SHOWTIMES:
FRIDAY, MAY 17
1pm matinee
7:30pm evening show
Western Manitoba Centennial Auditorium
205 20th Street, Brandon, MB Friday, May 17 - 1:00pm Matinee @ 1:00PM (features a talk back with Marc A. Moir after the show)
Friday, May 17 - 7:30pm
Matinee @ 1:00PM (features a talk back with Marc A. Moir after the show)
Evening Show @ 7:30PM
Doors open 1 hour prior to the show.
This show is open to school groups – grades 7 and up from Westman are encouraged to attend! Please contact gm@wmca.ca for more information.
Padré X is the amazing true story of Canadian WWII Captain John Weir Foote: the only chaplain to win the Victoria Cross during the Second World War – a story that, until now, has never been told. This multi award-winning play has moved audiences from coast to coast, with critics calling Marc A. Moir’s powerful performance ‘a pure triumph’, ‘electric’, and ‘the most compelling acting you’ll see this year’.
Marc A. Moir is an award-winning Canadian playwright and actor from Winnipeg, Manitoba. Best known for his hit one man play “Padré X”, Marc has performed in more than 60 theatre and film productions – including work with the Royal Manitoba Theatre Centre and Prairie Theatre Exchange – and has appeared in theatres across Canada. Moir’s writing has been compared by critics to such theatre luminaries as Horton Foote and Ira Levin. He is the co-founder and co-artistic director of Looking Glass Theatre located in Steinbach, Manitoba. Marc also teaches university acting, directing and theatre history.
This one-man drama is poised to become one of the hits of the fringe. The moment the lights come up on Marc Moir as Chaplain John Weir Foote, we are transported back to the Second World War. Moir, clad in a genuine vintage 1940s army uniform, captures his audience’s attention with a deceptive ease, and holds it for all 90 minutes. His script (yes, he wrote it too) uses some clever devices to draw parallels between the present and the war years, as his character laments the fast-paced “today” (i.e. 1948) with the “innocent times” (pre-First World War) of childhood. His portrayal of Foote, his men (a company of British, Canadian and Scottish soldiers), and the enemy Germans under fire on the beaches of Dieppe will have you vividly seeing combat scenes. And his tearful, silent salute at the end of the story may be the single most striking moment of acting you’ll see at the fringe this year.
— Janice Sawka, Winnipeg Free Press
War, Padre X tells us, is “the closest thing to hell a human being can experience on this earth.” Actor and writer Marc Moir stares into that hell, and we along with him, in his true story of a Second World War chaplain whose two greatest obligations were to God and his fellow soldiers. At the centre of this compelling show is the catastrophic Allied invasion of Dieppe, where countless men lost their lives and Padre X discovered the meaning of his. Moir’s depiction of the chaplain from small-town Ontario is nuanced and satisfying, a mix of the decent men once portrayed by film actor Jimmy Stewart and the memorable cadences of CBC Radio storyteller Stuart McLean. Padre X’s story, like the legacy of the war, resonates deeply.
— Patrick Langston, Ottawa Citizen
Adult: $36.75
Senior: $36.75
Student: $13.75
Child (12 and under): $13.75
Prices include taxes and service charge.
Tickets available at the WMCA Box Office, or by calling (204) 728-9510