The Birds and the Bees

Often flighty, sometimes sweet

   Greg Flis, Burlingtontoday.com

Theatre Burlington’s debut play of the season is a good lark, and while it’s not nearly as deep as it pretends to be, it adds just enough sweetness to round out its raunchier comedic moments.

The Birds and the Bees has a cast list of four characters. Gail is a hobby beekeeper, otherwise divorced and retired, who leases her farmland to her intrusive neighbour.

Earl is simultaneously amused and annoyed that his landlady forbids pesticides to preserve the purity of her beekeeping. Add to this mix Benjamin, who is studying bees as a graduate project in biology, specializing in entomology, the study of insects. 

Finally, there is Gail’s daughter, Sara, a turkey farmer who specializes in turkey husbandry, but whose own husband has flown the coop. Actually, Sara has left her husband, and has landed back at her mother’s home.

Set design was demanding for this production, but Cataldo Brugnano and Michelle Spanik are up to the job for the most part.

Two rooms need to be depicted – Gail’s bedroom and the former bedroom of her daughter, Sara – along with a hallway and entrances to a bathroom and to the exit from the house. That’s a lot, but Spanik and Brugnano manage to make it all work, though the audience is compelled to imagine walls where there are none. It works, but actors must also discipline themselves not to look directly at each other when they are supposed to be shouting at each other from other rooms. 

Most of the time, the actors do well in this regard. To complicate set design, the plot requires an air mattress, which takes up too much space, and could have been a single bed size. Also, each bedroom could have used a chair for actors to sit on from time to time. The gigantic orange exercise ball in Sara’s bedroom provides some humour, but functionally has limitations.

Much of the plot revolves around sex, or lack thereof, and good humour is provided in both the frustration and fulfilment of those sexual needs. Imagine, if you will, a landlady who has not dated since her divorce many years before and her tenant farmer who thinks he is God’s gift to women, and perhaps is, given the number of girlfriends he has had in recent years. 

Then there is the 38-year-old, recently-separated and frustrated daughter and the handsome 23-year-old student, who, by the way, gets stung by a bee in a delicate area which is swelling excessively. No, it’s not the thin plot of a porn film (though it could be). It’s the starting premise for Mark Crawford’s The Birds and the Bees.

Actors need to be courageous enough to get down to their skivvies in this production, so credit to them in this regard. 

They are also all very good in their roles.

Julie Donoahue knows her way about the stage, and seems to always find the right posture and expression for her varying emotions, which run from anger and bitterness to sadness, alarm and satisfaction. Her relationship with her daughter, Sara, rings true during those moments of angry embattlement and stubbornness.

Heather Nutt is equally skillful in varying situations. She seemed too intense in the opening scene, but as the play evolves, her more nuanced performance is revealed as she shows calmness, flirtatiousness and shock with equal aplomb. Her good acting assists the audience to feel the changing relationships she has with her mother and her young male friend.

Raymond Beauchemin is just plain fun as the self-assured 60-plus unglamorous self-proclaimed ladies’ man, and always looks comfortable on stage, even when his underwear may make the audience uncomfortable.

Jeff Nguyen is also good fun as the bicycle-riding young scientist, successfully demonstrating the nervousness and intimidation his role demands. His initial entrance was a tad over the top, but it certainly established his character. His main closing speech tended to be awkward, but the fault here lay in the weak dialogue the playwright provided, at least as much as the stilted delivery.

I had some minor quibbles with the direction of the play – a little over the top here, a chair required there – but Francesca Brugnano is still quite skillful in how she moves the characters about the stage and keeps the play moving forward at a good pace, with the exception of the weakly-written dialogue where the playwright tried to inject universal meaning that the play just didn’t need.

The play has been popular across Canada because it is funny, and it does have moments of sweet fulfillment as well, but the play itself is flawed when it tries to draw meaning and teach lessons that really have no business in a good farce.

Nevertheless, this production is well worth seeing for its comedy. It is a well-directed polished production with a skillful cast.

Slice-of-life comedy fires on all cylinders

By Allison M. Jones, Hamilton City magazine

As part of its “all-Canadian playbill,” Theatre Burlington has opened its season with playwright/actor Mark Crawford’s play The Birds and the Bees, which premiered at the Blyth Festival in 2016. Since then, it has been a popular choice for theatre companies across Canada, had its international debut in the United Kingdom in 2022, and premiered in the United States in 2023. The online magazine Ipswich24 has called it, “a laugh-out-loud comedy that proves sex can be funny without being smutty.”

It’s a slice-of-life story in which we find 30-something Sarah pumping up an air mattress in her mother Gail’s extra bedroom, having come to stay on the farm upon the breakup of her marriage. The now-guest bedroom was Sarah’s old room, and one thread of the storyline involves Sarah and Gail navigating their relationship as adult women having both weathered some big changes in their lives and to their romantic relationships. While Gail has become resigned to her long-time solo status, Sarah is struggling with the end of her marriage, a loss of identity, and the emotional fall-out from the inability to become a mother. These problems involve things, however, that are hard to discuss with your mother (mostly, SEX).

Buzzing in and out of the women’s orbit are Gail’s long-time acquaintance, farmer Earl, who rents part of her land and has had a long list of relationships which never last; and graduate student Ben, who cycles to the farm from town to study the inhabitants of Gail’s beehives as part of a study. The bees are dying, and Gail and Earl bicker over the causes and solutions to this state of affairs as their friendship … evolves. Meanwhile, Sarah invites the awkward but attractive Ben to the town’s last-ever Turkey Days celebration in an effort to ignore her troubles for one evening, and that drunken evening sets in motion unexpected and monumental changes to everyone’s lives.

Director Francesca Brugnano says she was drawn to the play not only for its humour and what it delivers in showing the nature of human relationships, but its overarching message of love and optimism as well: “In a world where the sea may be rising and the bees may be dying, uncertainty rules. But when things don’t go according to plan, you can always change, you can always learn, and you can always make a new plan.” Last season, Brugnano directed Village Theatre Waterdown’s Sequence, tonally a very different play about human nature and destiny, but one that also involved a script full of clever dialogue as well as a quartet of actors.

The cast is composed of Sarah (Heather Nutt), Gail (Julie Donoahue), Earl (Raymond Beauchemin), and Ben (Jeff Nguyen). After watching Donoahue in this play, as well as her performance earlier this year as the indomitable matriarch in Dundas Little Theatre’s production of Things I Know to Be True, one thing I know to be true is that when I see Donoahue’s name in the cast list, the audience is in for a treat. Donoahue is completely natural onstage, embodying her roles with great realism, authenticity, and timing.

Her castmates also bring their roles to life with authenticity and likability. Sarah, Earl, and Ben feel familiar and true-to-life. We probably know someone like each of the characters in our own lives. Sarah’s life is chaotic, tumbling from one crisis to another, but as we get to know her we increasingly root for her to be OK. That’s a testament to the emotional journey Nutt takes us on in her performance. Ben is an awkward fellow, and the character is the least fleshed out of the quartet. However, in the second half we begin to see glimpses of the man that Ben (Nguyen) is becoming, and that is someone who is steady, mature, adaptable, and thoughtful. And Earl? Beauchemin is a treat to watch, with a great sense of timing, physical comedy and, ultimately, a heart of gold. You can’t help but enjoy Earl’s antics, even when he’s pooh-poohing Gail’s serious concerns about the environment.

The set is very appealing, the stage divided into adjoining bedrooms and the bathroom of the upper floor of a farmhouse. It’s cleverly designed to reveal both a parallel and perpendicular hallway at centre stage, one leading to unseen stairs. The sound design is clever, punctuating the action with toilet flushes and the creaking of an unseen screen door below. What’s remarkable about the set design is how well it uses space and the absence of structures to allow the audience to see into multiple layers of the still very visually realized house. We watch interactions take place in the hallways which would normally be obscured by walls. Very impressive! Compliments to set designers Cataldo Brugnano and Michelle Spanik, sound designer Brian Nettleford, and all those who helped realize director Brugnano’s vision.

The Birds and the Bees’ author has penned a number of other plays, including Stag and Doe; Bed and Breakfast; Boys, Girls, and Other Mythological Creatures; The New Canadian Curling Club; Chase the Ace; The Gig; and The Golden Anniversaries. Crawford’s plays have been produced nationally as well as abroad, including the U.S., the U.K., Poland, Australia, and New Zealand. His website announces that his newest play, Ruby and the Reindeer, will premiere in December. Residing in Stratford, Crawford has been nominated for a Playwrights Guild of Canada Comedy Award and the Stephen Leacock Medal for Humour, and has a list of acting credits to his name.

His script is well-written, with clever, funny, and true-to-life dialogue. It’s bawdy without being vulgar. The action is nicely paced, and the audience comes to genuinely care about the characters, as evidenced by the audible reactions when the story comes to a series of startling, emotionally-charged climaxes.

This is an enjoyable play that entertains and gifts its audience with a hopeful conclusion.

Rural comedy, farce and environmental allegory

By Brian Morton, Hammer Monthly magazine

Mark Crawford’s play THE BIRDS AND THE BEES has emerged as a significant work in contemporary Canadian theatre, combining rural comedy, farce, and environmental allegory with a focus on human relationships and emotional growth. First produced at the Blyth Festival in 2016, the script has since become one of the most widely staged Canadian works of the last decade, with productions across the country and abroad. Its enduring appeal lies in Crawford’s ability to integrate humour with themes of ecological awareness, personal reinvention, and intergenerational connection.

    The narrative structure of Crawford’s play is deceptively simple, focusing on four characters whose intersecting lives create both comic and dramatic tension. Sarah, recently divorced, returns to live with her mother, Gail, on the family farm. While Sarah struggles with the emotional aftermath of her marriage, Gail faces her own crises: her honeybees are mysteriously dying, her neighbour Earl’s flirtations complicate her solitary routine, and Ben, a young entomology student, arrives with both research questions and a secret that could change everything.

    In the process of confronting these challenges, each character undergoes what director Francesca Brugnano describes as a process of “becoming unstuck,” a theme that forms the emotional core of the play. The script blends farcical situations, physical humour, and sexually charged moments with genuine vulnerability, resulting in characters who feel both relatable and cathartic.

    The play’s lasting popularity is partly due to its structural economy and thematic richness. Written for four actors and performed on a single interior set, it is particularly attractive to both professional and community theatres. Its two-act format, running roughly two hours including intermission, offers audiences a balanced evening of comedy and character development. 

    Critics have praised the play for its sharp dialogue and tonal precision, with reviewers describing it as “razor-sharp” and “one of those shows that make you feel better about the messy business of being human.” Its humour never diminishes its deeper subjects; instead, it frames issues of intimacy, grief, and ecological concern in a way that is accessible and resonant. Even scenes about turkey insemination and bee mortality become metaphors for the play’s larger exploration of life cycles, death, and renewal.

    Crawford’s position as one of Canada’s most frequently produced playwrights underscores the significance of THE BIRDS AND THE BEES within his career. His debut play, STAG AND DOE (2014), premiered at the Blyth Festival and introduced his recurring interest in small-town settings and community life. His 2015 play BED AND BREAKFAST expanded on those themes by following a gay couple who decide to start over in a rural community. Most recently, his political comedy THE GIG, which premiered at Theatre Aquarius in 2023, examined cultural and political tensions through the lens of drag performance. Collectively, Crawford’s plays use comedy as an invitation to consider issues of identity, social change, and the challenges of living in community.

    The Theatre Burlington production, directed by Francesca Brugnano and produced by Michelle Spanik, continues this tradition of thoughtful, lively theatre. Brugnano has emphasized the importance of timing—both comedic and emotional—throughout the rehearsal process. The cast, featuring Julie Donoahue as Gail, Heather Nutt as Sarah, Raymond Beauchemin as Earl, and Jeff Nguyen as Ben, brings nearly forty years of combined acting experience to the stage. Their collaboration promises a performance that will capture the play’s careful balance of humour and heart.

    Ultimately, Mark Crawford’s THE BIRDS AND THE BEES demonstrates the capacity of contemporary Canadian theatre to blend entertainment with deeper reflection. It invites audiences to laugh while considering environmental crises, romantic renewal, and intergenerational relationships, never losing sight of the humanity that drives its story. Nearly a decade after its premiere, the play continues to entertain and provoke thought, affirming Crawford’s reputation as a playwright who captures the complexity—and comedy—of modern life.

I am eager to see how Theatre Burlington brings this beloved Canadian comedy to life.