New Year's Eve in Toronto

New Year's Eve is not my favorite holiday. The end of one depressing year and the beginning of another hardly seems like cause to celebrate. Add to that the fact that for seven years of my life, New Year's Eve also represented the end of my theatre paycheck for the year, and a thrown together at the last minute cabaret in which I sat on stage acting like I was playing something meaningful. I have just never seen much cause to celebrate. Last year New Year's Eve happened when we were on tour, and the company arranged a party with free food and open bar. This year we were not so lucky. I guess since we had a Christmas party they decided not give us an organized New Year's party. What they did give us was transportation to and from Toronto because we ended up in Mississauga which is less than an hour away.

In usual fashion, I did some research and discovered that I could take public transportation into Toronto earlier than the company bus was taking the rest of the Wizard folk. I had a vague idea of seeing a show so I wanted to get in with as much time as possible. Plus I love Toronto so I wanted to just spend time in the city, and take some pictures.

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Well the pictures did not turn out very well. Not only was it foggy and rainy, I got in after the sun went down so none of my pictures turned out so well. Above is the CN Tower. I haven't been up in the Tower yet (it is a bit pricey), but it was fun to see it lit up.


As for the show, I was not totally sold on any one in particular. Jersey Boys was playing, but I had already seen it. The Toronto version of The Nutcracker did not have a performance that night plus I had just seen it in Chicago.


There was no way I was going to see The Sound of Music under any circumstance. So I had made up my mind that I would end up seeing The Toxic Avenger. Toxic is a show that just closed Off Broadway in New York, and I had passed on the opportunity to see it a couple of other times. So it felt right that I would see it in Toronto.


Well that is until I was walking down Yonge St. and passed the Canon Theatre. I knew that the tour of Fiddler on the Roof was also in Toronto so it was not a surprise when I saw the marquee. I also knew that the guy playing flute is a former IU student who studied with Kate Lukas my former teacher. She had told me about him when we played Bloomington. What I did not know was that Harvey Fierstein was playing Tevye. Under normal circumstances, I would rather shoot myself in the head than suffer through Fiddler of the Roof again having played 4 different productions over the years, but these were not normal circumstances. I felt like I should try to meet Mark, the flute player, and the thought of seeing Harvey Fierstein play Tevye was the deal maker. If there was ever something that would make we sit through that show again, it would be a really unconventional casting choice like Harvey Fierstein.
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I did actually meet Mark before the show, and I got to talk to him a bit afterwards. He seems like a very nice guy, and I think that we both learned a bit about touring from each other. Harvey was the best thing about the show. The woman playing Golde has been playing the role for many years and it showed. All the women were bland and uninspired. Some of the men were better, but overall the show seemed pretty tired. The orchestra sounded good, but I have both the flute book and clarinet book forever seared into my brain so I found myself listening to those parts more than the orchestra as a whole.

For me getting to see the Canon Theatre was the best part of the evening. Previously known as the Pantages Theatre, the Canon is where most of the long running shows play in Toronto. It is where The Phantom of the Opera, Beauty and the Beast, and Wicked amongst others have played. It is also one of the Toronto houses I have never seen. My on the sly picture above does not do the theatre justice. Maybe one day I'll play the Canon, and get to take pictures for real!

So then after the show, I was hoping to meet up with some others from the company to do the New Year's thing. Well since my phone does not work in Canada I had no way of contacting anyone, and my only real hope was to actually happen upon someone to hang out with. Well needless to say that did not happen. So I walked around a bit and at one point I saw people running down the sidewalks and turning onto a certain street. So naturally I followed them! It turns out that they were running to the square where the official Toronto New Year's festivities take place. I got there just as midnight occurred so I got to watch the fireworks. Thankfully I was on the edge of the crowd because I also got to get the heck out of there once it was over!

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With it being New Year's Eve I did feel the need to have a drink so I headed up to Church Street, and ended up at Woody's. After a couple of beers, it was time to catch the shuttle back to Mississauga. Perhaps it was not the most exciting New Year's ever, but after passing countless people yelling "Happy New Year" at the top of their lungs, and seeing paramedics cart off a person covered in their own vomit, perhaps it was better this way!