A Child’s Christmas in Wales at the GCTC

Rachel Eugster and Nicholas Amott invite you to this warm family show!

Photo: Chelsey Fawcett

By Eleanor Crowder

A Child’s Christmas in Wales & Carol Sing is playing the Great Canadian Theatre Company (GCTC) from December 7 to 21.

This warm hug of a show asks, “What makes Christmas for you?” Is it the crinkle of wrapping paper carefully muffled late on Christmas Eve? Is it the tang of pine? Snow over your ankles along the canal path? Dough with cinnamon and ginger in a kitchen full of busy cousins?

For me, the essential ingredient has always been carollers. My first lonely Christmas away from home was redeemed by a village choir under the windows of a tiny cold-water flat in the Schwarzwald. Just when I felt ineffably far from everyone who knew me, there they were, treble boys and warmly wrapped basses singing words I did not know, but deep snow and familiar music made for such joy!

If you have lived in the Glebe for a while, you’ll have encountered the young actors and families of Shakespeare Camp as Sing for Snowsuits travelled Bank Street on the final Friday before Christmas. Maybe you too dug generously in your pocket to help keep kids warm. We had 20 years of carolling and warm hugs! And then came COVID!

Bear & Co. is a collective of actors. That first winter of no contact, of elderly folks tucked inside for months, children afraid of strangers, not even able to read each other’s smiles, we struggled! We all did! Our remedy: solo, we came to your driveways, cloaked, masked, lantern in hand in the dark and the snow. Our actors sang with you, from porches, doorways, letting the old music lift us. It made Christmas for us all.

Now we can invite you openly to share that joy! This year, Bear & Co. presents Dylan Thomas’ classic tale of childhood wonder, followed by an invitation to sing along in a feast of favourite carols. Inside! In the warmth of the studio theatre at GCTC’s home at Wellington and Holland.

Rachel Eugster and Nicholas D. Amott transport you to Thomas’ snowy Welsh hills. You may know the actors from summer Shakespeare rehearsals in the Firemen’s Park. Rachel also directs with the Tamir Neshama Choir for developmentally delayed adults, and she co-hosts the Blue Vote Café podcast for Democrats Abroad with David Schellenberg. Nicholas is The BIG Voice from Little Shop of Horrors. Join them at GCTC Studio for the magic of Dylan Thomas and the pure pleasure of celebrating the holidays together. Tickets and showtimes available at gctc.ca/shows.

Eleanor Crowder directs the show. This year she is also directing The Drowsy Chaperone with a cast of 30 for GNAG Theatre.