A while ago, I was reading the New York Times arts section and I came across something amazing. A write up of a play preformed by a cast of young adults that sounded fascinating, vibrant and wonderful called Once and For All We’re Gonna Tell You Who We Are So Shut Up and Listen (yes, it’s a mouthful). I immediately thought “I must see this show!” but it was showing in New York and closing on that Sunday and I was going to have to miss it. Then in what I guessed was to be a futile attempt, I searched the play’s title and Toronto on Google and then HARK it was coming to Toronto in a month for its final run at the Harborfront. Well, I made it out and saw it and I wanted to post some thoughts.
The show is like nothing you’ve seen. From when you get into the theater and are handed a pin showing a hand giving the middle finger to when the lights go up, it is a surprising and enlightening experience. The play is basically a series of variations on one scene, recess and one question what happens when kids are free to play featuring a chorus line of adolescents. After the first time we see this scene, it is repeated again and again with the addition of various elements: sex, drugs, absence, ballet, anger, fulfillment. It has a fierce energy featuring a pumping soundtrack (the theater literally shook).
The day after I saw the play I was eating lunch at my school when I saw two kids fiercely dancing around with a leopard skin blanket. I smiled and thought back to a scene in the play where the same thing pretty much happened and I thought “for better or for worse, this show got it. This IS what its like. Down to the last detail. Everything is invoked” It was worth shutting up and listening for what I learned from (finally) seeing a truthful representation of adolescence.
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