In an era when dinner table conversations can escalate into ideological battles more quickly than a social media thread unravels, Olivier Choinière’s Public Enemy makes a timely arrival at Toronto’s Alumnae Theatre. This English “transadaptation” by Bobby Theodore (which not only translates the original French words, but localizes the copious political and cultural references) transforms two family dinners into a masterclass on the art of societal dissolution … and perhaps, unexpectedly, its potential remedy.
In its first act, Public Enemy places three generations of a middle-class family around a dinner table, where their conversation spirals into a literal cacophony of dueling dialogues fueled by competing world views and family animus. Their senses-assaulting symphony of family discord feels unnervingly authentic, but the genius of the scene, which is directed with precision by Marcio Beauclair, is in what lies beneath. Pay close attention: pick out some of the details in each conversation, pair them with the body language of the speakers, and add in a metatheatrical “replay” of the events in the adjoining family room — and you start to see how family dynamics, cultural touchstones, and societal pressures shape our perspectives – often without our awareness.
Janis Boase grabs attention right away with her strong performance as family matriarch Elizabeth. At first fuelled by straightforward conviction and comically table-thumping certainty, she demonstrates a revelatory vulnerability and a reassessment of former certainties by the time of the second dinner, which happens a year after the first. And at this second dinner, she is eclipsed by a magnetic, over-the-top performance by Kimberley Ann Croscup as new character Suzie, the second act’s even more voluble and self-assured new centre of gravity.
The rest of the ensemble cast also acquit themselves well, with Valérie Carrier, Trevor Cartlidge and William MacGregor as Elizabeth’s alternately bickering and peace-seeking children; and Audrey Keating, and Jordan Kewell as the two exclusively bickering members of the third generation. Each crafts a compelling character who contributes essential threads to this tapestry of familial conflict.
Renato Baldin’s set design is a triumph of meaningful minimalism. Skeletal metal wall frames surround the dining room, making the house literally a construct (or even an arena) that we are peering into. Strategically placed stacks of books — including a clever placement of the play’s original French script near center stage — serve as both physical boundaries and intellectual foundations for the family’s conflicts. The dining room’s stark white table, bottles and bananas strip away domestic comfort, forcing our focus onto the caustic exchanges that fill the space.
What emerges through the two dinner parties depicted in this fraught, fractious production is a powerful reminder that individuals, relationships, and families – like society itself – resist reduction to single moments or simple narratives. When we pull back the lens, we can recognize the complex forces that shape our perspectives and can re-fashion our identities and relationships over time. The full-contact experience that is Public Enemy (complete with its surprising inclusion of a combative squirrel that embodies the wild, defensive nature of family conflict) seems to suggest that the real danger (or public enemy, if you will) is less our differences than our rush to freeze judgments about them in amber, and refuse the possibility of growth, learning or reconciliation.
So as we leave the theatre, stepping back into a world where opinions are too often wielded like weapons, and are reinforced by algorithms and magnified by echo chambers, Public Enemy offers a challenging proposition: perhaps our salvation lies not in winning arguments, but in the determination to keep conversations open, even when – no, especially when – they become uncomfortably loud and fractious.
Public Enemy continues at the Alumnae Theatre until October 5, 2025. Tickets are available at alumnaetheatre.com.
© Scott Sneddon, Sesaya Arts Magazine 2025
