Akosua Amo-Adem stars in Table for Two, the play she wrote that follows a Ghanaian woman desperate to settle down but reluctant to let her singleness define her.Supplied
I’ve heard that dating apps can be a nightmare. With apologies, I’m one of Tinder’s success stories: My husband was one of the first people I met when I moved to Toronto. Nearly four years later, I can comfortably assert that he’s not a serial killer.
That said, I understand why online dating gets such a bad rap. The apps gamify the already terrifying ritual of a blind date – they reduce a potential mate down to a tweet-length bio and a handful of selfies. True love is, of course, deeper than that, rooted in how a person feels, sounds, acts. A Tinder profile can only capture so much of a person’s soul.
With apps and algorithms in mind, two new plays in Toronto interrogate the relentless grind of dating. The projects boast equal amounts of heart, and together they form a detailed snapshot of how it feels to be single in the aftermath of COVID-19. But only one has the polish of a play ready to tour Canada at a moment’s notice.
Table for Two, starring and written by Akosua Amo-Adem and directed by Djanet Sears in a co-production between Soulpepper and Obsidian Theatre, follows Abena, a Ghanaian woman desperate to settle down but reluctant to let her singleness define her. Over the course of an hour and 40 minutes, we accompany Abena through the scenes of a blind date – the wrestling with shapewear, the all-important choosing of a hairstyle, the pounding self-doubt when it becomes clear that mystery man JD45 is running late.
The play is funny, earnest and poignant, though it could use a few trims – the preface to Abena’s date with JD45 is overlong and keeps Table for Two jogging in place before we get to fall in love with Abena, her mother (Bola Aiyeola) and her best friend Janelle (Meghan Swaby). Abena’s relationship with Janelle in particular is vivid and sharp, and Sears’s staging offers a nuanced portrait of friendship that’s unburdened by fluff or cheap jokes.
With minor tweaks, Table for Two could enjoy Canadian productions far beyond its world premiere. A familiar face at Soulpepper, Amo-Adem has always been a terrific actor – now, she can add “gifted playwright” to her CV.
Across town at Theatre Passe Muraille, Blind Dates similarly unpacks the injustice embedded into online courtship. Visually impaired since 2004, Vivian Chong is a visual artist, musician and athlete, with an impressive roster of hobbies that include kayaking, stand-up paddleboarding and hiking. In her 75-minute solo show, Chong recalls coming into her own as a blind adult, from learning to ask for help as needed to figuring out how to pursue the activities that bring her joy, such as playing the ukulele and swimming in the ocean.
Blind Dates has potential, but at present it’s a string of short stories and songs that doesn’t actually tell us much about Chong. Throughout the play, Chong laments being seen solely for her disability: “What about my Asian-ness?,” she quips. While we learn a little about what Chong likes to do, and we get to meet a few of the men she’s dated over the last few decades, we don’t get a particularly detailed sense of the person in front of us — her childhood, her daily routines, her dreams.
Artistic director Marjorie Chan helms a friendly enough production in the Bob Nasmith Innovation Backspace theatre, but some choices keep Blind Dates from feeling like the intimate, conversational monologue it could someday become. AI-generated captions are only intermittently successful due to Chong’s accent, and errors in transcription often upstage Chong’s performance – on opening night, an unfortunate blip in the software caused Chong to describe a certain body part as “turkey” rather than “perky.” It’s fairly well-known that AI struggles to transcribe imperfect English, and Theatre Passe Muraille used human-generated, pre-written captions for The Flin Flon Cowboy only a few months ago – so what gives?
There’s a certain intersectional beauty to Table for Two and Blind Dates playing opposite each other, a cultural moment captured by two women with valid, well-worded qualms with a society that can err toward racism and ableism. One gets the sense that Abena and Chong could bond at a Galentine’s Day party, and maybe even become friends over their shared belief that dating ain’t always all it’s cracked up to be.
From personal experience: Table for Two makes for a great date night, and my husband and I spent our ride home from Soulpepper laughing fondly at the corny pickup lines that eventually got us married. I’m less convinced by Blind Dates, but I’m pretty charmed by the complementary meditations on love that currently bookend Toronto – and hey, you’ll never know if you don’t swipe for yourself.
Table for Two runs at Soulpepper Theatre until March 2, 2025. Tickets are available at soulpepper.ca. Blind Dates runs at Theatre Passe Muraille until March 9, 2025. Tickets are available at passemuraille.ca.
In the interest of consistency across all critics’ reviews, The Globe has eliminated its star-rating system in film and theatre to align with coverage of music, books, visual arts and dance. Instead, works of excellence will be noted with a critic’s pick designation across all coverage. (Television reviews, typically based on an incomplete season, are exempt.)
