Lighthouse Festival reveals 2026 summer season (Hamilton Spectator)

“Ultimately, we are known for comedy, and I think it’s always important,” said interim artistic producer David Leyshon.

By Raymond Beauchemain | Special to The Hamilton Spectator

May 21, 2026

The weather would have you thinking otherwise, but it’s Norm Foster season, folks.

The Lighthouse Festival’s summer 2026 season at its Port Dover and Port Colborne theatres is a bit of a road trip in its various destinations this year, starting with “The Beaver Club” and “Crees in the Caribbean,” before ending with Foster and the season’s usual finale musical cabaret.

As David Leyshon, the Lighthouse’s interim artistic producer, said recently, “Ultimately, we are known for comedy, and I think it’s always important. It’s what resonates. We want to go to the theatre to escape, especially now given the state of world. We have a laugh, let ourselves forget many of the challenges we are facing.”

Lighthouse, he said, is that “refuge, that place of escape.”

Seatbelt? Rear-view? Full tank of (expensive) gas? Let’s go.

‘The Beaver Club’

Four women who are longtime friends take off from Toronto in a beater en route to Dildo, N.L. The play just vibrates with old memories, spilled secrets and pushed boundaries. The play, written by Barb Scheffler, sparkles with joy and heart and “really speaks to people,” Leyshon said. “It incapsulates a lot of the work we’re looking to capitalize on: comedy with heart; funny, but filled with things that makes us feel and think about our own relationships.”

“The Beaver Club” opens in Port Dover May 27.

‘Crees in the Caribbean’

Evie and Cecil Poundmaker are celebrating their 35th anniversary by going abroad for the first time to a Mexican resort. A sampling of dialogue from the play by celebrated First Nation Canadian playwright Drew Hayden Taylor sums up the humour brilliantly:

EVIE: Supposedly there are some ancient Mayan ruins somewhere in the interior, not far from here. I thought that might be interesting.

CECIL: If you want to look at an ancient, broken-down, Indian ruin, we can go visit your cousin.

“Hayden Taylor is an incredible playwright who’s created a beautiful relationship that resonates with anyone who sees the play,” Leyshon said. “This is what a long-term relationship looks like.” Hayden Taylor forces his characters into different situations and then watches how they navigate “those as couples who have been together for a long time.”

‘Secret Service’

“Degrassi: The Next Generation” actor Ephraim Ellis turned his attention to writing recently and with “Secret Service,” now has three comedies under his belt.

Here, Ellis turns to the thriller genre and turns it on its head. The play unfolds in a swanky Toronto Italian restaurant, Il Glorioso Buco, where as the risotto is about to be plated and customers served, international spies take over the kitchen. The farce gets farcier though with the introduction of an overkeen waiter who doesn’t know what’s beyond the swinging doors into the kitchen.

Leyshon, who is directing “Secret Service,” said Ellis has a “great flair and ear for dialogue. This play is a real fun exploration of the spy genre through the comedy lens.”

The company includes Canadian and international talents Carly Street, Robbie Towns and Stephen Sparks, who “really bring every ounce of comedy out of this fun, super-fast-paced, super-exciting play.”

‘Liars at a Funeral’

This Sophia Fabiilli comedy kicked off the Blyth Festival in 2023 after the fest’s return from the COVID pandemic. If “The Beaver Club” is a play about female friendships and revealed secrets, “Liars at a Funeral” thrusts family members into a whirlwind of dysfunction, fakery, mistaken identity and maternal manipulation (i.e., Grandma decides to fake her own funeral).

Five actors play nine characters, requiring audience members to hang onto their seatbelts to keep track of who’s who. “Audiences connect to it because of the family dynamics, those moments in life that come with high stress, high tension,” Leyshon said. “Layer after layer, you see a little more depth in the characters, more complexity in the relationships.”

‘A Woman’s Love List’

Norm Foster’s voice “is one that really resonates with our audience,” Leyshon said. “There’s a quality of writing that draws people in, they’re comforted by it.”

The play is directed by Lisa Horner, who Leyshon described as one of Canada’s best with “an incredible eye and ear for comedy anchored inside a real human experience.”

It’s another comedy that’ll require audience attention with quick-change character switching. Two friends, Megan and Carly, concoct a list of qualities for the perfect man. When Mr. Dreamcatcher appears, he’s more a model train than a model of perfection, constantly on the move, morphing then remorphing between personality traits. And that’s before he finds the women’s list.

‘Get Down Tonight’

Leisa Way & The Wayward Wind Band created this season-ending celebration of music from the 1970s. Lighthouse audiences will no doubt recall some of the 50-year-old songs and probably danced or made out to some of them. The Eagles, Led Zeppelin, Fleetwood Mac, Elton John, the Bee Gees, Stevie Wonder, Carly Simon. The list is long, the band promises to be tight, and the music full of disco, rock/pop and folk nostalgia.