quinn222

But really, read this review and tell me how I'm going to manage to wait until Feb. 2007 for this???


The good news is Slings and Arrows is back for a third season.
The bad news is that this will be the final curtain for the fantastic Canadian series.
For those not acquainted with the series, it's a funny, sharp backstage look at the misadventures of the fictional New Burbage Theatre Festival.
This season, the festival finds itself in the unfamiliar position: It actually has money in its coffers.
However, being flush doesn't mean it's smooth sailing.
For starters, artistic director Geoffrey Tennant (Paul Gross) is under great pressure to follow up his hit production of Macbeth.
He decides on King Lear and casts an ageing, difficult actor (William Hutt) with a rather large secret as his lead.
Ofcourse, the stresses of the production weigh on Geoffrey and soon his ghostly former mentor, the very much dead Oliver Wells (Stephen Ouimette), returns to Geoffrey's life. But this time he, too, is an emotional wreck as he desperately tries to figure out a way to "cross-over."
As for Geoffrey's lover Ellen (Martha Burns), well, she continues to look out for No. 1.
If that isn't enough drama, the classical-oriented festival has expanded its program to include musicals.
And,in a matter of art imitating life, Don McKellar and Bob Martin -- the Tony Award-winning co-authors of the Broadway hit The Drowsy Chaperone-- play a major part in this series.
Martin is the series co-writer,along with Susan Coyne and Mark McKinney, who also play Richard and Anna, respectively. McKellar offers up a hilarious, campy turn as Darren Nichols, the egomaniacal director who has been brought in to helm the festival's commercial feel-good musical East Hastings. Nothing says entertainment like song and dance numbers about crack heads.
"I must admit, I have fallen in love with the musical genre," says the poncy Nichols. "It's the art for the common man. If you want to communicate something to the proletariat cover it in sequins and makeit sing. It's noisy vulgar and utterly meaningless. I love it."
Of course, the drama company members do not warm too easily to the idea of a musical in their serious midst.
"What do you do on the first day of musical theatre rehearsal?" drama actor Paul (Aaron Abrams) disdainfully asks.
"I don't know, get all gay," says Sophie, played by the enchanting Sarah Polley.
While the whole cast is in fine form, Gross is absolutely engaging as the beleaguered Geoffrey. He delivers a character that has the ability to make you feel uneasy but, at the same time, encourages you to root for him.
Directed by Peter Wellington, Slings and Arrows is one of those rare TV gems that avoids today's standard smoke and mirrors to deliver the comedy goods, all the while artfully managing to stay just on this side of the line that separates clever parody from hackneyed stereotypes.
It's just a shame that this run will be it's last.

dgee@png.canwest.com
Catch Dana Gee on The Morning News on Global Fridays at 8:45 a.m. and on Jack-FM's Larry & Willy Mondays at 7:15 a.m.