Theatre review: Mom's the Word: Talkin' Turkey delights with tales of Christmas calamities
The holiday-themed show is heartfelt and at times hilarious
Deborah Williams, Alison Kelly, Barbara Pollard, Robin Nichol, and Jill Daum in Mom’s the Word: Talkin’ Turkey, 2022: set design by Pam Johnson; costume design by Barbara Clayden; lighting design by Darren W. Hales. Photo by Moonrider Productions
The Arts Club Theatre presents Mom’s the Word: Talkin’ Turkey at the Granville Island Stage until January 1, 2023
WITHOUT SEEING IT, chances are you have a pretty good idea what the five members of the Mom’s the Word Collective are serving up in Talkin’ Turkey, their first holiday show. They’re aging, their kids have left home, and they’re at a stage in life where they can laugh at past Christmas calamities (like that time the oven caught fire with the bird still inside or how a room full of unattended children decorated their gingerbread cookies with pubes, penises, and voluptuous breasts). But even if the gist of the show is predictable, the true personal stories that emerge over its two hours are not, and the women are so engaging—each in their own way—that you don’t mind if you have some sense of what might be coming down the pike, or rather the chimney.
Creators-performers Jill Daum, Alison Kelly, Robin Nichol, Barbara Pollard, and Deborah Williams have been making Mom’s the Word shows since 1995; Talkin’ Turkey is the series’ fifth iteration. Through tales of their holiday highlights and lowlights, the artists lay bare some of their most painful truths and experiences.
By the end of the show, for instance, viewers come to understand why Williams, a lover of equinox and solstice celebrations, acknowledged anything and everything but Christmas for so long, and why Christmas was the one day of the year that Pollard could relax as a kid. Daum, hinting at her punk past, delves into some of the small and big things she has had to navigate since losing her husband, who had Alzheimer’s, while Kelly recalls the unbearably difficult days of her first Christmas as a mom. And Nichol still can’t talk about all that went down during an ill-fated holiday trip with her dementia-addled father, but their eventual toast is among the work’s most touching moments. (That last one is a section that drags on longer than a Christmas stocking, and yet when Kelly says “Don’t ask” not once but twice, you want her to go there.)
All of these stories and more are told through an assortment of songs, dances, rhymes, re-enactments, and even a mini revamped version of The Nutcracker that’s just plain hilarious. References to pieces of Vancouver’s past add some local-love nostalgia.
Set designer Pam Johnson’s backdrop is a huge gingerbread house-style advent calendar, complete with white icing and functioning cupboards, drawers, and broom closet; at times a few of the windows (decorated with a candy cane or an angel here, a wreath or a snowman there) act as a screen upon which photos, videos, and other images are projected. It’s pure gingerbread genius.
Sure, the show could be trimmed just like the ribbon on a store-wrapped gift, but for the most part the production moves along at a decent clip. Obviously, coming from five older white women with husbands and kids, Mom’s the Word: Talkin’ Turkey is geared to a certain demographic well-versed in Christmas conventions. It isn’t for everyone in multicultural Vancouver. Still, Hallmark has nothing on this genuinely heartwarming show. The night Stir attended, audience members leaped to their feet afterward.
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