The Short & Sweet of Short Story Long

Short Story Long, is written and directed by Joel Fishbane of Montreal’s Pumpkin Theatre and stars Stéphanie Breton and Stefanie Buxton. At MainLine Theatre, 3997 St. Laurent, to May 17. Drama. 75 minutes.

As the winter theatre season gives way to the spring sprint to Montreal’s summer festival season there are a surprising amount of new independent productions still opening; not wanting to let go of what has been for most a very long and hard winter with plenty of deep snow in a deep well developed theatre season. Mainline is no exception and is warming up after a dark and cold winter season of suicides, murders and abuse, so dress in layers, or run the risk of either being hot or chilly.

The Play is the story of a widow who discovers that her now dead author husband, a famous Montreal writer Lincoln Kennedy, has left his literary legacy to another woman. He’s left his worldly goods and funds to his wife Julianne (Stefanie Buxton) but all his writing and the copyrights are left to an anonymous person with the initials  “AK” we know as Amalthea King (Stephanie Breton) a former lover of his who shows up to ask the wife not to contest the will. The twist at the end is justified by the plot and may not come as a surprise to most.

What matters here is the clever repartee written by Fishbane for the two characters he has created. Understanding and writing for the female when you’re a male writer is always a challenge. If I may be so bold as to add especially if he’s a heterosexual. Women writers are assumed to have a natural insight into the male mind but when one of our ‘men’ take on the task of writing women’s roles we usually steps back and examine more in detail. They (the female characters) can’t be too ‘bitchy’ or too ‘emasculating’ or too ‘sluttish’ or too ‘feminist’ or too passive. The women in Fishbane’s Short Story Long do not come across as too much of any of the above.

The two characters are brilliantly portrayed by both Stefanie and Stephanie B’s. The pacing is quick and the dialogue is fired rapidly throughout the first part of the one act Play. Although I found this quick pace started to drag around the middle of the Play and it then started to pick up but never quiet got back on tract in the later part however overall most of the direction and interpretations were up to the demands of the material.

Having seen a number of Fishbane’s Plays which he has both written and directed; one can’t help but wonder if and when he’ll allow a producer/director to take on his work and add another perspective and vision to the production. Is it a control or insecurity factor? I guess we’ll just have to wait and see. It is refreshing however that Pumpkin Theatre continues to produce both original and entertaining theatre and that represents our Montreal talent in a positive light.
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