When confronting an issue that hits close to home it doesn’t hurt to be, well, close to home.
Home for Robert Winslow has always been the quaint farm property on Zion Line near Millbrook where, in 1992, he established 4th Line Theatre as its founding artistic director. It’s where he was raised and, over the last 25 years, it’s where his creative juices have flowed to produce numerous original theatre works that have both delighted and challenged audiences each and every summer since.
With The History of Drinking in Cavan set to premiere next month, home is also where the play’s writer, director, and lead actor is finding some much-needed comfort, as he confronts alcohol-soaked demons from his past as part of the play’s storyline.
“I’m excited but also very vulnerable because of the personal nature of some parts of the play,” Winslow says. “There’s a scene in the second act which is very personal and very painful — probably the most painful moment of my whole life.”
His voice quivers as he explains the scene that sees him go back in time to the 1980s to visit his mom Jean, “to try to resolve things with her.”
“We all have stories about our lives. We want to think everything is positive but there are difficult things that people experience. I hope people will relate to some of these issues.”
The History of Drinking in Cavan tackles the history of alcohol consumption and its prohibition in Cavan-Monaghan Township over the past 200 years. Having grown up in the township, Winslow lived that experience.
“As a teenager, I drank a lot. My friends did too, and eventually some of them got into drugs. We’re talking about the 1970s.
“As the play evolved in my mind, and I got older and I had my own issues around my family and stuff, it became a little bit more than just fun time stories. It’s personal and that’s very hard for me. I think it’s very hard for any family member where there is alcoholism involved to face some of this stuff, whether it’s yourself or somebody close to you.
“It’s hard to know how to deal with it. It’s hard to know how to behave. It’s hard to know how to figure things out. Sometimes you can’t. What is the age-old slogan, about God give me strength to change the things I can and the wisdom to know the things I can’t?”
Winslow, playing himself as well as his alter-ego King, the town drunk, is part of a small cast comprised of five other professional actors — Edward Belanger, Cyndi Carleton, Justin Hiscox, Mark Hiscox, and Shelley Simester — working alongside community actors Kiana Bromley, Maude Rose Craig, Tristan Cruise, Emma Khaimovich, and Gary Reker.
Winslow notes that a reminiscence held in February 2011 at the Millbrook Legion during which “people told stories” proved pivotal in the play’s development. That has resulted in “verbatim theatre” which uses other people’s words verbatim as opposed to the playwright’s.
Terming the play “a dramedy”, Winslow notes “there’s an awful lot of funny stuff” in the play but adds “if it was just all comedy, that would be disrespectful to the seriousness of the issues. It’s a real ride. It’s a play that’s as much about theatre as it is about stories, so things will transform and become something else.”
For her part, 4th Line Theatre Managing Artistic Director Kim Blackwell describes The History of Drinking in Cavan as “very confessional.” While she is taking a rare day off with this production, Blackwell hasn’t been idle in terms of closely monitoring the impact of the play’s content on its creator.
“I was very aware, as we developed the play over the last seven years, of wanting to make sure that he (Winslow) did what he wanted to do in terms of exposing his own story in a very honest and authentic way,” Blackwell says. “But I also wanted him to protect himself … there’s some stuff in the early drafts that isn’t in the piece we’re producing.
“As he’s been going through the painful journey of Robert the character in the piece, I’ve been checking in with him to make sure that he’s okay. The thing about Robert that is so extraordinary, that I am so in awe of, is so many times over the 26 seasons of the theatre he has used his own life, his own family, as a window into everybody’s lives, the struggles and the pain.
“This is probably his most personal piece, because he looks at himself and his mom and their relationship and her struggles. Why Robert is so good at what he does is that it’s a survey piece about the history of alcohol consumption and production in the township, so it’s great fun and he has made it incredibly entertaining.”
Blackwell adds her gauge for measuring the success of each 4th Line production is rooted in the presence of the three Es — Educate, Entertain, and Enthrall — noting “this play does all three.”
Speaking to the play’s small cast, Blackwell notes 4th Line’s employment of community actors is a story in itself, allowing the theatre, in this case, “to create an epic piece with a handful of people” as it carves out a unique niche.
“There is no other theatre company in this country that puts community members on stage in important, pivotal roles alongside professionals,” says Blackwell, her pride in that mission clear.
Among the play’s six professional actors is Justin Hiscox, a 19-year 4th Line veteran who is also serving as the play’s musical director. He says the lyrics for play’s songs were written first and then handed over for him to do his thing.
“I look at what kind of emotion or mood the lyrics portray. If the lyrics are about drinking and partying, then I compose something more upbeat. If it’s ‘Oh, I’ll never drink again … I’ve learned my lesson’, the music goes slower.”
Hiscox says his 4th Line work remains a welcome change from his regular gig playing with orchestras and bands, where “they hand you a book and it’s full of notes someone else has written and you’ve got to play them the exact right way.”
“That makes you a very good musician, but it doesn’t do anything for your creativity. Out here, once it’s set, you have to do that too but here I’m doing the setting. I really like a play like this because it has so many different styles of music.”
When all is said and done, Winslow’s hope for The History of Drinking in Cavan is not unlike that he has had for every production staged at 4th Line.
“I hope people in the audience will relate to their own parents or siblings where there has been a complex struggle,” he says.
“Sometimes the connections are made through the difficult way rather than the fun times way. I wish it was all fun and games. I wish everything I did out here was light and happy but right from The Cavan Blazers to The History of Drinking in Cavan, there’s always been that element of struggle as well as fun.”
Helping him through each staging will be thoughts of home and, more notably, memories of his mother.
“My mom was an amazing person. She was a great singer, a piano player, the leader of the church choir, and the leader of the high school choir. She sang at people’s weddings and was loved in this community, absolutely adored. The whole spirit of 4th Line being welcoming is really from my mom’s spirit. Anybody that came here she greeted them with extreme warmth. Her spirit is really at the heart of the play.”
Does her son sense that she’s still watching over him, perhaps from a second-floor window of the neighbouring family home?
“It (her presence) comes in weird ways at weird moments. There are little guidances here and there.”
With song lyrics by Winslow, musical composition and direction by Justin Hiscox, costume design by Meredith Hubbard, and fight direction by Edward Belanger, The History of Drinking in Cavan sees choreographer Monica Dottor serving as intern director.
Curtain is 6 p.m. Tuesday to Saturday from August 7th to 26th. Tickets can be purchased by phone at 705-932-4445, online at www.4thlinetheatre.ca, or at 4th Line’s box office in Millbrook at 4 Tupper Street and in Peterborough at the Peterborough Museum and Archives, 300 Hunter Street East (atop Armour Hill).
