The first week of the 81st annual Kiwanis Speech and Arts Festival winds up Saturday with the fourth Annual Musical Theatre Showcase at the Yates Centre.

“It’s gone very well,” said Executive Director Carole Roberts, who is calling it quits after six years at the helm of the long running local festival, which features close to 5,000 young performers including members of bands and choirs.

“We’re always looking for ways to bring people in,” said Roberts, adding the Musical Theatre Showcase is a recent addition to the festival designed to highlight the plethora of fantastic musical theatre entrants.

“We’ve seen a handful of people  who aren’t related to anybody performing, just coming just for pure enjoyment,” she added, noting everybody is welcome to come and listen to Lethbridge’s up and coming talent performing at the festival.

Lethbridge‘s gay and lesbian community will be coming out to entertain you, April 1 at the David Spinks Theatre for the eight annual Pretty, Witty and Gay cabaret.
“It’s a gay themed theatre cabaret that celebrates sexual diversity,” described organizer  Jay Whitehead.

“And gender identity,” added co-organizer Génevievé Paré, who is excited about being involved with her second Pretty, Witty and Gay, which she has had to juggle with  performing  the role of the Duke of Buckingham in the university’s production of Shakespeare’s Richard III.

“We have over 10-15 different acts of a wide scope from theatrical, comedy, musical and dramatic acts,”  she continued.

“This year we will also be having confessionals or testimonials. Members of the community have the opportunity to share their stories about coming about them and their families,” Whitehead added, noting  Lethbridge has a significant gay population.

“It’s hard to say. When I moved to Lethbridge and started this in 2004, they didn’t have much of a voice at all but they are starting to be heard. Lethbridge has an annual pride  event now and the university has a  very active gay and lesbian club. I’d say relative to our population it’s comparable to most cities,” Whitehead observed.

“The community is starting to see that we’re a contributing part of the community,” he added.

While reading Shakespeare can be a challenge, seeing it performed on stage is a pleasure.

Whether it is performed successfully or not— a lot of that depends on the cast. It is a daunting play and it’s a tragedy so pretty much everybody dies in it. It is also tough to follow the intrigue and the devious scheming.
Luckily the 30 some cast members  of The University of Lethbridge’s production make their production of  the dark, deadly and devious tragedy of Richard III, really shine.

Stephen Iremonger is scary as the sociopathic Richard III , murdering and scheming his way to the throne, but managed to evoke a few laughs from the attentive crowd during the play’s opening, March 22 at  University Theatre.
He is no less matched by Génevievé Paré as  the Duke of Buckingham, who helps him scheme his way to the top.

Paré, who  did a great job with New West’s charming production of Munsch back in December, proves herself equally adept at drama as she is at children’s theatre.
The whole cast shines, be it Queen Margaret (Gail Hanrahan)’s crazy ranting and invoking curses or the  humour and conscience of Richard III’s two murderers, played with relish by Kelly Roberts and  Lindie Last.

Particularly New West Theatre veteran Roberts, who  has a crisis of conscience about murdering  Duke of Clarence (Mark Spracklin) I wanted to see more of their interplay, but alas, it was not to be. The same goes for  Spracklin, whose performance of Clarence was immediately touching. I missed him when he was gone.