Book Reviews and More: Goblin Oedipus Stratford Festival 2025 A Review

Wednesday, 5 November 2025

Goblin Oedipus Stratford Festival 2025 A Review

Goblin Oedipus

2025

Stratford Festival

A Spontaneous Theatre creation

by Rebecca Northan, Bruce Horak, and Ellis Lalonde

Directed by Rebecca Northan

Goblin Oedipus Stratford Festival 2025 A Review

Over the last few years my son, who is now 17, and I have attended a number of plays in Stratford at the festival. We eagerly await the announcements of the season’s shows and often debate what shows we want to attend and why and then we buy our tickets early in the winter. For the 2025 Season this was one of our fist picks. We bought tickets for opening night of this production before any other shows this season. The other shows we have seen or plan to see this season are Macbeth, As You Like It, The Winter's Tale, Anne of Green Gables, and Annie.

Cast:

Rebecca Northan

Bruce Horak

Ellis Lalonde

This play has its world première in 2024 at High Performance Rodeo in Calgary in January. The entire play is put on by a cast of three assuming different stances, voices, postures and a few props to play the various roles in the play. This production was done in the Meighen Forum a small intimate space, with steep seating and seating in an arc around the performance area. The actors in full costume and character come in through the lobby prior to the doors being opened, carrying a giant sculpted phallus. The description of the production is:

“Following their highly acclaimed unconventional performance of Shakespeare’s Macbeth in 2023, the goblins will be making a triumphant return to the Meighen Forum in 2025. Taking on another roller-coaster theatrical classic, Sophocles’ Oedipus Rex, audiences can anticipate glorious drama with unearthly charm as the goblins are determined to delve deeper into the Dionysian degeneracy of the human race, dissecting the dithyrambic to offer up a cautionary tale of patricide, incest and eye-gouging comedy.

The production contains adult themes and occasional use of strong language that some people may find offensive. We recommend it for audiences 18 years and older.”

Then they are wandering around the stage and interacting with the props and elements on stage. So the magic begins before they even utter a single line of the play. The characters often break the fourth wall and interact with the audience. They also pull 12 members from the audience to play the Greek Chorus, they were seated to the rightmost of the stage when facing it, in 2 rows with a slight arc.

This was another near perfect production. The audience was engaged, enthralled and had an incredible time. The play was masterfully executed and I was amazed at how well the three put it on. The music by Ellis fits perfectly with the actions and events, and his fascination with Christmas and trying to slip in Christmas references is over the top but so fun. As well Ellis Lalonde's music throughout the production was amazing. And the goblins costumes and acting was amazing. The play concludes with a dance party and the Goblins interact with the audience, and are willing to take photos, with or without the phallic sculpture.

After seeing Goblin MacBeth my son and I went to a local eatery and ran into Stratford alumni Jamie Mac, he informed us that Bruce Horak is legally blind, this making the performance and play that much more incredible.

I have read this play twice in the last few years as different of my children have done it in High school. We are informed that this production is based on John Murrell's translation, with permission from Meg Murrell-Peloquin. The version I have read because it was the one used in school was Oedipus the King by Sophocles translated by Bernard Knox. My son took his copy, which we gave him last year for Christmas with the tickets inside. He had the goblins sign his copy and it is now a treasured possession. We attended with our aunts, who know Rebecca.

This Deadpool-ish production of the play is absolutely outstanding! The cast is amazing, and the production laugh out loud funny. We greatly enjoyed this play and look forward to seeing what the Goblin’s will do next.