28 — North Shore News - Friday, January 21, 2000 The B For the Pleasure of Seeing Her Again, to Feb. 13 at the Stanley Theatre. Layne Christensen News Reporter lchristensen@nsnews.cont INTERVIEWING Nicola Cavendish, it is easy to imagine the North Van actor on stage. Articulate and animated, confident and coherent, she carries a conversation ard off rs insight into a character close to her heart. Cavendish stars, Jong with Muitrcaicr Dennis O°Connor, in the national touring production of Michel Tremblay’s For the Pleasure of Seeing Her Again. The critically acclaimed play is a co- production of Montreal's Centaur Theatre Company and Toronto's Canadian Stage Company. The play opened Wednesday in Vancouver for a month-long run at the Arts Club Theatre Co.'s Stanley Theatre. Since making its debut in Montreal last year, just weeks fol- Jowing irs French debur, the English-language version of the play has consistently earned Cavendish and O°Connor standing ova- tions. For the Pleasure of Seeing Her is the latest offering from Canada’s best-known playwight. The play is a tribute to his mother. Tremblay wrote the part of Nana, his mother, for French-Canadian actor Rita Lafontaine, who starred in the origi- nal French production, Encore une fois, si vous le permetres, In the English language version of the play, Cavendish has made the character of Nana her own. While not entirely likable — “she’s not all nice this woman, at all,” says the 47-year-old North Shore actor — Nana is recogniz- able, a kind of everywoman. “I can recognize myself in that woman. I can recognize my mother. I can recognize other people around me in this woman,” says Cavendish. “She’s very recognizable for her posi- tive attributes and her not so likable qualities.” Cavendish praises translator Linda Gaboriau for preserving the integrity of the character through its translation into English. “I think the English production achieves a kind of truth and honesty,” says the actor. . In accepting the role of Nana, Cavendish made a long-term commitment to the play — a full neo years from the play’s devel- opment in the fall of °98 to the rour’s final show dates in Washington, D.C. next November. But much like it was with Shirley Valentine 10 years before, Cavendish knew that this was a career-defining role. “1 thought to myself, here’s a play that’s going to be with me for a long me,” she says. “You land a role that is so well written it touches people, many people. It’s an honour to be in a play chat has such good writing.” If theatre is about anything, it’s about connecting in a really substantial, emotional way with your audience, says Cavendish. “Te’s net just about entertainment. It’s also about what is being conveyed, what is being touched upon. I think there’s a + ne phote Lydia Pawelsk NICOLA Cavendish stars with Dennis O’Cornor in Canadian playwright Michet Tremblay’s For the Pleasure of Seeing Her Again at the Stanley Theatre. ry big recognition factor in this piece of writing. Even though it’s coming from a French-Canadian culture, it’s universal in its theme — it’s about mothers. And it’s also about mothers and sons.” Cavendish describes Tremblay as a fovely, gentle man. “He's very vulnerable. He's a man who had a very strong mother and many, many aunts and women around him — big women with loud voices. But if anything it gave him a sense of the dis- tance one ought to Keep from women — a wide distance that would allow him to observe.” For the Pleasure of Seeing her Again ruas to Feb. 13 at Vancouver's Stanley Theatre. Tickets are $29 to S41 with discounts for students and seniors. Phone ihe theatre box affice at 687-1644 for tickets and information. ' Let us send your old eyeglasses to the developing world. Bj OPERATION EYESIGHT UNIVERSAL 1-800-585-8265 Saving & Investing. EL SE EE EE EL SEE, pianning for Read about Tij Musgrave movie in the works NORTH Vancouver- based Voyageur Film Capital Corp. and its subsidiary Cadence Entertainment Inc. announced Wednesday the acquisition of the life story rights for a feature “biopic” of Susan Musgrave. The film project is a co- production with Raincoast Storylines Ltd. Based on the life story of the renowned Western Canadian poet, the biopic explores one woman's fasci- nation with good words and dangerous men. According to press mater- ial released earlier this week, “Ie’s a rollicking love story about one of Canada’s most provocative poets and ane of North America’s most noto- rious bank robbers — the EBI says Stephen Reid and his partners (a.k.a. The Stopwatch Gang) hit more than 100 banks and stole roughly $15 million — with- out firing a shot.” The biopic is to be penned by Jerry Thompson, whose interest in the project came as a result of his work on CBC-TV's Life Gm Times biography of the couple, pro- duced in January 1999. Raincoast Storylines is the company Thompson runs with producer and research director Bette Thompson and producer/composer Terence McKeown.