New West Theatre has been forced to shift the timing of their season due to  the delays in renovating the local semi-professional theatre company’s home of The Yates and Sterndale Bennett Theatre.
 But in addition to rethinking venues, they also decided to refocus their image of being best known for their always popular musical comedy revues.
““Rockers Gone Country’ was going to be our first show in July. It was already cast but we had to move it to February. So we gave the actors cast in it first right of refusal. Some of them were only available for the summer. Some of them are available for this show. But the show also falls on Valentine‘s day, which is a great date night,” said New West Artistic Director Sharon Peat.

“ It’s all about songs which were number one on both the country and pop charts,” she said.
they are trying something completely different, by putting on the Tony Award winning musical “Million Dollar Quartet for their first show of the season, Sept 12 at the Yates Theatre.

“It’s the first time in years New West has done a musical. It’s about Sun Studios musicians Jerry Lee Lewis, Johnny Cash, Elvis Presley and Carl Perkins. It’s based on an actual recording session they did in 1956. It’s like being a fly on the wall of Sun Studios, so you learn all about these characters, and of course there’s the music,” Peat enthused.

 She is also excited to bring back “Night Life,” a cabaret in the Sterndale Bennett Theatre. Nightlife 2.0. runs Nov. 16 and 17.
“We’re super excited about the second show. It’s adult based, so it’s not for families. It’s New West after dark,” Peat described.
 The first musical comedy revue of the season is their Christmas show, “Hit Parade,” running Dec. 18-Jan. 5 in  The Yates Theatre. It will combine comedy with plenty of favourite hits.

Their beloved Munsch Theatre for young people show returns for Christmas as well as Munsch-O-Rama explores Munsch favourites  ‘50 below Zero;’ ‘The Paper Bag Princess,’; ‘Thomas’s Snowsuit’; ‘PIGS’ and ‘Something Good.’ It will be running at Casa, Dec. 26 -Jan 5.
 Peat is especially pleased to present   Evan Placey’s play “Girls Like That,” which explores teens in the age of the Internet and social media, May 1-11 in the Sterndale Bennett Theatre.

Local artist Rob Bechtel goes back to his originals influences for his new Exhibit  “Lineage” in the Concourse Gallery, one of five new exhibits opening tonight, June 23.

“I started thinking of my influences when I was starting out as an artists. There are so many of them — a lot of twentieth century artists,” Bechtel said, noting his exhibit includes the oil and canvass works he is known for which he created at the McNally Arts Centre studio as well as ink on paper he completed at home.

“ I can’t get  to the studio every day, so I’ve been doing a lot more  work on paper at home,” he observed, adding all of the works were completed in 2017 and 2018.

Local film-maker C Blake Evernden explores the history of movie poster design by looking back on his very earliest films for his movie poster themed exhibition “Cinematic Imaginings,” which opens at Casa tonight, Saturday, June 23.

“I’ve been making movies since I was 11 or 12 and usually the budget wasn’t enough to reflect what was in my head.

So I thought making a movie poster could better reflect it,” he said, adding the works include posters for short films and featured he’s  completed throughout his career, but also three new films he is working on. The new films include a romantic comedy set  in, aptly, a movie theatre.

“And on another of the new ones, I’ve used a couple actresses I hope to be working with on the film,” he said.