Production History of Maggie and Pierre

Spring 1979

Paul Thompson begins rehearsals for a play about English people going to Quebec, Les Maudits Anglais. During improvisational sessions, Griffiths keeps doing a Pierre Trudeau character. Thompson says, “That’s your one-person show, you do both of them.” Griffiths says she doesn’t want to do a one-person show.

Summer/Fall 1979

Griffiths and Thompson begin improvisational rehearsals for Maggie and Pierre. Instead of taping the improvisations, Thompson uses a Passe Muraille employee, Kitten, as a live stenographer. During this time, Griffiths makes three trips to Ottawa. On the third, she gets into the Governor General’s Ball.

December 1979

Maggie and Pierre receives its first workshop production in Theatre Passe Muraille’s Backspace. The production includes a two-level set with a ladder backstage, Rolling Stones songs for the transitions, and thirteen quick changes—from Maggie’s bathing costume to full political suit for Pierre, to Henry’s coat and hat. In the second act, the costume images are reduced to a more basic look for the three characters, excepting the signature disco outfit for Maggie near the end of the play.

January 1980

A slightly shorter version receives a full production, complete with standing ovation on opening night. The play immediately seems to engender more publicity than most Canadian plays—perhaps encouraged by a character based on themselves (Henry), the political media also write about it. This bypasses the quota on Canadian entertainment coverage.

Spring 1980

Maggie and Pierre tours to Vancouver, playing a sold-out eight-week run at the Vancouver Cultural Centre. Margaret Trudeau sees the play, arriving with a friend. After the show, the stage manager, Myles Warren; his wife, Judith Rudakoff; Griffiths; and a couple of friends go out for beer and pizza with Margaret. As was fitting, Griffiths paid the cheque.

Fall 1980

Maggie and Pierre tours to the Centaur Theatre in Montreal, Theatre Calgary, and Edmonton. In Edmonton the show plays at the University of Alberta, starting a trend for independent producers to produce it when regional theatres are not interested. All these producers make money.

Fall 1981

The demand for Maggie and Pierre grows and the search begins for another actress to perform and tour the play. Toronto actress Patricia Oatman is chosen and Paul Thompson begins rehearsing her in. When Griffiths sees Oatman do the show, she thinks Oatman’s Trudeau is perhaps a little better than hers. Oatman receives wonderful reviews and plays Winnipeg, Victoria, Saskatoon, Thunder Bay…

Spring 1981

Maggie and Pierre plays Ottawa, not at the National Arts Centre, but at an Ottawa high school auditorium. Rumours abound that cabinet ministers and high-level bureaucrats are arriving incognito. Pierre Trudeau does not come, as he is busy hosting Ronald Reagan, who arrives in town during the run.

Summer 1981

Maggie and Pierre returns to Passe Muraille as part of Toronto’s International Theatre Festival, run by Shane Jaffe. Ticket demand is at such a premium that there are fistfights in the lobby to get seats. Shane Jaffe and Paul Thompson conspire to move the show to a larger location. Shane finally says, “The hell with it, let’s go to the Alex.”

Summer 1981

Shane Jaffe and Paul Thompson (with Theatre Passe Muraille) do the unheard-of. They rent the Royal Alexandra Theatre for five nights, hoping people will just show up. They do. Griffiths is the first woman to play a solo show on the Alex stage since Ruth Draper. Maggie and Pierre paves the way for other local plays to be produced by the Mirvishes and everyone got dinner at Honest Ed’s Steak House.

Summer 1982

Paul Thompson wants to keep the show going but Griffiths is flagging. He decides that if someone else plays Henry, and if that someone is Griffiths’s boyfriend, she’ll keep going a while longer. Patrick Brymer is contracted to play Henry on a tour of southwestern Ontario. In southwestern Ontario, the show is usually referred to as “Pierre and Margaret.”

Summer 1982

Garth Drabinsky shows interest in taking Maggie and Pierre to New York in an off-Broadway theatre. He partners up with Norman Kean, who had made money as one of the producers of Oh! Calcutta! (a few years later, Norman Kean shot himself and his wife). For some reason, Drabinsky thinks someone else should play Henry. Hoping that this might make it easier for someone else to eventually slip into the show, Griffiths agrees. Eric Peterson is contracted to play Henry in a limited run at the Phoenix Theatre in New York. Eric is a great Henry, but the split is not good for the play. Something about the power of one playing three is broken.

Fall 1982

Maggie and Pierre begins previews at the Phoenix Theatre. No one tells the company that in New York critics come to the previews. During previews, the play is very uneven and finally comes together on opening night when hundreds of critics have already seen it. The critical response is dire, except for Clive Barnes, who unfortunately no longer works for the New York Times. The general response is that an upstart is suggesting that their stars are bigger than our stars—and they’re not. This translation of the story to the American Myth is a disaster. In a never-to-be repeated exercise in Canada/US cultural relations, The Globe and Mail prints the New York Times review of Maggie and Pierre verbatim, without comment. Frank Rich begins, “Poor Canada…” and goes on from there.

Late Fall 1982

John Sayles, an independent filmmaker, sees Griffiths’s picture in the Times, winces at the review, sees the play, and auditions her for his new film, Lianna. Paul Thompson and Eric Peterson return to their work in Toronto and Griffiths goes to Hoboken to film the title part of the movie.

Spring 1998

The Playwrights Union of Canada asks Griffiths and Thompson if they will do Maggie and Pierre as a benefit for the organization. They agree. Myles Warren is again stage manager and Judith Rudakoff gets student volunteers from York University to help out. Maggie and Pierre is again mounted with a one-level set and thirteen quick changes for a two-night run. There is a big laugh when Henry/Griffiths says he’s doomed to tell this story over and over again.

1998

Based on the success of the benefit, Susan Serran, then artistic director of Theatre Passe Muraille, decides to mount a revival. Maggie and Pierre plays again, and Thompson directs. New audience members arrive, many who have barely heard of Pierre Trudeau and have never heard of Maggie. They have barely heard of the Stones. Maggie and Pierre enjoys another sold-out run, people judging correctly that Griffiths is about to put away her disco pants forever.

Fall 2000

Pierre Trudeau dies. Public mourning is intense and overwhelming. The country is insatiable for stories of Trudeau. The media remembers the girl who did a play about Trudeau and his wife…