Director Rebecca Russell's Toto Too Fun Home a triumph

Director Rebecca Russell’s Toto Too Theatre stage production of Alison Bechdel’s Fun Home, based on genius comic creator Alison Bechdel’s graphic novel of the same name, a bildungsroman about a queer kid growing up in a dysfunctional family whose father has a secret life,  is startlingly moving. It’s  a rousing success that I am so happy I caught at the Gladstone Theatre in Ottawa last weekend.

Steph Goodwin plays 43-year-old Alison. Jason Swan portrays father Bruce Bechdel. Together, they anchor the whole works much like Sir Patrick Stewart and Sir Ian McKellen anchored the Bryan Singer X-Men films. Swan’s Bruce carries the discomfited, particular mannerisms of a young Giannetti, in the most flattering and adept ways. Goodwin, as the chorus, grown cartoonist Alison, flaunts the acting acumen and gravitas that becomes the line-through of all the different time periods which the play portrays. Goodwin’s admirable intensity, physicality and amazing pipes are a fascinating contrast to the almost minimal physical stature of cartoonist Alison Bechdel herself. And Goodwin knocks this one out of the park.

However, without a robust supporting cast, the whole enchilada wouldn’t work, and the supporters more than work. They sing, in all senses of the phrase. The fam’ is Jean-Luc Arun Mullin as Christian Bechdel, Luna Oancea as John Bechdel, Frances Winchester and Emilia Castro as Small Allison, and charming stand-out Kaylee Ross as Medium Alison finding herself at college. The kids do a great job of acting like kids, a fine trick to pull. That said, there’s no weakness in this bolstering chain of players. Naomi Miller beguiles as love interest Joan, while Howard Yung is the picture of discomfort in multiple roles, most notably as handyman Roy. Nicole Tishler also brings her A-game as long-suffering wife Helen Bechel.

Having read and admired Bechdel’s Fun Home, my only qualm was the lack of ambiguity surrounding Bruce Bechdel’s decisions. However, this is an adaptation issue, not that of cast and crew. Ultimately, I recognized much from Bechdel’s graphic novel. The players wooed me. Their rendering of Bechdel’s discovery of her queerness and OCD and cartoonist calling and the tragic story of her father is heart-wrenching. The musical numbers are bangers, the kids are surprisingly funny, and college-age Alison will steal your heart before you know it’s gone, then sing a naughty observation like a classical musical number. 

Anyways, see it. And have tissues close at hand. Toto Too has a triumphant show on their hands. I would see it again. Ask for an encore.

Poetry in the Pontiac, with AJ Dolman this Wednesday!

 Poetry in the Pontiac, with AJ Dolman ! This is a poetry thing happening this Wednesday!

Because Shawville demanded it! Or you demanded it. But certainly organizer fellow Tree Reading Series organizer alumni Jennifer Mulligan asked us.

Thanks, Jenn! Been a minute. Wait! Do I owe you money? No, I'm sure I don't....

Virtual Reading Brockton Writers Series on Wednesday, May 13

Woot! I have a virtual reading with Toronto's Brockton Writers Series on Wednesday, May 13, 2026, at 6:30 p.m. at Glad Day's new space at 32 Lisgar St.

I'm reading alongside some fab company—Justin Ancheta, Allister Thompson & Matthew J. Stafford.

Guest speaker Xio Axelrod will discuss the topic "From Pen to Platform: Author Branding in the Age of Noise."

Do I know anybody in Toronto—or anywhere—who would dig this?

They will also livestream the event on the series' YouTube channel.

Link in comments.

The Brockton Writers Series (#BWS) is a bi-monthly literary reading series. The reading is PWYC (suggested $3-$5) and features a Q&A with the writers afterward. Books are available for sale.

#writersseries #writersevent #readingevent #bookevent #gladdaybookshop #torontoevents #bwsevent #brocktonwritersseries #brocktonwriters #canlit #torontolit #queerauthors #queerwriters

Public Lending Rights Chuff

Been struggling lately to feel like a writer, and to work on my stuff.  But last week, I received my annual payment from the Public Lending Rights Program from the Canada Council for the Arts, as my books Town & Train and Fear Itself (both Lethe Press) are available in Canadian libraries. It's a reminder that I'm still a writer.

Thank you, casual library users, avid bibliophiles, the Canada Council, The Writers' Union of Canada, all you readers out there and, of course, other writers carving out their craft. 

Work-in-progress: reviews, poetry, fiction

Currently reviewing Soundtrack, a Book*hug Press poetry collection by my pal Michael V. Smith. Each poem is titled after a popular 1970's, 1980's or 1990's pop song, his personal experience with that song, and growing up queer in our hometown of Cornwall, Ontario. 

Also trying to place a review of San Francisco-area writer Scott Terry's 2025 literary novel, The Gift (Torchwood Books), the story of both a single mother, Pansy, and her son William (aka Butch), a queer kid who embraces the cowboy lifestyle, growing up in a strict Jehovah's Witness household in the Siskiyou Mountains in the late 1950's to the late 1970's.

Then also continually organizing my poetry and editing my second short-story collection, which fab editor-writer Andrew Wilmot edited last year.

Catherine O'Hara, March 4, 1954 – January 30, 2026

 Oh, damn it to hell, to hear the news of Catherine O'Hara passing yesterday. Discovered her as a kid watching Toronto's SCTV at sleepovers, growing up  in the 'burbs. The film Beetlejuice cemented my enduring crush for her doing Harry Belafonte's "Day-O". Adored her pretentious Moira Rose (depicted) in Schitt's Creek. Last saw her as an alcoholic pothead shrink in the second season of The Last of Us. A delightfully irascible broken character.

You were terrific, Catherine O'Hara. Rest in humour & power. And please say "Hi" for me to your fellow SCTV alum John Candy.

Sal Buscema, Comic Book Artist, 1936-2026

This week has had noteable losses. 

Sal Buacema passed away January 24 at the age of 89. Buscema is the legendary comic-book artist who, among other many credentials, drew The Incredible Hulk monthly comic for a record ten years, defining Ol' Greenskin's iconic comic look of the time. Notable additions to the Green Goliath mythos include the treacherous fellow irradiated U-Foes and the Cold-War-era Soviet Super Soldiers. 

The slobbering mouth is all Buscema's touch, like the famous Kirby Cosmic Crackle. I grew up with that comic. For eight years, Buscema also penciled The Spectacular Spider-Man. 

I have a poem, '"Nomad", about Sal Buscema and the Jade Giant, that I am seeking a home for. 

Thank you for the high adventure, Sal. You were brilliant. 

Here is the Frank Miller cover, opening splash page, a Hulk-out splash page and a claustrophic sequence from The Incredible Hulk # 261, "Encounter on Easter Island". Hulk meets up with sociopath Crusher Creel, the Absorbing Man. Fellow comic legend, mainstay Hulk writer Bill Mantlo, scripted the issue, during Old Jade Jaw's worldwide drifter years. This outre imagery, the entire Easter Island motif, captured my impressionable imagination. 

I allude to this outlandish issue # 267 in "Nomad".

https://www.marvel.com/articles/comics/sal-buscema-tribute