When the curtain raises and spotlight shines, two protagonists will take the centre stage and weave a magical tale of life, death and everything in-between.
In Bean & Hat, a family- and LGBTQIA+-friendly clown play, New West queer playwright Katie Gartlan-Close builds a world of wonder and curiosity, and ponders the bigger questions of life through best friends who explore what it means to live, die, and grow up.
The audience will witness a world without gender through protagonists Bean and Hat, who conjure up magical worlds in their attic, where their dreams become reality and death is a scary but beautiful unknown. A curious and emotional Bean (played by Rhyan McCorkindale) joins Hat (played by Geneva Perkins), who takes life more seriously, in exploring simple human desires, gender fluidity and expression through dark comedy.
In a conversation with the Record, Gartlan-Close expressed that the play was written as a result of her questioning her own life’s deeper meanings.
“The world can be such an overwhelming and scary place … and there's so much going on politically,” she said. “And I think, 'What can I do?' 'What's my place in all of this?' So I keep coming back to these themes because I have to remind myself every day to enjoy the little things and stay curious about the world.
“In that I'm always asking questions about, 'Can I can I live out my dreams?' And what it means for people I love to move on or die…. I’m always thinking about it.”
While the inspiration for the story came from her own curiosity about life, the show, it also owes a lot to her desire to combine clowning and physical theatre with a structured scripting process, she said. She added that, contrary to popular belief, clowning is not always “party clowns with giant shoes and red noses” or the scary “Pennywise from IT."
Clowning technique used in the play, she explained, comes from an original Canadian style of clowning from Richard Pochinko. “[The actors] walk just like everybody else…the epicentre of clowning is the heart of humanity and exploring all of the human emotions,” she said.
The 75-minute play, written and co-produced by Katie Gartlan-Close, co-produced by Olivia Etey and directed by Davey Samuel Calderon, will play at the Cultch, Vancouver Culture Lab from Wednesday, April 12 to Sunday, April 16.
A ten-minute version of Bean & Hat debuted in 2019 at Vancouver’s Pull Festival, and Gartlan-Close hopes that everyone can come out to see the characters come to life and have a great time — laugh and explore the reflection of their own life and things that matter to them through the characters who have themselves gone through growth.
“I hope they kind of walk away, noticing little things that they might not have noticed on their way to the theatre,” she said. “Maybe they noticed the flowers blooming on the grass that they didn't see before or maybe they connect with the person that they came to the theatre with in a different way.”
Bean & Hat — live theatre performance
Where: Cultch Theatre’s Culture Lab, Vancouver (1895 Venables St.)
When: April 12 to 15; 7:30 p.m.; April 15 & 16 2 p.m.
Cost: Tickets are available at the door or in advance. Tickets are priced from $15 to $40. For more information about the play and tickets, visit website.
