Ruth Leon recommends… Casey and Diana – Stratford Ontario Shakespeare Festival
Ruth Leon recommendsCasey and Diana – Stratford Ontario Shakespeare Festival
Rent £3.91 for three days.
The Stratford Shakespeare Festival in Ontario, Canada, now has a website which allows both purchase and rentals of their plays. It’s work trawling the site as there are a number of fine productions, which may never make it over the border, not to mention the Atlantic, that are worth our attention.
One of those came to my attention because it was reviewed positively in an otherwise scathing review of the dramatic and theatrical ways in which Princess Diana has been portrayed and exploited since her death. This made me track it down and I’m delighted to share it with you as well as the website where it lives.
My dear Canadian friend Sheena alerted me to this strong play. She reminds me that AIDS is on the upswing again because so many young people don’t know what happened in the 80s and they are taking terrible risks. Casey and Dianamay serve as a wakeup call for some of them. The play is based on a true story about a real event.
It is set in the Toronto AIDS hospice, Casey House, as it prepares for the historic visit of Diana, Princess of Wales, in 1991, residents and staff are inspired to beat the odds as a plague continues to ravage a generation.
This potent and moving drama by Nick Green, which was commissioned by the Stratford Festival, vividly captures a moment in time when a rebel Princess, alongside less famous caregivers and advocates, reshaped the course of a pandemic—and how those stricken by the virus found hard-won dignity, community and love in the face of astonishing hardship.
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