John Muggleton values twists and plausibility in theatre
John Muggleton’s An Act of Grace closed at the Ottawa Little Theatre on June 29, but a shortened version will play at the Edinburgh Fringe in August.
Photo: Alexa MacKie
John Muggleton values twists and plausibility in theatre
By Alexa MacKie
Before John Muggleton became a playwright, he was a dissatisfied Ottawa theatregoer.
“I was sort of dissatisfied with these local plays that were just not possible, and yet they were being presented as a possible situation,” he said. “You’ve got to give the audience a story with a possible element to it. It can’t be impossible or silly. That’s just lazy writing.”
Muggleton gave an example of a show whose title he can’t remember (“Something like, Babble, but it wasn’t Babble.”) He recalls the play took place inside a fake police station, and the plot centred on a scheme to murder a father in front of his son.
Muggleton listed the plot details he found implausible: leasing a New York building to execute the murder plan and finding extras and police cars to make the location believable, among them.
“How can you present that story as, ‘Oh, never mind the details. It’s all about the trap’?” he said. “That’s not respecting the audience. You’ve got to explain everything.”
As an actor, director and playwright with experience in Ottawa, Toronto and Edinburgh, Muggleton wants to ensure his work is believable.
Muggleton and I spoke for 90 minutes before the closing performance of An Act of Grace. The play ran at the Ottawa Little Theatre from June 12 to 29, and a shortened version is slated for the Edinburgh Festival Fringe August 2 to 24.
“There’s no social message,” Muggleton said about the play. “There’s enough finger wagging and social messaging at other theatres. I just want people to have a good time.”
If the closing night audience’s laughter and gasps at plot twists were any indication, An Act of Grace is both a playful comedy and a suspenseful thriller. We follow Chuck (Kurt Shantz) and Tony (Christian Giansante) who are lured to the home of a wealthy widow named Grace (Venetia Lawless). The plot moves at a breakneck pace as the actors stumble about and cut each other off.
In spite of the whirlwind plot, Muggleton insisted, “Everything is backed up and everything is explained.”
Chuck and Tony are tricked into Grace’s plot to plan her own murder. Muggleton’s writing shuts down plot holes, as Lawless elegantly delivers her character’s monologues, highlighting Grace’s plan:
“It’s a challenge to play a character that’s the bad one, but it’s also quite fun,” Lawless said. “Playing with the twists and turns of the plot is really appealing, because we’re taking the audience on a ride.”
“It’s a real honour to play these words John crafted. I have the utmost respect for him as a playwright.”
Lawless will reprise her role in Edinburgh, along with Shantz and Giansante, with Lindsay Laviolette remaining as director. Laviolette worked on previous iterations of An Act of Grace and Burn, Muggleton’s first play that’s been staged in theatres around the world.
Laviolette said it’s “gratifying” to bring Muggleton’s work to life for a receptive audience.
“I would often sit at the back of the house and just listen to people mumble or murmur as they’re reacting to things,” she said. “That’s something really special, because it means the script and the show are landing for John.”
That landing is what Muggleton said he looks for, hoping that his work sticks for what he calls the “drive-home conversation.”
“I like characters pushed into a corner where they see very little way out. I want the audience to think, ‘What would I do in that situation?’”
“Just enjoy the play,” he added. “There’s a place for pure, silly entertainment.”
Muggleton keeps to his “art-should-be-fun” philosophy as artistic director and teacher at the Ottawa Acting Studio.
“We’re going to have fun,” he said he tells his nervous acting students.
“If you fall in love with acting, you want to do it more. Then, you want to get better at it. That’s the biggest change you see.”
Muggleton opened the Glebe studio in October 2023. Classes for acting in film, theatre, comedy and improv run throughout the week, with the occasional playwriting course.
“I just make sure that people have a good class,” he said, adding that afternoon classes for seniors generate a social network of participants getting together post-lesson.
Ultimately, Muggleton said he feels enriched when he witnesses his students’ growth. He shared a recent anecdote where one of his students called him, crying for happiness, because she was cast in a Kanata Theatre play.
“It happens all the time,” he said. “It’s a very enriching experience to see first-hand.”
Alexa MacKie is a third-year journalism and law honours student at Carleton University, and Glebe Collegiate Institute graduate. She is the 2024 recipient of the Anne Donaldson Memorial Scholarship for excellence in community journalism.
