The 39 Steps

Student Matinees:
October 6, 2010 at 1pm

Student tickets $15
Teacher tickets $10

Suitable for grades 7 & up

Mix a Hitchcock masterpiece with a juicy spy novel, add a dash of Monty Python and you have a fast-paced whodunit for anyone who loves the magic of theatre! This 2-time Tony and Drama Desk Award-winning treat is packed with nonstop laughs, over 150 characters (played by a ridiculously talented cast of four), an on-stage plane crash, handcuffs, missing fingers and some good old-fashioned romance! A man with a boring life meets a woman with a thick accent who says she's a spy. When he takes her home, she is murdered. Soon, a mysterious organization called The 39 Steps is hot on the man's trail in a nationwide manhunt that climaxes in a death-defying finale! A riotous blend of virtuoso performances and wildly inventive stagecraft, The 39 Steps amounts to an unforgettable evening of pure pleasure!

Curriculum connections to: TBA

Educating Rita

Student Matinees:
November 3, 2010 at 1pm

Student tickets $15
Teacher tickets $10

Suitable for grades 9 & up

British playwright Willy Russell's hit, Educating Rita, like his blockbuster, Shirley Valentine, is a perennial theatrical gem that refuses to wane in popularity. Winner of the Best Comedy Award in London's West End, and made into a mega hit movie starring Julie Walters and Michael Caine, Educating Rita is a winner. Rita crashes into Dr. Frank Bryant's life wanting an education, although she has no idea what it is that she's asking. Her brash sincerity earns the respect of the doctor who has previously resigned himself to a life of empty lectures and booze. Rita's character is a breath of fresh air for Bryant and he begins to care about someone, or something for that matter, for the first time since his wife left him. As each begins to wake up to life in their own way, the story comes to a close as an inspiring tale of self discovery and of the power choice that comes through education.

Curriculum connections to: TBA

Dinner With Friends

Student Matinees:
March 2, 2011 at 1pm

Student tickets $15
Teacher tickets $10

Suitable for grades 9 & up

This remarkable play won Margulies the Pulitzer Prize. His work mixes humor with the pain of human existence and creates an evening of theatre that makes one laugh while one weeps at the human condition. It is a vital and vivid piece about communication and relationships. Dinner With Friends examines and illuminates the relationships between husbands and wives, men and women, friends and couples. It questions the validity of the family as we in North America know it, and in a beautifully understated final scene, makes us wonder if the bonds we use to form family and friendships are simply desperate attempts to cover the gaping void of isolation. It is a powerful play, both charged and humorous. It is also the winner of the Outer Critics Circle Award for Best Off-Broadway Play, the Lucille Lortel Award for Outstanding Off-Broadway Play, the Dramatists Guild/Hull-Warriner Award, and the American Theatre Critics Association New Play Award . To make this production even more special, Theatre Aquarius is proud to announce that Joyce DeWitt (from television's Three's Company) will be starring in this contemporary masterpiece!

Curriculum connections to: TBA

For This Moment Alone

Student Matinees:
April 6, 2011 at 1pm

Student tickets $15
Teacher tickets $10

Suitable for grades 9 & up

For This Moment Alone is a new Canadian play making it's World Premiere at Theatre Aquarius! Based on a true story, it asks, how far would you go to save a life? What do you consider the boundaries of family? Do we have the right to judge a person who has survived through hell? When Freddy arrives in Toronto from post-war Europe to reunite with his sister Ruth and other members of the Goldfarb family, it sets off a family crisis. As they each struggle to let go of the past and embrace life, they have to determine how much they are willing to forgive, where the truth lies and how to survive as a family. The title is a Talmudic reference to the hope that exists for humanity. When a person does a good deed that (s)he doesn't need to do, God looks down and says, "for this moment alone it was worth creating the world".

Curriculum connections to: Literature, History, Drama

Buddy: The Buddy Holly Story

Student Matinees:
May 4 & 11, 2010 at 1pm

Student tickets $15
Teacher tickets $10

Suitable for grades 6 & up

On February 3^rd, 1959, at age 22, the man who changed the face of popular music tragically died in a plane crash. Now, Buddy – The Buddy Holly Story shows us he became the world's top recording artist in a production that features over 20 of Buddy Holly's greatest hits including Peggy Sue, That'll Be The Day, Oh Boy, Not Fade Away, Everyday, Rave On, Maybe Baby, Raining In My Heart, Ritchie Valens' La Bamba, and the Big Bopper's Chantilly Lace. Over 20 million people around the world have come to see Buddy and now, at last it is here in Hamilton! The young man with glasses whose musical career spanned an all-too-brief period has enjoyed a longevity that was denied him in 1959.

Curriculum connections to: Drama, Media, and Music

A Christmas Carol

Student Matinees:
December 2, 2010 at 1pm
December 8, 9 & 16, 2010 at 11am

Student tickets $15
Teacher tickets $10

Suitable for grades 3 & up

Called by The New York Times "a tonic for adults, and for children a transfixing journey," this spectacular musical extravaganza ran for ten years at Madison Square Garden, complete with falling snow, exuberant dances, flying ghosts and the streets, graveyards, homes and buildings of Dickensian London. This "A Christmas Carol" retains its emotional power and pure joy, thanks to the marvelously-told story by Ockrent and Ahrens, and the Menken/Ahrens score filled with beautiful melodies and emotional lyrics. In fact, their song A Place Called Home has become a holiday standard.

Curriculum connections to: Drama, Dance, Music, & Social Studies