No Dead Ends Here
Daniel MacIvor Challenges Himself by Playing 15 Characters in Cul-De-Sac
Janice Sawka

In Cul-de-sac, the upcoming production at the MTC Warehouse, playwright/actor Daniel MacIvor single-handedly portrays 15 characters who all happen to live on the same street.

In one scene he attempts to play several of them as they simultaneously interact during a neighbourhood Christmas party.

“That’s the show-off moment,” MacIvor says over the phone from Montreal. “I wrote it as a deliberate impossible challenge to keep me on my toes and keep me interested.

“I’ve been on the road with this show for two-and-a-half years now, and I personally believe most shows have about three years before they start becoming routine for the performer. At that point, it’s time to move on. Life’s too short, and I love theatre too much to perform something less than fully alive.”

In prior interviews MacIvor has steadfastly insisted that his job is not to explain what Cul-de-sac means nor to give any concrete advance framework to potential audiences. Speaking with Uptown, he seems to have relented and mellowed just a bit — if you can use the term ‘mellow’ for someone whose rapid-staccato speech pattern resembles machine-gun fire. This speed, I soon realize, is the physical manifestation of his earnest attempt to express the many, many ideas and motivations behind the play.

He reveals that the story concerns Leonard, a 40-ish “sweetheart of a gay man” who keeps to himself after breaking up with his lover. One night, Leonard, along with the rest of the neighbourhood, hears a foreboding sort of moan. The play takes off as a series of present-tense flashbacks as each character comes forward and relates his or her personal response to the mysterious noise to the audience. It’s a multi-character approach that mirrors MacIvor’s personal beliefs.

“I’ve been on a spiritual quest for the last few years,” he explains. “I’ve worked for some Buddhist organizations. I think my own understanding of the play has changed over time as I’ve revised the text — I’m the writer, I’m allowed to stick in new good ideas when they occur to me — and I think the play is a commentary on community.

“A community is a living entity made up of all the individuals within. On a profound level, that means that every individual is integral to the community. If you remove an individual, you change the community. Everyone is connected. No life is insignificant. I think I’ve always believed that, I just didn’t always know I believed it.”

Asked to put his subjective and ethereal frame of reference into more concrete terms, MacIvor begins, rewinds and fast-forwards several times before settling on his answer.

“We’re all part of a bigger picture,” he says at last. “Ultimately, that’s the story that needs to be told. I don’t have a ‘meaning’ I want the audience to get, but if there was some action I wanted them to take once they left the theatre, I’d hope they would go out and try to reconnect with someone they’d lost touch with.

“The soul connects us all.”