Stage-Bound

Since the 1990s many of Canadas best-known filmmakers, such as Denys Arcand, John Greyson and Robert Lepage, have looked to the stage for inspiration. While feature-film adaptations of Canadian plays have become increasingly common, the practice of turning drama into film began in Canada in 1942 when Hilda Hooke Smiths Here Will I Nest was brought to the screen. Some adaptations, such as Wedding in White and Being at Home with Claude, enjoyed a fair measure of success; others, such as Me and Les Clbrations, have fallen into oblivion. Some stayed close to the dramatic structure of the original; others sought to explode the limits of the stage to create a greater cinematic effect. But virtually all adaptations have engaged with, rather than denied, their theatrical origins. This acknowledgement of their dramatic origins has often led to criticism that these movies remain too rigidly anchored to the stage; too stage-bound. Stage-Bound, the first extensive study of feature film adaptations of English Canadian and Qubcois drama, challenges this reductive interpretation. Andr Loiselle demonstrates that theatricality is central to the meaning of these works. In the process, he reclaims these stage-bound films, which have generally been ignored by scholars.