Photo: Bellrockers as they might have been 150 years ago

On September 17 the village of Bellrock was transformed and appeared closer to what it resembled 150 years ago as residents dressed in petticoated frocks, pocket watch-bearing vests and top hats mingled amongst horse drawn carriages and wagons to celebrate and share the village’s rich 150-year history.

Local dignitaries gathered for the opening ceremony, which began with Central Frontenac town crier Paddy O'Connor followed by addresses by various representatives from the township of South Frontenac including Deputy Mayor Mark Tinlin and Councillors Alan McPhail and John McDougall, as well as Central Frontenac mayor Janet Gutowski.

Event coordinator and longtime Bellrock resident Virginia Lavin organized the plethora of events, which included local artisans and vendors, and tractor wagon tours highlighting many of Bellrock’s historic sights.

Tour-goers learned about the old Bellrock Mill, built in the mid 1800s (the present building dates back to the 1920s), which is one of the few mills in Eastern Ontario that included a saw, plane, veneer, flour and grist mill, all under a single roof. Among the more famous items produced at the mill were Red River cereal and round veneer cheeses boxes; the latter were made until 1965 when cheese factories declined. Bellrock’s cheese factory burned down in 1943. The planing and saw mill were in operation until the 1970s. Visitors were also shown the old Gonu house, where an old Victorian woman’s leather boot and an oval charcoal portrait of an unknown young female were recently unearthed from within a wall.

Dolphine Dowker’s barn was pointed out as a rare example of the old log structures originally built in the village long ago. Tourists were also offered a 1 km drive down the road to one of Canada's first ever organic farms, Blue Roof Farm, where owner, award-winning artist Kim Ondaatje and Verona resident Louise Day held a photography show.

On an outdoor stage the Fred Brown Band played old time favorites, and later on excerpts of well-known literary works by one time Bellrock resident authors Michael Ondaatje, Karen Holmes, Stan Dragland and John Moss were read by local area wordsmiths.

Winners of the Bellrock story prize, chosen from over 50 entries by students at St. Charles Public School in Verona were also announced. First place was John McIlroy; 2nd Cailey Cotnam; and 3rd Destiny Ritchie; Honorable mentions were Jack Revell and an unknown author.

Not surprisingly local history buffs bee-lined to the Bellrock community hall where a rich display of village history was laid out, much of it by well known collector and private museum owner Lois Grant, who has been collecting village artifacts and lore since she moved to the area 41 years ago. Also on display was a written history of Bellrock edited by Lois and written by May Meeks who at 90 is one of, if not the oldest living historian in Bellrock. May spoke about her early years as a student at the old school and she recalled some of her fondest memories, which included swimming and skating the mill pond, and one particular snowless winter freeze that allowed her and friends to skate all the way from Moscow to Enterprise.

I later found out that event organizer Virginia Lavin was a long-time friend of famed author Matt Cohen and quite possibly the woman who inspired the main character of his famed 1999 Governor General award-winning novel “Elizabeth and After”.

For Lavin, Saturday was indeed a day to celebrate: “The opportunity comes around not very often and you can trust that we won’t be around to celebrate the next 150 years, so yes, today is a very special day and a great opportunity to celebrate the beauty and history of this very special place."

The event was part of an ongoing effort to raise funds to renovate the community hall. Residents and non-residents who are interested in assisting with fundraising events, making a donation and/or helping reach the final goal of establishing the Bellrock Schoolhouse Theatre can contact Virginia Lavin at 613-374-2344.

The next meeting at the hall will take place Tuesday October 4 at 7:30 PM and everyone is welcome to attend. Thanks to all of the students who entered their stories in the competition and below is a list of the winners:

One hundred and fifty years later the question remains.

The hamlet of Bellrock is currently home to 63 people, according to Virginia Lavin, one of the key organizers of the 150th Bellrock anniversary celebrations, which are slated for Saturday, September 17.

Bellrock, located just west of Verona, was once a thriving mill town and trading centre in its own right, and its location on the Napanee River was instrumental both in its commercial past and the fact that it remains one of the prettiest spots in Frontenac and L&A Counties.

“It used to be a very active place for French, English and First Nations traders,” said Virginia Lavin, “and at one time the river’s name was bilingual. It was known as Deep Eau, which later was anglicized to Depot River before being named the Napanee River.” The name Depot has survived as the name of a number of feeder lakes in the region, including 2nd and 5th Depot Lakes.

“But what we do not know is the origin of the name Bellrock. It too could be anglicized from the French ‘belle’, but we don’t know,” said Lavin.

While there are three local historians who will be conducting tours as part of next Saturday’s festivities, the origin of Bellrock may be revealed by some younger community members. Students at Prince Charles School are taking part in a story writing contest this week about how Bellrock got its name, so there will be an answer to the 150-year-old question, though it might not be a historically accurate answer.

But perhaps taking literary license in explaining the name of the place is fitting in Bellrock’s case, since the hamlet has been employed by some of Canada’s literary heavyweights, and this literary history will be the subject of evening readings that will be one of the highlights of the anniversary celebrations.

Fred Colwell will be reading from “The Skin of the Lion” the book that made Michael Ondaatje famous and was the prequel to his subsequent novel “the English Patient”. The latter won the world’s most prestigious annual prize for fiction in English, the Booker, in 1992.

Patrick Lewis, the protagonist in “In the Skin of the Lion” comes from “Depot Creek” a logging and milling town where youngsters would skate on frozen ponds lit by burning cattails.

As well, some of the works by the late author Matt Cohen, will be read by Wayne Grady, a well known Kingston-based author in his own right. Both Cohen and Ondaatje lived in the vicinity of Bellrock and used the historical village in their fiction. Helen Humphreys will be reading from Stan Dragland’s “The Drowned Lands”, and Merilyn Simonds and Jennifer Bennett will also be contributing readings.

The anniversary celebration will start with opening ceremonies at 12:30 p.m. at the Bellrock Hall, located in the converted Bellrock schoolhouse. Any funds raised at the event will go towards ongoing renovations to the schoolhouse/hall, which has received a boost with a $67,000 Trillium grant to cover some of the needed upgrades.

After the ceremonies, Ron Moyer, Doris Ritchie and Lynn Hutchison will present historical tours of the village.

Artisan booths, including weavers and spinners, a soapmaker, blacksmith, rug hookers, fiber arts, herbalist, books, and preserves of jams, jellies will all be featured in the park area outside the hall. There will also be historical displays, including butter churning, sauerkaut making, and more.

There will be games for children, including the kinds that would have been common 150 years ago: three-legged races, sack races, egg toss, etc., in addition to hay rides.

All events throughout the day are free, and there will be a canteen on site as well.

At 4pm the winner of the “How Bellrock got its Name” contest will be announced, and at 5pm a pulled pork supper will be served, at a cost of $10 for adults and $5 for children, followed by the free readings by local authors that were referred to above.

In order to raise money, aside from accepting donations, a raffle is being held, with prizes that include a $100 food basket from Local Family Farms, an outdoor fireplace from the Verona Hardware store, and donated locally-made pottery. Raffle tickets and dinner tickets are available at Local Family Farms. For further information, call Virginia Lavin at 613-374-2344

The weather could not have been better for this year’s Blue Skies Arts Camp, which took place in Clarendon July 22-25. The 52 campers who attended this year enjoyed a number of creative activities including dance, drama, choir, band, graphic design and animation and costume and prop making.

Campers had a chance to showcase their new found talents and skills at the Friday Showcase event on the Blue Skies main stage. The showcase included band, dance and choir numbers plus a dramatic production titled This Land is Our Land, a fashion show and much more. First-time camp director Susan Walker, who has been working with Blue Skies in the Community since 1987 and who has been the camp liaison for the last five years, said she was pleased with how the camp worked this summer.

“It was excellent. We had great weather and exceptional instructors and counselors this year which made for a very memorable and enjoyable time all around.”

New this year at camp was a plethora of yummy snacks from local farmer Janet Ducharme, owner of Johnston Lake Organic’s, who provided farm fresh snacks to campers and staff daily. Every morning a fresh delivery of home baked treats, bread, fresh fruits and veggies and other comestibles helped provide local organic food energy to campers.

Kids love puppets and theatre and it was with that in mind that volunteers from the community, many of whom are veterans of the North Frontenac Little Theatre (NFLT), developed a summer puppet theatre workshop for kids of all ages. The program, called the North Frontenac Little Theatre Puppetry Program, was developed as a pilot project by Derek Redmond, Michel Alarcon and Kathy King with the assistance of Rob Moore, Roseanna Redmond and Pam Giroux, and the organizers hope to see it continue into the future.

The participants, which included nine local children of all ages, spent three days at the little white church in Tichborne, which is the home of the North Frontenac Little Theatre, creating puppets, designing sets and writing a puppet play that they will be performing on July 27.

The theme of the workshop centers around Tichborne's local train history and on the first day, which was July 13, local historian Lois Webster informed the participants about the history of the former train station in Tichborne and other buildings there. Following that visit the volunteers assisted the kids in making the puppets, which will be the main characters in the puppet show.

On the second workshop day, July 20, I visited the church and found the young participants busy finishing their puppets, designing the set, which includes one very cool and colourful cardboard train, and also writing the script of the play, which is a railroad story centered around summer cottagers taking the train to their cottages in Tichborne. The colourful puppets include one train engineer, a conductor, a passenger, a hobo, a dog, and a cow. According to Michel Alarcon, one of the program’s developers, the aim of the program was to engage children more in theatre arts. “Puppetry is a very magical thing that kids (and adults) can really relate to and this is another creative way that kids can take part in the theatre arts.” Alarcon said that he and his team are also hoping to offer a program in puppetry at the NFLT for adults as well.

Judging by the joyful buzz in the quaint little church on the day that I visited, it looks as though the program is definitely meeting its goals. “The kids are having a great time and we are hoping that this program becomes an ongoing one offered through the NFLT, with future workshops to take place in the spring and summer next year,” Alarcon said. The program has also come to the attention of members of council at the Township of Central Frontenac and organizers are hoping to be able to secure some funding to help develop ongoing puppetry theatre programs both for adults and children at the NFLT.

For those who love puppets and theatre, a one time performance of the play will take place at the NFLT's home in Tichborne on Saturday July 27 at 1:30PM.

In a testament to the fact that Herb Alpert and Herman’s Hermits never go out of style, the Classic Theatre Festival’s season opener on July 13 at 8 pm will be a celebration of 1966, complete with classic cars of the era, an opportunity to dance “The Freddie” and the “Hanky Panky,” and to enjoy the Neil Simon comedy “The Star-Spangled Girl,” set in San Francisco during the middle of that turbulent decade.

“With each opening of one of our shows, we try and take the audience back to the time period in which the play is set, to give them a sense of the look, feel, and sound of the era,” explains Festival Artistic Producer Laurel Smith. “With this show, it is an era that is recognizable to a lot of people because it is during the middle of the rock and roll renaissance, combined with the rapidly changing mores of youth culture, with all the passions and commitments that entails.”

Based this summer at the Full Circle Theatre at 26 Craig Street, the Festival’s opening night will feature a 1966 Thunderbird owned by Barry Splaine and a 1966 Austin-Healey convertible owned by Mike Maloney, among other vehicles expected to be on display.

“When you see these cars, you really get a sense of the style of the mid-60s, and these are the kinds of cars that were on the road a lot when our characters were ‘doing their thing,’” Smith explains.

“The Star-Spangled Girl” is the story of Andy and Norman, two free-thinking magazine writers who are dedicated to changing the world, a not uncommon trait of the 60s generation. Their apartment features a banner that reads “A Remedy for a Sick Society,” a tribute to their magazine, “Fallout,” which analyzes the problems of society and seeks solutions. Their walls are also adorned with icons of the era from actors Julie Christie and Anouk Aimee to pictures of Martin Luther King, Jr., and folk singer Joan Baez.

Close friends since high school, Andy and Norman (played by actors Trevor Pease and Richard Gélinas) eke out a living in an apartment whose rent is perpetually late (something they get away with because Andy ‘entertains’ the outrageous landlady downstairs). Their lives are turned upside down when a conservative southern belle moves in next door, the inimitable Sophie Rauchsmeyer (played by returning Festival actor Kate Gordon). Engaged to a U.S. marine, and dedicated to the red, white and blue, Sophie sets off sparks both romantic and otherwise, as issues such as social change, patriotism and the nature of love are played out.

In typical Neil Simon style, the writing is sharp and funny, the characters inherently lovable, and the story one that could apply to our current daily lives. Indeed, Simon’s show, written almost 50 years ago, could just as easily apply today to the Americans’ red state-blue state divide, in which conservatives and liberals continue to duke it out in elections and congressional debates.

The show’s director, Laurel Smith, reminds audiences that ultimately, the play is about the power of love to transcend differences, a valuable lesson in uncertain times.

“The Star-Spangled Girl,” sponsored by TVCogeco, runs until August 4, Wednesday-Saturday at 8 pm, with 2 pm matinees each Wednesday, Saturday and Sunday. Each matinee is preceded by a 1:30pm pre-show talk under the trees at the back of the theatre. Folks looking for a bargain can buy a season pass: by purchasing one regular ticket to “The Star-Spangled Girl”, they will receive a 25% discount off the season’s second show, a comedy of madcap marital mayhem, “The Marriage-Go-Round” (running August 9-September 1).

The Festival gratefully acknowledges the support of its season sponsor, Best Western Plus Perth Parkside Inn and Spa, as well as Ottawa Woman Publishing, WPBS, and the Ontario Tourism Event Marketing Partnership Program.

Tickets are available at www.classictheatre.ca and 1-877-283-1283.

The Bellrock Schoolhouse Theatre production of the topsy-turvy melodrama, “The Great Ice Cream Scheme” tickled not just the taste buds but also the funny bones of theatre goers at its four-show run. Three of the shows were completely sold out, proving that the Bellrock Schoolhouse Theatre is definitely making waves in community theatre.

The play, directed by melodrama hit man Doug MacIntyre who also directed “Here Come The Cows” in October, was a delicious, old-fashioned romp through the trials and tribulations of the proprietors, staff and regular customers of Pop Sicle's Ice Cream Parlour after Pop’s famous recipe comes to the attention of two evil villains out to build their own ice cream empire.

The play opened with newcomers to the community and stage, Jane and Ian McKay, who played Etta Lotta Spumoni and Alex de Spoon, two ravenous ice cream eaters whose love for one another was even greater than their ice cream appetites. Their very funny and punny one liners set the tone for this over the top sweet toothed caper.

The cast, many of whom are veterans to the stage, included Cody Steeves who effectively played the romantic, likeable and innocent young hero, Robin Baskins, and Joelle Parr, who played Marsha Mallow, the innocent young waitress and Robin's love interest with freshness, finesse and a bit of pluck.

Dick Miller and Connie Shibley were perfectly cast as the villainous ne’er-do-wells, I.C. Custard the evil plot hatcher and Parfait Deluxe, his klutzy ex-chorus girl sidekick, whose endless scheming gave the play its momentum. Other notable performances included Kathy King as the ever twirling, happy-go-lucky Candy Sprinkles, and her love interest Walt Nutz played with aplomb by Michel Alarcon. The two brought the house down with their behind the counter love antics, which left them as red-faced as maraschino cherries. Everyone got a taste of the latter at the intermission.

Debbie Lingen played Nana Peel to great effect as the brains and common sensical go to of the bunch and Brian Robertson's portrayal of Pop was perfect in all of his teeth-chattering and odd-tick, old-timer charm.

Much of the humor came from the zany, old-fashioned language in which the script was written and in the abundant physical comedy that took place on stage, especially between the villains and their oh-so innocent victims. John Stevens brought forth the script’s "play within a play" element as the stage hand who keeps entering the action, preferring to act alongside the cast members rather than just move the props around.

As in any good melodrama, the script also invited audience participation. The audience was encouraged to boo the villains and applaud the heroes, and early on some unsuspecting female audience members were asked to offer up their most evil chortles. The stage looked great thanks to Director Doug, Howard Hutcheson and Peter Platenius and was all pastel colors with ice cream-themed paintings, cloth-clad tables and chairs and one broken freezer door that was a key feature in the plot’s unfolding. The props, especially the biggest ice cream sundae likely ever to grace a stage, was courtesy of prop master Judy Goodwin. The costumes, which were designed and created by Debbie Lovegrove, also made the play a visual treat, and featured a wide array of parlour whites and aprons, pretty dresses and decorative head gear like Parfait's beautifully fruit studded hat. And like all great melodramas this one ends up with the heroes saving the day while the villains are left to face the consequences of their evil shenanigans.

Mention should also be made of the theatre’s latest acquisition of brand new stage lights, tables, comfy chairs and a new water system - all thanks to a grant from the Frontenac CFDC. New stage flooring was also purchased and it will soon be installed. It is because of the committed work of the members of the Bellrock Community Association along with a very talented community of crew and cast that the Bellrock Schoolhouse Theatre has become a hot spot for local theatre and other worthwhile community events. For more details about upcoming events visit www.BellRockhall.ca.

If they were ever called down to the office at Sydenham High School this year, you can bet that it wasn't for bad behavior. Both Jacob Sharpe and Jesse Bell returned for their 5th victory lap at SHS this year, primarily for a chance to be a part of the school’s 2013 drama production. Little did they know that due to Bill C-115, it would be they alone producing, directing, and designing the sets. They acted as well in the 14-member cast of the drama production, which ran from May 23-25.

The show was Norm Foster's ribald comedy “Office Hour's”, whose six separate and cleverly connected office scenes tell of the wild, irreverent and highly comedic lives of 4 memorable characters, each caught in their own stormy, controversial and very funny family, romantic, business and professional relationships at the office. Sharpe and Browne had much more work than they should have had to do, and so they do have the official bragging rights for this production, which was a highly entertaining, visually attractive and downright professional piece of high school theatre.

The two were met more than halfway by a very talented cast, many of whom were younger students and newbies to the stage, but who (as I found out later) found their voices and stage legs through the leadership and unbridled enthusiasm of Sharpe and Bell.

Every single member of the cast not only nailed their lines but also delivered them with highly believable comedic mastery. In scene one it was Fleet Brown who set the bar as the disillusioned, down and out, and very soon to fall further TV news reporter Warren Kimble, who was threatened with firing by his sexy but showing-no-mercy producer Pam (Taylor Drake), who ruled the stage and Warren with her firm voice and red-heeled stomp of disapproval.

Owen Orser was convincing and physically hilarious as the small time, lovable, well-meaning but easily swayed and misdirected film producer Gordon Blaine, who took the side of the increasingly tipsy and highly derivative Hollywood director (Connor Beyers), who made a comedic splash with his apish and addled ideas for the next big cinematic hit.

Bryar Vuyk shone as the lying, never faithful but still charismatic and charming husband of the deservedly frustrated and furious Ellie (Leah Gurrl), who wants so much to believe his lies and alibis but cannot due to explicit photos of his philandering shenanigans.

Sharpe and Bell played to great comic effect side by side in Scene four, a very funny family drama with Bell as the cartoonishly overbearing Rhonda, mother of Richard (Sharpe) her soon-to-be-out gay son. The two were joined in the scene by stellar straight man Eric Gordon as Lloyd, the reserved and severely hen-pecked hubby of Rhonda, who in the end has his own little hidden secret to reveal.

In Scene five, race track owner Stan Thurber, played to perfection by Kody Thomson, who definitely knows a thing or two about how to deliver a comedic line, is forced to fire family friend, the overweight jockey Arthur Barnes, who was played with gusto by Gavin Colman and whose highly comedic last-ditch groveling for his job was a memorable highlight.

Bell and Sharpe both were pleased with the Friday night show that I attended. Both students discovered their love of theatre while at SHS and have worked together in many productions there. “Since we've been working together for the past five years we really understand our individual strengths and weaknesses,” Bell said when I spoke with them after the show.

Sharpe said Bell’s strengths are “his ability to work hands on with the actors and his incredible way of getting everyone pumped up and enthused about their roles on stage. He is especially great with the younger actors and made them feel very comfortable and confident.”

Of Sharpe's strengths Bell said, “No one understands the mind of a character like Jacob Sharpe. I may be able to motivate but he is the person that truly understood everything in this script-the jokes and all of the characters. He truly shaped and cultivated all of the actors on stage and his role was that of the traditional director.”

Each one agreed that they could not have done the job without the help of the other.

Where are these two talented students heading next September? Sharpe will be attending a special comedic writing course at Humber College and then plans to study theatre at Ryerson, while Bell plans to become a teacher and will be studying Concurrent Education at Queen's University. They both hope to meet up again sometime in the near future and to do more stage work together. If their production of Office Hours is any indication, it looks as though they both have very bright futures ahead of them, whether on and off the stage.

The Great Ice Cream Scheme, a play written by Billy St. John, tells the comedic tale of hero Robin Baskins and cold-hearted villain I.C. Custard and the attempts to steal the coveted ice cream recipe.

Custard's devious plan to steal the recipe involves hiring an accomplice, Parfait Deluxe, an ex-chorus girl and total klutz. Parfait is instructed to entice the recipe from Robin, but Robin has been smitten by Marsha Mallow, the sweet young waitress. The action is fast and furious...and hilarious. Employees getting trapped in a faulty freezer, a stage struck prop man, a rainbow of colourful characters and a funny fight sequence all make The Great Ice Cream Scheme a delicious show to sink your teeth into!

Audience members won’t be in any doubt of whom to boo or cheer for. There is interaction with the audience as I.C.Custard explains his evil intentions. The audience is encouraged to actively participate with their boos, hisses and hoorays.

Doug MacIntyre is directing this production. "I got hooked on melodramas about a year ago. I co-directed one in Arizona and wanted to try one on my own. The results were amazing. The best compliment came from the audience as they left the theatre saying "When is the next one?"

Doug is looking forward to having the play in Bellrock Schoolhouse Theatre. "The Bellrock Schoolhouse Theatre seats about 80 regular seats or about 50 dinner theatre seats, making it an intimate space. This is ideal for melodramas, which require audience participation and interaction."

The cast is a mix of newcomers and veterans. Connie Shibley and Dick Miller take on the roles of Parfait Deluxe, the villain’s klutzy sidekick and the villain I.C. Custard. The young lovers Marsha Mallow and Robin Baskins are played by Joelle Parr and Cody Steeves. Brian Robertson plays kind-hearted Pop Sicle and John Stephen plays Ernie, the misguided stagehand. Husband and wife team Jane and Ian MacKay play Etta Lotta Spumon and Alex de Spoon (patrons of the parlour). Rounding out the cast are Kathy King as Candy Sprinkles, Michel Alarcon as Walt Nutz (waitress and waiter) and Debbie Lingen as Nana Peel.

There will be three "Dinner Theatre" performances on Friday, June 7; Saturday, June 8; and Saturday, June 15 starting at 6 p.m. Tickets are $20. The meal will be a delicious ham dinner with all the fixings. Dessert, of course, is ice cream. There will also be a "Dessert" Matinee on Sunday, June 16. 2:30 pm. Tickets $12. Tickets are available at Verona Drug Mart, Local Family Farms, Verona Hardware and Asselstine Hardware.

The play will be held in the Bellrock Theatre, 6034 Leveque Rd., Bellrock. For ticket information, call 613-374-2344.
All proceeds from the play will go to support the Bellrock Hall.

The North Frontenac Little Theatre's "God of Carnage" is not for everyone. But for those wishing to delve beneath the surface of couple-dom, marriage and parenthood to find what dirt might be lurking there, the NFLT's production of Yasmina Reza's play was the ticket. While some regular North Frontenac Little Theatre goers may have been deterred by the first and third words in this play's title, for those who attended its four-show run at Sharbot Lake High School from May 2-5, God of Carnage proved a refreshingly rewarding and highly entertaining night out.

The play appears at first to be a jovial, simple and civil meeting of two respectable couples, Annette and Alan Raleigh (Martina Field and Robert Bell) in the upper class living room of Veronica and Michael Novak (Karen Steele and John Stephen), where the entire play unfolds. But very quickly the dialogue first meanders then dives head first into the uncharted waters of marital resentment, nastiness, and bitter couple-to-couple combat. The play was a serious undertaking for the entire four-member cast, with Reza's unrelenting, rapid fire dialogue never ceasing for a second, which forced the actors to rely on each other's cues more than might be necessary in productions with larger casts. But the small cast definitely rose to that challenge.

The premise for their meeting is a playground altercation between the couples' two 11-year-old sons, whom we never do meet. At first it seems that the Novaks and Raleighs will be able to agree on a plan for their sons' reconciliation but a blame game quickly makes mincemeat of that first initial try. At the door and about to leave, the Raleighs edge back for a second try over clafouti and coffee. The play is clever and much of its comedy lies in the fact that at every turn when a reconciliation seems imminent, bedlam ensues. Adding to the building tension throughout the play are the characters' touching on seemingly unrelated worldly issues and gender-based topics, which in fact demonstrate both couples' faults and flaws.

Reza's gift and what gives the play its momentum is her ability through the dialogue to pull the couples constantly back and forth between the point of resolution and all-out battle. Reza touches on the idea of hypocrisy in Veronica's case, as she curses out Annette after the latter succumbs to her growing nausea, and in what is the first great shock of the play's uncivil decorum, pukes all over Veronica's very expensive coffee table art books.

Later on, the gents insult each other's chosen lines of work, with the cell phone-dependent, high flying, holier than thou corporate Alan finding fault with Michael as a lowly seller of plumbing fixtures. Part of the fun of the play is the ever changing alliances that are struck between the men and women.

On the subject of gender issues, which is focused on more deeply and to great comic effect in the second act of the play, the gals get increasing tipsy and Annette, who is by far the more reserved and submissive of the two ladies (her husband calls her Woof Woof), lets down her guard and in disgust at her husband's incessant cell phone interruptions, grabs it and plunges it into a vase of tulips. Meanwhile the men join forces, finding comradeship in their love of their former childhood gangs. The bossy and demanding Veronica (Karen Steele) demonstrates the tension in their relationship with endless quibbling about trifles like cake recipes. Steele played the chatty and bossy Veronica with deftness, making her desire for control in her marriage and her love of conflict and one upmanship a delight to witness.

John Stephen was likely the most imaginably likeable of the four characters and he played Michael with a veteran actor's naturalness, every line ringing true.

Martina Field's spot on portrayal of the neurotic, timid and finally drunken Annette was highly comedic and her shredding of the lovely tulips near the play's end was a delightful shock to witness.

And last but not least, kudos to first time performer Robert Bell, who created a wholly unlikeable and pompous Alan and whose biggest challenge was managing the multiple cell phone conversations that occurred throughout the play. Kudos also to Kelli Bell, who must have had a great time not only directing her husband but also tackling a very dense and subtle script.

The stage looked sharp and very civil thanks to Donna Larocque and Peter Platenius, who created the sets and Jeff Siamon, who lit it. Those who missed the play can see the movie version of the play, called simply “Carnage”, directed by bad boy Roman Polanski and starring Jodie Foster, Kate Winslet, Christopher Waltz and John C. Reilly.

Since it was first produced in English on Broadway in 2009, “God of Carnage” has been an unlikely hit. It's about two couples who meet at one of their houses to talk about their sons, 11-year-old boys who got into a fight after school. Although it is not referred to by any of the characters, there is an underlying sense that the conflict that spurs the action in the play is something that would only be important in a modern context, and only among a specific social class.

What the play is really about is how the thin veneer of civility can be broken down between and among the two couples. While “Carnage” is a comedic romp through the wasteland of modern marriage, the interactions between the characters ring true. Although we laugh, it is not always comfortable laughter, perhaps because the characters are a bit too much like us. “God of Carnage” is the final North Frontenac Little Theatre production at the Sharbot Lake High School Cafetorium. It stars well-known NFLT actors Karen Steele, John Stephen and Martina Field, and introduces Rob Bell as Alan. Directed by Kelli Bell. “Carnage” runs from Thursday to Sunday. See the ad on page 2 for details.