning towards nihilism—has accidentally been selected to assume an important religious position and his parents have dutifully accepted on his behalf. Family conflict ensues over Bashir's reaction to his appointment. As the doorbell rings and several unexpected visitors turn up at the Ladha door, the family is taken on a comedic intergenerational ride that forces them to grapple with long-avoided questions of identity and family.
PlayME: Carried Away On the Crest of a Wave: In 2004, the deadliest tsunami in recorded history tore through over a dozen countries around the Indian Ocean. In a series of vignettes, David Yee imagines the people left behind in disaster's wake: the ripples extend far below the surface of the earth as two men endlessly fall down a hole.
Audiomoves: These short accessible podcasts are designed to encourage children to move, dance and use their imagination with a screen-free activity.
What live performance podcast do you think deserves a standing ovation? Email, tweet us @PodcastPlaylist, or find us on Facebook.
For more great podcasts, check out CBC's podcast portal, subscribe in Apple Podcasts.