Canadian Theatre Encyclopedia
Spring Thaw
Musical theatre/sketch revue with book and lyrics by Mavor Moore and music by Tommy Tweed, premiered by the New Play Society in Toronto in 1948, directed by Moore, with Jane Mallett, Connie Vernon, Margaret Brenton, Peter Mews, Bud Knapp, Alfie Scopp, Eric Christmas and Don Harron (among others). Later the production also included the work of Barbara Hamilton, Dean Regan, Don Francks, Alan Lund and Dave Broadfoot. The revue was subsequently performed across the country including at the Charlottetown Festival for the venue's first season.
Skits, solos and impersonations which, begun as a replacement production, proved to be the cash cow for the Society, which ran from 1948 to 1971, and from 1980 to 1986. Among the original sketches were ones about the Kinsey Report and a newsreel parody.
Critic Nathan Cohen wrote of the premiere, "...we can say the review as an entity was bright, unpretentious, engagingly funny, and sometimes as gay as a pinwheel."
Profile by Gaetan Charlebois. Additional information provided by Claire Sedore.
Last updated 2021-10-29
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The Canadian Theatre Encyclopedia web site was originally conceived and developed in 1996 by Gaetan Charlebois—theatre critic, playwright, and actor.
