Orphans for the Czar
A Crow's Theatre Production
Written by George F. Walker
Directed by Tanja Jacobs
90 Minutes (no intermission)
The reviews are in and ORPHANS FOR THE CZAR is a hit!
Mar 29, 2022 - Apr 24, 2022
Guloien Theatre
Read the Globe and Mail "Critic's Pick" review HERE.
A child left to his own devices becomes a man without an anchor.
Orphans For the Czar, George F. Walker
ORPHANS FOR THE CZAR, George F. Walker’s newest high-stakes comedy, ruefully exposes the duplicity, revenge, and self-interest at the core of a culture about to go up in flames. Suggested by the novel The Life of a Useless Man by Maxim Gorky and set shortly before Bloody Sunday in St. Petersburg, a hapless double agent tries to stay on the right side of both the revolutionaries and the czarists.
Our protagonist, the orphaned fool Vasley, leaves his impoverished village to work in his uncle’s bookstore in the city. He becomes engrossed by the women, the intelligentsia, the spies, and all their conflicting ideologies. A comedy of pathos about the fragility of people in unstable times, ORPHANS FOR THE CZAR is also a plea for the possibility of decency.
George F. Walker is one of Canada’s most prolific, decorated, and popular playwrights. Since beginning his theatre career in the early 1970s, Walker has written more than 30 plays, including Suburban Motel, Love and Anger, and Nothing Sacred. His plays have been translated into more than ten languages and have received many hundreds of productions around the world.
Director Tanja Jacobs has appeared with Porte Parole and Crow’s Theatre in Seeds, The Watershed, and The Assembly and has directed George Bernard Shaw’s Getting Married at the Shaw Festival, Twelfth Night at Canadian Stage, and the ferocious comedy La Bête at Soulpepper.
Read a compelling new interview with George F. Walker HERE.
Read a conversation between playwright George F. Walker and director Tanja Jacobs HERE.