Good Monday!

I hope you all had a good weekend. I recently saw Theatre By the Bay’s new play, Bobbie, in Barrie (an hour north of Toronto). I wasn’t planning on writing a review for this show, namely because (a) I was super jet-lagged when I saw it (lol) and (b) one of the four actors in the play was out sick and director Lynn Weintraub had to perform in the play with script-in-hand, so it wasn’t really a typical performance. Nonetheless, I think you all should know about the subject of this play, Bobbie Rosenfeld, I think you should know about the lead actor, Olivia Daniels, and I’m trying to document all of my theatre adventures, so here we are.

Have you ever gone to a play and come out of it feeling like you’re better for seeing it? That’s how I felt with Bobbie. Bobbie tells the story of Fanny “Bobbie” Rosenfeld, a Jewish refugee whose family fled Russia during the pogroms (early 1900s) and settled in Barrie, Ontario. Bobbie went on to become one of the best Canadian athletes of all time, setting numerous records and winning Olympic medals in track and field, and winning major titles in hockey, softball, tennis and basketball. Bobbie was an unrivaled superstar, but due to anti-Semitism and sexism, she never achieved the accolades she deserved. Hey, I’m a part of the Canadian Jewish community, and even I didn’t know about her.

The play takes you through Bobbie’s life from her teenage years through her professional career, which is nothing short of awe-inspiring. Bobbie would enter new sports like a wrecking ball – with little practice, she would annihilate the competition and completely dominate. I would liken her performance to that of Simone Biles in gymnastics, or Serena Williams in tennis. Bobbie was also known for her sportsmanship – in the 1928 Olympics, Bobbie decided at the last minute to enter the 800-metre race and, with no training in this event, was set to finish fourth but instead chose to run beside her teammate, Jean Thompson, who had begun to lag behind, and let Jean take fourth place.

While you can read about Bobbie online (and you should), there’s something about live theatre that makes you connect with the subject material on another level. For the production I saw, this was in large part due to actor Olivia Daniels’ beautiful performance as Bobbie. She was magnetic.

Olivia had a lot on her plate – both on a technical front (there were many long monologues), but also on the storytelling front. She had to effectively portray someone’s entire career in a short time span, and the whole play rests on her performance. And I thought Olivia was immensely successful. Olivia is a very intelligent performer, and she portrayed Bobbie in a thoughtful manner. While the play itself breaks the fourth wall pretty often (i.e. Bobbie talks directly to the audience, partially narrating her own life), it never felt like Olivia was being overly showy. Her performance felt truthful and nuanced, and you could tell that a lot of heart was put into it. Olivia’s one to watch.😊

With regard to other aspects of the show:

• The set felt carefully designed, which I appreciated. I liked the various levels of the stage, and I liked the running track that wrapped around the platforms. The staging was lively, which helped with moving the story forward.
• I thought the supporting actors in the show, Ori Black and Matthew Gorman, were great at portraying multiple characters and making them each feel distinct from one another.
• I especially liked the second act, because the pacing felt fast (but not too fast), and the story seemed to gain momentum as it progressed.
• Regarding the script – overall, the speech felt natural, though sometimes it was a tad literal in spelling out issues clearly. The show is fairly presentational in style, so I think it would work particularly well in an educational theatre setting.

Overall, I’m so glad I saw this show, and I’m happy that playwright Trudy Romanek decided to write about this amazing woman, because her story deserves to be told.

If you’d like to learn more about Bobbie Rosenfeld, I encourage you to check out her entry in the Canadian Encyclopedia or the Jewish Women’s Archive. Theatre By the Bay’s production of Bobbie closed earlier this month, but I hope this show will continue to be developed and performed around the country (especially for young audiences).

Bobbie Rosenfeld on a track field. Credit: Jewish Women’s Archive

Cover photo: Theatre By the Bay website