Poster for a theatre production titled "The Odd Couple" directed by Belinda Cornish, starring Andrew Macdonald-Smith and Alexander Ariate, with other cast members listed. The poster features two men, one seated with cards, chips, and a cigar, and the other standing with a feather duster, against a patterned background. The event runs from July 11 to 27, 2025, at the Varscona Theatre.

The Odd Couple

written by Neil Simon
directed by Belinda Cornish

Running: July 11 - 27, 2025
preview: July 10th

Starring

Alexander Ariate as Oscar Madison
Andrew MacDonald-Smith as Felix Ungar
Garett Ross as Speed
Mat Busby as Murray
Bernardo Pacheco as Roy
Oscar Derkx as Vinnie
Kristin Johnston as Cecily Pigeon
Jenny McKillop as Gwendolyn Pigeon

ABOUT

Neil Simon’s classic comedy of mismatched roommates brings the season to a riotous close. When fastidiously domestic Felix exits his marriage with no new home in sight, he finds himself rooming with the irascible Oscar, a divorced dad with a pronounced attachment to slovenliness. Their battles escalate in intensity and hilarity as the two men attempt to create a new kind of co-habitation in the heat of the New York summer.

RUN TIME APPROXIMATELY 2 HOURs and 15 minutes (includes 2 intermissions)

SPECIAL TICKETS

PREVIEW: All tickets are $25 each
PAY-WHAT-YOU-CAN: Tuesday, July 15th and 22nd
FREE WINE AND CHEESE: The Teatro Board of Directors invites you to attend on Wednesday, July 16th for Free Wine and Cheese at intermission.
$67 DINNER AND A SHOW PACKAGE: 1 ticket and 1 appetizer and entree from Boxer Kitchen and Bar
$98 WINE AND CHARCUTERIE PACKAGE: 2 tickets PLUS 2 glasses of wine and 1 charcuterie platter at Boxer Kitchen and Bar

All Performances take place at VARSCONA THEATRE - Learn how to get to the theatre here

Evening performances start at 7:30 PM
Sunday Matinees start at 2 PM

Varscona Theatre lobby opens 45 minutes before the start of the performance

Digital Program

CREATIVE TEAM

A man with glasses, a beanie, and a beard smiling in front of a colorful mural.

  • Alex is an Alberta based actor and creator who made his Teatro Live debut in 2023 in Listen Listen. His recent credits include Citadel productions of Heist, The Importance of Being Earnest, Clue, Peter Pan Goes Wrong, and The Three Musketeers, the latter two of which were also seen at the Arts Club in Vancouver. He was also in the Citadel’s The Play that Goes Wrong, a production which also played at the Manitoba Theatre Centre in Winnipeg and at Theatre Calgary. His other credits include Murder on the Orient Express and Might As Well Be Dead at Vertigo Theatre in Calgary and The Merchant of Venice, The Tempest, Othello, Twelfth Night, and The Winter’s Tale for Calgary’s The Shakespeare Company. Most recently he appeared in Horseplay at Workshop West, and he was in Fortunate Son for CBC Television. Alex is a graduate of the BFA Acting program at the University of Alberta.

Close-up photo of a young man with blue eyes, light skin, reddish-brown hair styled to the side, wearing a dark coat and a light blue shirt

  • Mat made his Teatro debut in 2008 in A Rocky Night for His Nibs and has subsequently been seen in The Oculist’s Holiday, The Jazz Mother, The Nutcracker Unhinged, Sleuth, For the Love of Cynthia, The Importance of Being Earnest, The Bad Seed, and The Exquisite Hour, and he received a Sterling Award for his performance in Teatro’s Whiplash Weekend. He’s worked for many other local companies, including the Citadel, Firefly Theatre, and Shadow Theatre, and has multiple Fringe credits, including several with Belinda Cornish’s Bright Young Things. Mat thinks of the Varscona as a home; he was the Operations Manager for the building from 2017 to 2021 and he created and and operates the theatre’s Bespoke ticketing system. On coming back to Teatro, he says “It’s always such a thrill to return to play with this riotously delightful company!”

Portrait of a man with dark hair and beard, wearing earrings, black jacket with shearling collar, against a dark background.

  • Bernardo is an Albertan actor and musician honored to be making his Teatro! debut with a cast full of friends. His select credits include: A Midsummer Night's Dream: The 70's Musical (Citadel Theatre); Network (Citadel Theatre/ Royal Manitoba Theatre Centre); The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde (Vertigo Theatre); With Bells on (Lunchbox Theatre); Little Women, Forgiveness (Theatre Calgary). Bernardo would like to dedicate this performance to Michael: "You're going to love this one.” 

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  • Lieke is a Dutch-Canadian graduate from the University of Alberta’s Theatre Design program, and is very excited to put her designs on the Varscona stage once again! Some of her credits include her work at the St. Albert Children’s Theatre as Costume Coordinator (2022-25), Crescendo!, (Set and Lighting Designer, Shadow Theatre 2023), Grease (Set co-design, Dresser, Paint, Mayfield Dinner Theatre 2024), The Full Monty (Set co-design, Costume design, Paint, Mayfield Dinner Theatre 2025), and A Gentleman’s Guide To Love And Murder (Costume Design, Grindstone Theatre, 2025). She is incredibly grateful for all of the support she’s received from her loved ones, and appreciates the wonderful folks who come to see her shows. Enjoy!

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  •  Andrew is in his last season as Teatro’s Artistic Director. He made his company debut in the original production of The Salon of the Talking Turk in 2005, and his other credits include Witness to a Conga, Cocktails at Pam’s, Going Going Gone!, Vidalia, Fever Land, and A Grand Time in the Rapids, and he was Jack Vail in the 2012 and 2024 productions of Pith. He’s appeared at the Citadel Theatre in The Play that Goes Wrong, Disney’s Frozen, Crazy for You, Jersey Boys, A Christmas Carol, Shakespeare in Love, 9 to 5, Peter Pan Goes Wrong, Mary Poppins, and One Man Two Guvnors, winning Sterling Awards for his performances in the latter two. Andrew has also appeared with The Mayfield Dinner Theatre and Shadow Theatre. In 2023, Edmonton Opera presented him in the cabaret show Andrew MacDonald-Smith: My First Hundred Years, which he created in collaboration with Stewart Lemoine and pianist Frances Armstrong. This fall, he’ll be seen at the Grand Theatre in London, Ontario in The Play that Goes Wrong.

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  • Belinda was a Co-Artistic Director with Teatro from 2020 through 2023. She made her company debut in A Grand Time in the Rapids in 2005, and subsequently appeared in Witness to a Conga, The Exquisite Hour, Vidalia, Evelyn Strange, and Private Lives. Her Teatro directing credits include Fever Land, A Grand Time in the Rapids and The Oculist’s Holiday, plus the three online streaming offerings in the 2021 season- Lost Lemoine Parts 1 and 2, and A Fit, Happy Life. Belinda has appeared often with the Freewill Shakespeare Festival and The Mayfield Dinner Theatre, and she’s been in both versions of A Christmas Carol at the Citadel and in Peter Pan Goes Wrong, which also played at the Arts Club Theatre in Vancouver, and most recently Heist, which also played at the Grand Theatre in London, Ontario. With her own company Bright Young Things, she produced and appeared in No Exit, The Real Inspector Hound, Our Man in Havana, and The Bald Soprano. Belinda has won two Sterling Awards for playwriting- for Little Elephants at Shadow Theatre, and Category E with The Maggie Tree. Her adaptation of Todd Babiak’s novel The Garneau Block premiered at the Citadel in the fall of 2021 and her play Hiraeth played at the Varscona shortly thereafter.

Black and white portrait of a young woman with long straight hair, makeup, including lipstick, with a septum piercing, smiling slightly, wearing a collared shirt.

  • Skye Grinde is a theater designer with experience in set, lighting, costume, and projected media design. Skye also explores the world of fine art regularly in their work; they are passionate about creating work that is accessible for both audiences and artists. This includes sewing for all sizes and abilities. When Skye is not designing, you can find them at home, doing their best to recreate the painting Ophelia by Alexandre Cabanel. Select credits include: The Play that Goes Wrong (Keyano Theatre), Cycle (Thou Art Here Theatre), Honk! The Musical (Storybook Theater), and The Space Between the Stars (Westbury Theater).

Close-up of a woman with wavy blonde hair and green eyes, looking at the camera.

  • Jenny made her Teatro debut in The Ambassador’s Wives in 2010, and has subsequently been seen in For the Love of Cynthia, I Heard About Your Murder, Pith!, The Euphorians, A Lesson in Brio, A Likely Story, Fever Land, and The Exquisite Hour. Her other credits include Outside Mullingar for Shadow Theatre and The Secret in the Wings at Studio Theatre. Her Fringe credits include Maggie Now, Wilder and Wilder, Legoland, The Myth of the Ostrich, You Are Happy, Crescendo and the Bright Young Things production of The Real Inspector Hound. She has also worked for Free Will Shakespeare Festival, Alberta Opera, and Quest Theatre. She made her Citadel debut as Audrey in As You Like It, a production also seen at the Manitoba Theatre Centre in Winnipeg and at the Grand Theatre in London, Ontario. Next season Jenny makes her Northern Light Theatre debut in How Patty and Joan Won High Gold at the Grand Christmas Cup Winter Dance Competition.

Black and white digital illustration of a woman with spiky hair, wearing large round glasses, earrings, and a patterned shirt.

  • Leona has worked regularly with Teatro as a performer and designer since the company’s inception at the first Edmonton Fringe in 1982. Her appearances include such classic Teatro shows as Cocktails at Pam’s, and The Vile Governess and Other Psychodramas, and Pith. Leona has been Teatro’s principal costume designer for four decades, and her recent company costume credits include On the Banks of the Nut, The Noon Witch, The Woman in Black, Private Lives, The Oculist’s Holiday, Pith, Everybody Goes to Mitzi’s, Deathtrap and The Margin of The Sky. Her other recent credits include Clue, and Jersey Boys at the Citadel and After Mourning - Before Van Gogh, and Where You Are for Shadow Theatre. She’s worked on many shows for The Mayfield Dinner Theatre including Canada Rocks: The Reboot, and the recent Flashback Fever. Leona designed costumes for the feature film Before I Change My Mind, directed by Trevor Anderson. She was honoured with a a 2020 Edmonton Artist’s Trust Fund Award from the Edmonton Arts Council, and she’s a three-time Sterling Award winner for costume design.

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  • Kristin is an Edmonton based performer and instructor, and a graduate of the Theatre Arts Program at Red Deer College and the Canadian College of Performing Arts in Victoria, BC. She made her Teatro Live debut in 2022 as Myra Bruhl in Deathtrap and returned as Virginia Tilford in Pith in 2024. Her local credits include A Christmas Carol,  9 to 5, and Sense and Sensibility at the Citadel, and she’s appeared in MOB at Workshop West, Helen with Trunk Theatre, and most recently in Dance Nation with Skirts Afire. She’s also appeared regularly with Northern Light Theatre, where her credits include We Had a Girl Before You, Baroness Bianka’s Bloodsongs (Sterling Award Nomination), Origin of the Species, and Enough. Kristin’s many Fringe credits include Destination Wedding, Destination Vegas, The Black Widow Gun Club, and Mass Debating. Next season, she returns to the Citadel in The Vinyl Cafe.

Close-up of a man with short brown hair, blue eyes, and a beard, wearing a green plaid shirt and a black jacket, looking directly at the camera.

  • Garett made his Teatro debut in I Heard About Your Murder in 2017 and returned for Fever Land and Private Lives. He’s a graduate of both Grant MacEwan Theatre Arts and the University of Alberta’s BFA program, and has been working professionally in Edmonton Theatre for over 25 years. His recent credits include the Citadel’s The Three Musketeers, The Sound of Music, Pride and Prejudice, and Jane Eyre, Shadow Theatre’s Outside Mullingar, and Catalyst Theatre’s Nevermore, seen across Canada as well as in the UK and off-Broadway in New York. Garett has also appeared at The Mayfield Dinner Theatre in Hairspray, Chicago, and Shear Madness. He has numerous Fringe credits, including Wilder and Wilder in 2015, and his Sterling Award-winning turns in the Plain Janes’ It’s a Bird, It’s a Plane, It’s Superman! and A New Brain. Garett has also been the Varscona Theatre’s Operations Manager since 2021.

A smiling man with curly brown hair, blue eyes, and a beard, wearing a black shirt against a dark background.

  • Oscar made his Teatro debut in the 2015 production of The Hothouse Prince and has since returned in Evelyn Strange, The Oculist’s Holiday, and the video streaming presentation Lost Lemoine: Parts One and Two. His recent credits include Grindstone Theatre’s A Gentleman’s Guide to Love and Murder, Julius Caesar at Bard on the Beach in Vancouver, Trouble in Mind at the Citadel and Manitoba Theatre Centre, and Peter Pan Goes Wrong at the Citadel and the Arts Club in Vancouver. He also appeared in As You Like It at the Citadel, in a production also seen in Winnipeg, Calgary and Vancouver. Oscar’s other Edmonton credits include performances with Freewill Shakespeare Festival, Concrete Theatre, and Punctuate Theatre, and you might also have seen in numerous commercials for The Brick.

A young woman with brown, shoulder-length hair wearing a beige turtleneck sweater, smiling in front of a dark green background.

  • Maddy (she/her) is a multi-discipline Stage Manager based in Edmonton, and is excited to make her Teatro debut! Much thanks to Andrew (and Farren!), Belinda, this stellar team, and BDC. Select credits include Little Women, The Ballad of Johnny and June, A Streetcar Named Desire, The Three Musketeers, The Importance of Being Earnest, Deafy, & Jane Eyre (Citadel Theatre), The Sound of Music, Network (Citadel Theatre/Royal MTC), Gaslight (Chemainus); Hey Viola! (Charlottetown Festival); The Wizard of Oz, Chelsea Hotel, A Christmas Carol (Western Canada Theatre); The New Canadian Curling Club, The Buddy Holly Story (Thousand Islands Playhouse). 

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  • After doing Scenic Construction/Carpentry on numerous Teatro shows in recent seasons, Tiana is now the company’s first official Production Manager. A graduate of Grant MacEwan University’s Theatre Production program, Tiana has spent the last two decades working in Edmonton Theatre, where extreme weather, fire, illnesses, broken scenery, aggressive prop handling, and squirrels have taught her much about problem solving and remaining calm in a crisis. Past credits include working as Production Manager for FreeWill Shakespeare Festival, Head of Lighting and Carpentry for Theatre Network, and Technical Director for Alberta Musical Theatre (formerly Alberta Opera). Her favourite show experiences include doing scenic construction for AMTC’s Pinocchio while 7 months pregnant, and building the tricky/scary sets for The Woman in Black both at Theatre Network and Teatro Live. Tiana recently became the Varscona Theatre’s Director of Production.

Close-up of a cooked London Broil steak on a wooden cutting board with "a Teatro Live! RECIPE - London Broil, as featured on stage in The Odd Couple" in

London Broil - What is it?

Much of the tension in The Odd Couple’s central act is generated by Felix’s determination to serve a perfectly cooked London Broil for his and Oscar’s double dinner date with the Pigeon sisters. A quick poll of our rehearsal room found not everyone equally well-versed in the particulars of this one-time menu staple. So we did a little research and discovered two rather significant things; London Broil is American in origin (Philadelphian most likely) and it is often not broiled, but rather grilled or pan-seared. The name is believed to have been applied as a marketing measure, as the dish’s most accurate name -Marinated Flank Steak- seemed less appealing. Basically, a London Broil is made by marinating a tougher, less expensive cut of beef - flank steak, top round, or skirt steak- searing it on or under high heat, and most importantly, slicing it across the grain. Maximum juiciness is achieved by not cooking the meat beyond medium rare, so - as Felix learns - timing is everything. 

SEE THE TEATRO LIVE RECIPE FOR "LONDON BROIL"
Two men having a phone conversation indoors. One man with short brown hair, wearing a striped short sleeve shirt, appears surprised or confused. The other man, wearing a blue hat, olive green shirt, and beige pants, is talking on a black corded telep
A man wearing a blue shirt and a blue hat is gesturing with his hands while speaking to another man sitting on a couch. The room has a yellow wall with decorative round mirrors and modern lights.
Two men are engaged in a conversation in a room with a dining table and chairs. One man, in a cream shirt, stands on the left. The other man, wearing a blue shirt and hat, and with tattoos on his arm, is on the right, gesturing with his hands. The ro
A group of seven men in a living room, engaged in a theatrical scene. One man in a hat and floral shirt is reaching towards a seated man in a striped pajama top, while another man in glasses kneels beside them. A third man in a green shirt and beige
Two women are peeking out from behind a door labeled 1306, laughing and looking at two men in suits standing outside. One man is opening the door, and the other is observing. The scene appears to be indoors, in a dining area with a table set with a r
Four people sitting in a living room with vintage decor, two women in colorful dresses sitting together on a couch, and two men in suits sitting separately on chairs flanking the women, engaged in conversation.
Three people sitting on a couch, crying and visibly upset, in a living room. Two women are wearing colorful dresses, and a man in a brown suit is in the middle.
Scene from the TV show 'Schitt's Creek' featuring a man in a suit with red cleaning gloves holding a dustpan, and two women sitting on a sofa wearing colorful dresses and glasses, with a man in a suit standing nearby.
Two men in suits are in a room; one sitting with a serious expression, the other in the background dancing and smiling.
A man in dress shoes cleaning up cereal spilled on a dark wooden floor with a broom in a mid-century styled living room, while another man relaxes on an orange couch reading a newspaper.
Two men are facing each other across a dining table, leaning forward with hands on the table, appearing confrontational in a tense discussion.
A scene from a theatrical play set in a living room, with four men seated at a table and two men standing near a yellow sofa.
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Media Release: The Odd Couple