After the Rain: ladies and gentlemen, Evans Stone
13 Jun 2025 - Photos by Dahlia Katz

Evans Stone is a soft rock band who are "Canada famous." Or, as is repeatedly stated, "poor." But they are driven to do what they do, tour and struggle to record, in pursuit of writing that perfect song. And for the sheer joy in performing. And when they are performing the joy is infectious, turning the revamped Tarragon theatre into a raucous concert, a party, a magical space where feelings and emotions are expressed in song. The stage also becomes a rehearsal space and watching the band interact, with their complicated allegiances and interpersonal relationships is stunningly rendered. Just gritty enough to be real, and theatrical enough to hint at a universal truth about that remarkable place where work and creating art intersect. Evans Stone is based around a husband and wife team as the main vocalists, with their daughter as a guest star. The financing for a new album, their first in years, suddenly hinges on the daughter's participation as a full-fledged band member, a bid to capture a younger audience. However the daughter, who is teaching piano to an older richer woman who wants to be able to play Satie's “Gymnopedie No. 1” and make it appear casual, is given the opportunity to study music at U of T and change her life. A life that at the moment consists of getting stoned, sleeping with her "stupid but he's hot" boyfriend, and chasing an elusive song of her own that is just out of reach.

When After the Rain sticks to that central conflict it is riveting, and has a great excuse for a hearty helping of those infectious songs courtesy of Suzy Wilde. There is a lot of fascinating discussion of how composing and lyric writing works. Characters remark that "the saddest songs are in major keys," and "simplicity is hard," and, of how Satie managed "transgression in tranquility." The concept of "singing from your ass" was a crowd pleaser. And if that is how this cast achieved what they do, it is advice worth sitting on. In an extraordinary scene the mother, Jean Stone, and the father, Ashley Evans, try to work out a new song. She wants a duet, he says to split the verses. As they work the song through, their entire relationship plays out in all its gentle bickering, deep affection and sexual heat. And they nail the song. These moments when the music melds with the plot and characters, are sheer magic. Unfortunately there are a multitude of other plotlines and metaphors, making one wonder if the book was hobbled by autobiographical songs, that tangle up the momentum and instead of a cathartic climactic number, or resolution, we get a self-serving fizzle of a finale that is flat-out disappointing.

Conceptually the book by Rose Napoli (Mad Madge, Wildwoman, Heart of Steel) does reflect life and life creating art. It meanders, is punctuated with sparkling moments of humour, and there are detours and distractions, an erratic rhythm in search of the right beat. And we are carefully set up for the final destruction of the fourth wall. After the Rain is narrated, already breaking the fourth wall, by Annika Tupper as Suzie Evans Stone. Tupper is a playful, congenial host and a powerful singer. She easily draws the audience into her confidence, a necessity as that cracked fourth wall is further broken by frequent audience participation. Tupper manages it well, from her singing we have seen she can manipulate an audience with ease, though it veers wildly from engaging to cringey. She also drives a parallel plot with the piano student, cancer, and a possibly autistic son (Shaemus Swets). While this plot has its delights—Deborah Hay (London Assurance, Twelfth Night, Fall On Your Knees, Caroline, or Change, Lear, London Road) who does double duty as Jean Stone and Donna D'Angelo is irrepressible and marvellous—it is a lot to layer onto rock n' roll. The two plots do dovetail and for a moment it appears that the threads will pull together powerfully, but then After the Rain just stops dead in its tracks for the title song and finale.

The lead guitar and drums duo of Brandon McGibbon (Hamlet, Midsummer) and Joe "JoJo" Bowden get in some wisecracks and impressive licks, but are mostly there for musical reasons and to add verisimilitude to the band banter and family feeling. Andrew Penner (Natasha, Pierre & the Great Comet of 1812, The Shape of Home, UnCovered, Ghost Quartet) plays both the good ol' boy Ashley Evans and the reserved Frank D'Angelo, using only a cardigan and a quick slick of his hair and slump in his posture to make the shift. Evans is a happy manchild but we see why Jean loves him, his interaction with his "ukelebabies" class is delightful fun but also solid teaching. We're all aware by now that Penner does love to rock out, and here he does so with exuberance. Hay plays all the comedy and contradictions given to her and sings like a '70s rock chick bordering on goddess. Her Donna D'Angelo is just off-kilter enough to avoid the maudlin and the broadly comic. Somehow she and Tupper make a manufactured mother/daughter spat that surfaces out of nowhere into actual emotional fireworks. Jean Stone lives in the, also out of nowhere, credo that Evans spouts, "When there's nothing left to burn, you have to set yourself on fire." Hay is on fire.

To facilitate the musical numbers, which are the majority of and the best part of After the Rain, Tarragon has been reconfigured with the stage in the center and the audience on both sides. As in a stadium concert with a satellite stage, it immediately implies an intimacy. Director Marie Farsi (Fifteen Dogs, Ghost Quartet) exploits that feeling by keeping the cast in constant motion and interacting. But it is a double edged sword as no matter what is happening, musically or dramatically, half the audience is watching the back of a performer's head. Fortunately everyone is miked so the words and lyrics come through clearly. Whether intentional or not, all the ideas and themes in After the Rain become subordinate to an exploration of the difference between what is said and what is sung. Lyrics don't always have to be literal or explicit to convey an emotion or idea, dialogue usually needs a certain coherence. What needs to be said can be expressed either way and often music, a song, a melody wedded to a phrase, can conjure what appears to be unexplainable. So while After the Rain doesn't entirely make sense, other than as a framework for songs, a sudden jukebox musical, it does aim for an elusive truth and entertains as only a scrappy rock n' roll Canada famous band, or musical, can.