Theatre review: Arts Club's The Golden Anniversaries weaves a tender story about love and memory
With strong performances and set design, Mark Crawford’s dramedy relives a marriage’s milestones on a lived-in cottage’s cosy front porch
Eileen Barrett and Peter Anderson in The Golden Anniversaries. Photo by Moonrider Productions
The Arts Club Theatre presents The Golden Anniversaries until February 15 at the Granville Island Stage.
HOW DO YOU celebrate 50 years of marriage? From playwright Mark Crawford comes The Golden Anniversaries, a fast-paced, laugh-out-loud funny story about love, memory, and the beautiful messiness of a long life together.
And if you’re not in a position to know what half a century of marriage feels like, don’t worry; it’s not a prerequisite to enjoying this piece.
Upon entering the theatre, the eye is immediately drawn to Ryan Cormack’s impressive set. As is typical of an Arts Club production, the level of care and attention to detail is incredible, and Cormack’s cottage does a tremendous amount of storytelling on its own. The set transports the audience to a muggy summer day in rural Canada and remains visually engaging throughout the nearly two-hour production, despite never changing locations. The wooden deck is outfitted with a barbecue, leafy planters, buckets of garden tools, long grass poking up beside one corner of the deck, and a string of lights stretching from front to back. Two cherry-painted, well-worn Adirondack chairs sit together, having played witness to five decades of marriage. The cottage itself is decorated with red-trimmed windows, the door is chipped white metal with a heart-scroll lattice, and, upon actors entering and exiting, a faint glow of warm yellow light can be seen from inside the cottage.
The entire play takes place on this deck, making it imperative that the space feels alive—and it does. The result is a setting that feels both deeply familiar and quietly special, a place you want to step into and stay awhile.
We first meet Glen Golden (Peter Anderson) as he carefully prepares the deck: placing a bottle of wine just so, hanging metallic balloons, and tuning the radio. As the decorations suggest, this is a big one—their 50th anniversary.
When Sandy Golden (Eileen Barrett) arrives, however, it becomes clear that things have not gone according to plan. The party has been cancelled. The cake too. And perhaps, as Sandy asserts, the marriage itself. This cottage has hosted every anniversary before, but it’s not where Sandy had hoped to find herself today.
Nevertheless, the two begin to reminisce on their past anniversaries, and as they talk, the audience is carried through a series of anniversaries past, all spent at the cottage. Alexandra Caprara’s thoughtful lighting design gently guides us through time, seamlessly shifting us from memory to memory.
We’re transported from one anniversary to the next: some defined by romance and others by heat waves, illness, irritations, and overwork. Crawford’s great strength is his refusal to sentimentalize longevity.
By the end of the first act, you can’t help but wonder where this couple—and this marriage—can possibly go from here.
Crawford’s dialogue is quick, punchy, and acutely observant. In The Golden Anniversaries, he’s nailed how long-term partners speak to one another: the shorthand, the teasing, the defensiveness, and the love that persists beneath it all.
Peter Anderson is downright charming as Glen. His grounded, steady presence makes the moments when that stability falters genuinely unsettling. Watching him lose his footing emotionally is quietly heartbreaking, and Anderson’s casting feels pitch-perfect.
Eileen Barrett is equally compelling, skillfully navigating Sandy from young adulthood through middle age and into her senior years with precision, wit, and emotional clarity. Her performance captures both Sandy’s sharp edges and her vulnerability, often within the same breath.
Director Arthi Chandra must also be commended for honouring Crawford’s balance of humour and heartbreak, allowing the play’s biggest laughs and quietest devastations to land with equal weight.
The Golden Anniversaries is a funny, tender story about love and the promise to hold each other through every year, even as memories fade and change. 
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