What happens when Oceans 11 meets Mission Impossible meets Cirque du Soleil? The Arts Club Theatre Company’s season opener Heist, now playing at the Stanley, until Oct. 18.
This is a glitzy, high-tech, stunt-filled, fast-paced, whodunit crime drama that fuses cinema and theatre and will keep you on the edge of your seat until the reveal. Techno geeks, this one is for you.
Written by Calgary ophthalmologist Arun Lakra, the play evolved from a 2022 Bloomington Playwright’s Project, directed by Chad Rabinovitz, titled Fortunato Heist (a reference to Edgar Allan Poe’s short story The Cask of Amontillado – see if you can figure out the connection). The present version had its Canadian premiere in Calgary in 2024 and is now running on various stages throughout North America.
The Mission: Steal the Kakkaua ruby from an impenetrable art gallery.
The Team: Marvin (Charlie Gallant) as the Mastermind is the boss. He narrates the story with an authentic-sounding Irish accent as he assembles a crew of specialists to help him pull off the mission. Each member of the team has a particular skill that is highlighted as they are introduced to the audience. There is Angie (Alexandra Lainfiesta) as Mary Lou, whose acrobatic skills are needed to get around the lasers protecting the ruby; Kruger (Andrew McNee) as Popeye, the gun-toting muscle man with a hair-trigger temper (not the sharpest knife in the drawer); Fiona (Jennifer Tong), the computer geek who runs the techno part of the scheme; and Ryan (Tainui Kuru), codename, “the Gilligan,” a wealthy charmer along for the thrill of it all.
The Heist (Act I): Angie defies gravity as she is lowered upside down by wires from the roof over the laser-guarded glass case containing the ruby. Using claw-like pincers she hits the mark. Yet, something goes wrong and the gang’s euphoria is short-lived – the ruby is a fake. This leads to mistrust and suspicions as to who betrayed the group. To ferret out the double-crosser, a second, even bigger heist is planned.
The Second Heist (Act II): The goal is to liberate the Satoshi diamond from the home of ruthless international jewel thief, “the Spider” (formidable local veteran Patty Allan). How can the crew pull off the deed? Cue more lasers, code-cracking and manipulations.
The storyline uses flashbacks to previous days to drop clues as to what is ultimately going to happen. One moment you’re watching action-packed scenes on a movie theatre screen. The next, the actors take to the stage in real time. The cinema shots include a swimming pool scene and a helicopter escape – all locally filmed. It is a twisting and turning rollercoaster ride that challenges the audience to figure out who did what to whom and why.
The Show: The acting is terrific and the production values sublime. As you enter the theatre, you are welcomed by a blueprint-like grid running along the back wall of the stage with assorted tiles representing a bomb, a diamond, wire cutters, a keypad, gold bars – all to get you in the mood for the caper. The tiled letters move at lightning speed to form different words until stopping at the word “Fortunato.” In Act II, the back board morphs from the blueprint to a web with the final word stopping at “Tarantula.”
It takes a lot of behind the scenes work to make this production possible: Ryan Cormack’s stark set design, Wladimiro A. Woyno Rodriquez’s projections, Sophie Tang’s evocative lighting, Malcolm Dow’s music, Peter Boulanger’s fly-system and rigging, and Barbara Clayden’s costumes. There are drones, lasers, high-wire performances and much more. This is an ensemble piece combining the talents of the creative team and the actors, all under the watchful eye of director Andrew Kushnir.
The Finale: See the show to find out. One hint, “the end changes the beginning.”
Caper clichés aside – and there are some over-the-top moments in the script – this is a refreshing take on the genre. Performances should sell out so get your tickets soon. Go to artsclub.com or call the box office at 604-687-1644.
Tova Kornfeld is a Vancouver freelance writer and lawyer.
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More from Arts Club …
The Arts Club Theatre Company presents two shows opening this month that are directed by members of the Jewish community, and have other Jewish connections.
Josh Epstein directs Dracula: A Comedy of Terrors, written by Gordon Greenberg and Steve Rosen, which runs Oct. 22-Nov. 15 at the Lindsay Family Stage at Granville Island. Kat Sandler directs Big Stuff, which she co-created with writers and actors Matt Baram and Naomi Snieckus, for its Oct. 14-Nov. 1 run at the Olympic Village Stage at the BMO Theatre Centre.
Everyone knows the story of Dracula: a vampiric count, a kidnapped young lady and a brave hero to save the day. But, this time around, the hero’s a coward, the lady yearns for adventure and the count is … a cake-baking dreamboat? This adaptation of the gothic classic turns the tale on its head but never loses track of its heart – that’s where the stake goes, after all.
“Following the tremendous audience response to The Play That Goes Wrong, we are thrilled to have Josh Epstein directing this ambitious, physical and deeply ensemble-driven comedy,” said Arts Club’s artistic director Ashlie Corcoran. “Audiences are invited to come along for the ride of an imaginative, mischievous and wonderfully unexpected night at the theatre rooted in a familiar tale. This show celebrates what actors can do when they come together as an ensemble and shows us the simple, powerful fun of live theatre.”
Dracula: A Comedy of Terrors premiered Off-Broadway in 2023 and has since entertained audiences in productions across North America and in London, where it has been praised as a “fantastic high-camp spoof.” Inspired by Mel Brooks and Monty Python, the Arts Club production – presented with Concord Theatricals on behalf of Samuel French, Inc. – sees Kate Besworth, Steffanie Davis, Jeff Meadows, Vincent Tong and Synthia Yusuf portray more than a dozen characters through gender-bending casting, physical comedy and carefully orchestrated anarchy.
The Arts Club Theatre Company’s presentation of Big Stuff comes fresh from the work’s sold-out run at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, where it won the International Fringe Encore Series Edinburgh Prize.
Using their singular brand of improvised storytelling, shaped by time at the Second City and comedy clubs worldwide, Baram and Snieckus, in Big Stuff, debate the sentimental power of the objects our loved ones leave behind. She wants to keep everything. He wants to throw it all away. This two-hander transforms questions of clutter, memory and loss into a fast-moving comedy about relationships, grief and what we choose to carry with us.
Tickets to both Dracula: A Comedy of Terrors and Big Stuff (starting at $29) are available from artsclub.com or 604-687-1644.
– Courtesy Arts Club Theatre Company
