Can art carry the baggage we put on it today?
Playing Shylock is a quick-witted and poignant one-man play that has been embraced by Toronto audiences and the Canadian media in its sold-out run at Canadian Stage.
The play opens as Saul Rubinek, playing a version of himself, walks on stage after intermission and announces to the audience that The Merchant of Venicehas been cancelleddue to a backlash the theatre can ill afford. Rattled, Saul shares his disappointment, what inhabiting the role of Shylock means to him personally, and his questions about the role of the artist and the theatre in today’s culturally fractured age. Saul asks us… “Can we share our common humanity if a hashtag, #Cancel Merchant, disables us from sharing our stories, our history, ourselves?”
Playing Shylock was captured at the end of its sold-out run at Canadian Stage in Toronto.
The Team:
Produced by Vérité Films (Corner Gas, the Governor General’s Performing Arts Awards) and Starvox Entertainment (Van Gogh Exhibit). Virginia Thompson (Vérité Films) and Corey Ross (Starvox) are Producers. The film is directed by Robert de Lint (Corner Gas, Kim’s Convenience, InSecurity, the Governor General’s Performing Arts Awards) in association with Martin Kinch. Written by Mark Leiren-Young.
Reviews for Playing Shylock:
“Rubinek is simply magnetic… “Playing Shylock” reaches beyond Rubinek’s personal desires and biography to meditate directly on the purpose and challenge of art itself.”
“One of the most provocative and urgent shows of the year.”
“Impossible to ignore.”
“Theatre is consistently poised on a precipice where we worry that things will shut down because people care too little, or things will shut down because people care too much. In the nexus between those two states sits Saul Rubinek.”