The Toronto Theatre Review: Emily Paterson’s Butch/Femme
by Ross
The static of an old-time record player fills the air of the Mainstage at Theatre Passe Muraille, as a neatly dressed woman, Jenny, enters the vintage living room, dusting away her troubles until a knock on the door interrupts her. The unexpected visitor is known to her, and when leather-jacketed Alice asks if she can come in, Jenny, of course, says yes, but her head and heart seem to shake no in response. From that point forward, Butch/Femme becomes a dance of emotional survival, when two women, very different in stereotypical appearance, attempt to understand the other, repeatedly asking the difficult “why” question over and over again, hoping against all hope to fully understand why Alice had abandoned Jenny over a year ago.
The framing is intense, surreal, in a way, but also honest and engaging. The arrival has obviously shaken the prim and respectable Jenny, played solidly by Annabelle Gillis, but she works hard to hold her own against the pull of her ex-lover Alice. Played carefully and authentically by Tessa Kramer, Alice has returned to what used to be their shared home in a rural Ontario town sometime in the 1950s. Alice is yearning for reconnection and forgiveness, but it’s not going to be a straightforward duet. Too much has happened to these two in that year, and as the dynamics and persuasive arguments are swallowed down like cheap red wine, the intensity of their attachment builds in ways both expected and unexpected.
The play, written and directed by University of Toronto student Emily Paterson, is a tightly focused tango overflowing with sexual tension and power dynamics. The air in the room is thick with discomfort, but also longing. Shifting undercurrents are created that don’t always match the outward appearances, meticulously crafted, with costumes by Salma Qureshi Wennekers, composition, music direction, and sound design by Anya Ivantchenko, lighting by Eden Phillips, and set by Aria Kowal. The air between Jenny and Alice is charged, almost combustible, with the strength of character shifting inside every move and turn around this dancefloor. Paterson captures that tension with an intimacy that feels lived-in. Yet even as the dialogue deepens, there’s a sense that the production is holding itself back, circling rather than leaping.
The emotional current is strong and carefully choreographed — a testament to Paterson’s vision — yet I found myself wishing for a bit more focus and freedom in the staging. It’s possible that a separate director, unbound by the script’s intimacy, might have pushed the piece beyond the stuck realism that exists on that stage into something more fluid and forceful, letting the movements mirror the emotional turbulence rather than parking them in a literal corner of this period piece. Even the wine prop, while practical, felt like an unnecessary pause and positioning, rather than a dramatic idea-driven choice. The potential for a faster, spiralling build, like a record player subtly speeding up, pushing the dancers forward, is all there within, and I kept hoping the production would seize it.
“Why did you come back?” is the question of the night, asked repeatedly, with a slow unpacking of the true answer. Yet, as orchestrated, the yearning of these two for understanding and resolution is clearly there, in between and inside the way they look at each other. We feel their ability to organically sense the heartbeat of the other; when it is racing and when it is boiling, with tension, love, anger, pain, and desire. And in that duel for authentic connection, this tender play wants to look at the way we understand historic and contemporary queer personas, and dig in past the outward archetypes to a place of more authentic understanding. There is a yearning to explore sapphic and queer history in both Toronto and its outskirts, and the obstacles for open connection in communities both big and small, urban and rural. Both carry challenges that resonate within Butch/Femme, playing with dualities in ways far beyond those superficial framings.
The play connects and resonates far beyond these two women who are fighting against the world, each other, and themselves, for a place of safety and security that doesn’t come easy; not then and not now. I think everyone who sees this compelling play has that one love that won’t leave our system. That if that person did show up, unannounced at our door, asking for forgiveness and an invitation to reenter, we might all find ourselves in the same complex dance that these two are engaged in. The push and the pull of that kind of chemical and emotional attraction is the common thread, whether it’s now or in this story set over 70 years ago. We know the dance. We (secretly) want the dance. Yet we just don’t know where those steps will lead or how we’ll feel as we step to the music together. Will the dance break us or save us? It’s difficult to say, so we lean in with wonder, as we watch Alice and Jenny find their way to the end of their Butch/Femme song and tango, maybe not in the most surprising of ways, but it certainly rings true.
