For one brief shining moment, this blog-site “Entertain This Thought” hit a major milestone. On Saturday, August 6, there were 16 shows listed in the “Now Playing” category, a record number.
I have been going to shows and writing my thoughts on them since the summer of 2004, when we moved to Strathroy. Our location here is central to theatre in southwestern Ontario – just an hour to Stratford, 50 minutes to Sarnia, and 40 minutes to Grand Bend or Petrolia. It’s only an hour and a half for the occasional trip to Blyth, or under an hour to visit Port Stanley once and awhile. To go a little beyond southwestern Ontario, it’s just over two hours to Niagara-on-the-Lake, and two and a half hours to downtown to Toronto.
If the show is still running, I leave it posted in the “Now Playing” listing, and once the show has closed, I move it over to the “Archives” pages.
On Saturday , I saw Simply Grand at Sarnia’s Starbright Festival and added it, late that night to the Now Playing section – bringing the total to 16. I must confess that this is not a true Ontario total. Two shows, Anne of Green Gables and The Full Monty, are now playing in Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island, where I saw them earlier this summer.
But no sooner had I posted the opening of Simply Grand, when I had to archive Vimy at the Blyth Festival and Italian Funerals at Playhouse II. So from 16, the Now Playing total fell back to 14. But still a record!