Arts and Entertainment

‘The Wonder of It All’ returns in a bold new production at Theatre Orangeville

October 2, 2025   ·   0 Comments

By Joshua Drakes

Theatre Orangeville is set to open its season with a bang. The Wonder of It All by Mark Weatherley, an original play that is coming back expanded and reimagined since its first presentation in 2021.  

With a cast of seasoned talent, the production will follow Kingsley (Mark Weatherley) and Charmaine (Monique Lund), a couple navigating love, work, and family life across different stages of their marriage. The story moves fluidly between past and present, exploring how the couple met, what drew them together, and the challenges that threaten to pull them apart when faces from their past reappear.

Weatherley said that while the story remains a comedy first and foremost, there is much more to the story for audiences to take away, especially now that it has been expanded into a two-act production.

“I think what’s cool about the show is, if you want to come just because you want some laughs, there’s lots of laughs in it, but if you want a little more, there’s more depth to it than that,” he said. “It still starts out when they meet, and then they have trouble, but there was a giant hunk in the middle that I hadn’t really explored.”

He said that now, audiences can expect to see much more detail and nuance in the marriage of Charmaine and Kingsley that guests did not see before.

“This one explores more about their marriage and leads us to sort of the conflict later on, so that’s filled out more,” he said. “I think it’s a fuller, funnier and [a] more compelling story with that exploration.”

This production will seek to explore the polar opposites that are Charmaine and Kingsley, who met through music, and whose totally different outlooks on life attracted them to each other.

A dreamer at heart, Kingsley is creative and full of joy in the early days of his marriage. He thrives on imagination and humour, but as life changes and the children leave home, he struggles to find his place. His love for Charmaine is genuine, yet he tends to undervalue himself, to the detriment of his marriage.

Driven, intellectual, and fiercely ambitious, Charmaine is a woman who has set the highest standards for her professional and personal life. Practical and detail-oriented, she is the opposite of Kingsley’s free-spirited nature, which both attracts and frustrates her. Throughout the story, she wrestles with the balance between achievement, expectations, and love, finding herself challenged by both the present and echoes from the past.

Lund, who plays Charmaine, said that this contrast between characters will inevitably spread into the audience, as the characters may seek confirmation of their worldviews through them.

“We need the audience in this play,” she said. “We really need people to work through what we’re trying to work through. We take moments where we will really enlist their help in a very kind of active way, through audience engagement.”

Lund, however, was clear that no one would be expected to take the stage.

“They don’t go on stage,” she said. “I know people hate that. They’re still in the dark.”

Lund continued by saying this approach makes every performance unique, as live audiences and live performances play off of each other in surprising ways.

“We always say that, you know, the audience is the final character,” she said. “That one person or that one voice or that one laugh can change the whole texture of the audience. And with that, we make those micro adjustments to the story that you only get with a live performance.”

The play is supported by one of Theatre Orangeville’s most ambitious set designs to date. Artistic director Jennifer Stewart said that it will blow the audience away.

“I think it possibly is one of the most fantastical sets that we’ve ever had on the Theatre Orangeville stage. Becky Morris, our set designer, has gone above and beyond,” she said. “We have giant flowers because there’s a theme of gardening and sort of cultivating your relationships, cultivating who you are as a person.”

This set will adapt and change as Kingsley and Charmaine’s relationship evolves over time.

“We have that as a theme throughout the play, where we would have this giant garden that sort of grows as Kingsley becomes a fuller person and works on himself, and therefore can work on his marriage,” Stewart said. “We also have a giant ukulele on the stage, because music is what connected Kingsley and Charmaine in the first place.

The play promises to deliver an experience that will be positive for everyone. If you’ve come looking for laughs, you’ll find them. If you’re there for relatable relationship struggles and reflection, you’ll find that as well.

The Wonder of It All runs from Oct. 9 to 26 at Theatre Orangeville, offering audiences a chance to experience laughter, heart, and the magic of live performance.

Tickets are available online now on Theatre Orangeville’s website: theatreorangeville.ca/show/the-wonder-of-it-all

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