HOW GREAT IT IS WHEN CANADIAN STAGE SHARES ITS OUTDOOR AMPHITHEATRE WITH OTHERS

Canadian Stage is planning to make room for the much-anticipated return of live, in-person theatre, dance and music to Toronto this summer. It’s putting aside the normal Shakesperanean outdoor productions of the Bard – and instead share its 1,000-seat open-air Amphitheatre in High Park with a wide variety of local arts groups from the end of June/2021 into September. Most exciting will be full productions of a new Canadian musical; a new work by two-time Governor General’s Literary Award-winner Jordan Tannahill. A special performance beyond the Amphitheatre will use the entirety of High Park itself. All will be physically distanced, mask-wearing audiences up to 100 – with strict COVID-19 protocols on stage and off. Running times will be around 90 minutes. See the full Dream in High Park 2021 line-up. And there’ll be so much more.

FOR A WHILE TORONTONIANS HEADED FOR THE SUBURBS & EXURBS – PLANNING TO ESCAPE THE CITY

“The pendulum might now have swung too far”, wrote the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce (CIBC) economists Benjamin Tan and Royce Mendes. That was applied to Toronto when 50,400 people left the city for other parts of Ontario – Cottage Country, small towns and rural areas. As in America, some families are having second thoughts about heading back, or staying put in countryside towns. New York City is again embracing those who fled to the hinterland or the middle of nowhere when the pandemic hit really hard. Jason Kirby in the Globe and Mail’s ‘Report on Business’ writes . . .  . . . . . “In its most recent analysis of housing market imbalances and household debt, the Bank of Canada looked at markets in scores of postal codes in and around Toronto, Vancouver, Montreal and Ottawa. It found that the farther you went from those city centres, the hotter the market.” “A lot may depend on how accommodating employers decide to be when it comes to continuing remote work arrangements. CIBC economists found that many employers expect their workers to return to the office full time when this is over.”  The city is waiting, and daily commutes may be approaching.