Credit: Tim Matheson
Historic Theatre at the Cultch to April 6, 2025
Tickets from $29 at 604-251-1363 or www.thecultch.com
Posted April 2, 2025
There is an abiding sweetness to Niall McNeil’s Beauty and the Beast: My Life. I cannot think of another word to better describe this highly imaginative revisioning of the old folktale. Especially in Act 1, during which McNeil follows fairly closely the plot of Disney’s 2017 film, there is an innocence, a kind of gentle, quirky, whimsy; even Billy Marchenski (as the Beast) doesn’t seem all that scary. Just a guy making faces the way we used to do in the mirror when we were kids.
Act 2 goes deeper, strays from the original story and begins to explore the way McNeil, who identifies himself as an artist with Down Syndrome, views himself in the world. The Beauty (Sophia Mai Wolfe) and the Beast do eventually get together but not without the help of a character called The Master (McNeil himself) pulling the strings. It is The Master – sometimes wearing a crown – that instructs the Beast to improve his table manners, to be a gentleman, to ask Beauty to dance.
Credit: Tim Matheson
Considering the title of this piece is Beauty and the Beast: My Life, I suspect McNeil is The Master in both the play and in his real life. Here is a trailblazing artist who has taken life as it was handed to him and forged a career in theatre, the visual arts, film and now as a director. Informing his life in the theatre were the early years spent at Caravan Theatre in Armstrong, BC where he was surrounded by unbridled, unleashed creativity – and all those horses, kids and dogs! Eating communally, creating theatre together on a huge grassy farm in the sunny BC Interior. For McNeil, Leaky Heaven Circus followed and, once again, there were no boundaries: no rules to follow, no ‘well-made play’ limitations. Out of these playful, liberating theatre experiences and surrounded and supported by his theatre ‘family’, McNeil crafted an expansive, artistic life for himself.
Credit: Tiim Matheson
McNeil’s artwork makes up part of the Beauty and the Beast set design (by Paula Viitanen): large, colourful paintings (with handles) that are ‘danced’ around by the performers. His lyrics have been put to music by composer Veda Hille and performed by musician June Mirochnick. McNeil is not only the playwright, he is also director, voice-over and performer. And because he himself is experiencing hearing loss, all the dialogue also appears as surtitles. A handout explains: “This is the first work in which he [McNeil] incorporates ASL into the language of the play. He uses both spoken English and ASL in ways that are intuitive and deeply personal.”
To say this Beauty and the Beast is like no other you’ve ever seen is an understatement. It’s not designed for children although the night I attended there were a couple of youngsters in the audience. For those of us who are neurotypical, McNeil opens a window on his world and his thought processes; it’s highly instructive for all of us to see just how far McNeil has pushed his personal boundaries.
Credit: Tim Matheson
Collaborators/performers in McNeil’s creative process are Billy Marchenski, Sophia Mai Wolfe, Kate Franklin and Peter Anderson – all of whom play multiple roles. Costumes by Christine Reimer and lighting design by Itai Erdal add immensely to the surreal, fairytale quality.
Most of all, I’m grateful to McNeil for inviting me into his world: “Writing is hard”, he says several times. “My original idea is to let the performers work in my different new way. It’s my first time being a director for The Cultch. My goal is to be the best of the hard work and story so the community can really see it.”
The Cultch invites you to “embrace his distinctive way of expressing himself and find the poetry within it.” I saw it. I embraced it. I found the poetry.