Like any nineteen-year-old, this year’s Fringe was a bit sassy, a little clumsy, affecting a touch of shyness with a bit of swagger thrown in. There was a dearth of shows to pick from, with the 141 selections spanning more than twentyfive venues across the city. There were, as usual, the touring pros who know how to pack the house, but there was also a crop of homegrown material that brought both innovation and entertainment to the hordes of patrons dashing from venue to venue. The Varsity waited in the sun and rain with crowds of locals and out-of-towners, all clamouring to see the hits (and in some cases, the misses) of the fest. Here’s the wrap-up from this year’s lineup, highlighting the various productions and what they brought to the party.-NS
Escape From Grace – Factory Theatre Mainspace
This tight little family drama by recent Ryerson grad Haley McGee was both great and exceedingly standard-for all the same reasons. In a festival where quirky rules, McGee focused on a real family with issues that were funny and tender. The family in question-the Mc- Carthys-are trying to come to terms with the loss of their youngest child (the titular Grace), who drowned under uncertain circumstances. Each of the characters cope with it in his or her own way, and the acting, particularly from the younger performers, was outstanding in its interpretation of mourning and all the trappings that come with it. If anything, McGee’s big, heartfelt script sprawled out a little too much and some of the plot points weren’t much more than a few quick references- like traditionalist brother Adam’s loss of virginity or the somewhat hasty ending that suddenly veered toward the supernatural. Despite these flaws, Escape From Grace was still poignant and well-directed, showcasing a lot of fine performances from some extremely talented Ryerson grads.-NS
Rating: VVV
Manners For Men – Glen Morris Theatre
Mum’s the word when it comes to Justin Sage-Passant’s one-man show Manners For Men. Drawing on the hyper-awkward comedy styles of Larry David and Ricky Gervais, Manners tells the story of Brit-git Frank Wilson, a well-spoken yet pathetic thirtysomething who is continuously haunted by a public incident of explosive diarrhea in his past. Frank now lives in perpetual servitude to his condescending and increasingly senile mother, a relationship that nicely mimics Samuel Beckett’s ruminations on the burden of the elderly. To that end, Frank’s morbid and excessively embarrassing relationship with his mother (he bathes her, dresses her, and even hand-washes her unmentionables) comes to a head in a hilarious, cringeworthy, and rather fitting climax. While primarily playing the role of Frank, Sage-Passant does an excellent job of seamlessly switching off between Mum and a whole host of secondary characters in a variety of settings without a set or any props, except a single chair. The result was both disgusting and beautiful.- JB
Rating: VVVV
BASH’d – Factory Theatre Mainspace
BASH’d, the high-octane “Gay Rap Opera,” featured Chris Craddock and Nathan Cuckow performing the multi-character musical they penned. Although BASH’d was fun and wellstaged, it was so over the top that at times the finer points failed to resonate, and the themes regarding equality and gay rights came off as one-dimensional. Nevertheless, Craddock and Cuckow were so good at making their rap alter-egos sympathetic and complex that it was easy to overlook the slightly heavy-handed message at the end. Highlights include a fantastic tour of the club where the two lovers, Jack and Dylan (rap monikers: Feminem and T-Bag) meet and fall in love. Altogether, a fun show with relevant points which would have been better served had they not been tacked on in the final ten minutes.-NS
Rating: VVv
Die Roten Punkte – Glen Morris Theatre
These Germanic clown brother/sister punk rockers put the White Stripes, the Dresden Dolls, and Hedwig to shame with their insane, loud, repetitive numbers, killer guitar riffs, mad glockenspiel playing, and incestuous interludes. The audience was going nuts for the pair-dubbed Otto and Astrid Rot-which I guess makes sense since, as Astrid continually asserts, they are so famous. Their song “Die Roten Punkte” is practically the national anthem in Germany, and it even has the power to cure arthritis. There wasn’t much of a plot, and Die Roten Punkte stuck to the concert format, providing banter in between tunes that often went into exposing how their parents died (murdered by a train, Otto reveals), and determining which of the two siblings is getting more audience attention. Some of the gags went on a little too long; for example, Otto’s jealous response to Astrid’s friendliness with a man in the front row could have taken half the time that it did. Other than that, Die Roten Punkte was an übergood time, and the only company to stay in character even after the show was over. Their theme song is also diabolically catchy-and not the sort of thing you can sing quietly to yourself while waiting for the streetcar.-NS
Rating: VVVv
Looking After Eden – St. Vladimir’s Theatre
Stephen Massicotte’s Looking After Eden wanted to be a pop-culture-cluttered existential love story, but instead had to settle for being an ADHD-fuelled dramatic cock-tease. Kepler (Greg Schneider) and Halley (Jayne Collins) are the quintessential odd couple who get stuck house-sitting the same space. Naturally they rub each other the wrong way; Kepler is a pissy, horny, and childish version of The Dude from The Big Lebowski, while Halley is engaged and on-track for some version of domestic bliss. Why neither of them leaves out of simple redundancy (a house only needs one sitter, right?) is never explained, but I guess that would kill the chances of their pointless bickering leading to sexual tension. To their credit, Schneider and Collins did well at filling out these characters, and were always on top of the quick pacing. Plus, the aforementioned tension between them was palpable and totally believable when it finally arrived. What killed this performance was that the tension and energy created by Kepler’s nonstop, high-octane pseudo-philosophical rants isn’t paid out in the ending. Sometimes it works to end with a whimper, but after an unnecessarily-long 90 minutes of build-up, all I wanted to see was a big bang.-JB
Rating: VVV
The Gladstone Variations Part One – The Gladstone Hotel
A bride backlit by a cloud-free sky; a bellhop lying prone on a flight of stairs; a dotty old lady singing Elvis under a flickering light before disappearing round a corner. The two one-acts in Convergence Theatre’s remarkable achievement were equally striking in execution, drawing the audience into the multi-dimensional staging at the Gladstone Hotel and leading groups from floor to floor. Taking a page from John Krizanc’s similarly site-specific Tamara, The Tearful Bride and Requiem for a Hotel both used the restored Gladstone to tell tales of mystery, loneliness, and gentrification. Of the two, Mike McPhaden’s Requiem was more resonant-both funny and biting. Janet Amos gave a remarkable performance as the sweet but unsophisticated Rhonda who, banned from the Melody Bar, seeks to find other ways of getting her karaoke fix, with surprising results. The stirring conclusion created a moment of pure theatrical harmony, and there was a definite sense of change and solidarity within the small audience as we left the characters in the hallway of the hotel, so captivating was the fiction of it all. There is already talk of a remount, so get ready-these Variations are not to be missed.-NS
Rating: VVVVV
Serena de Bergerac – Theatre Passe Muraille
Yasmin Siddiqui’s Serena de Bergerac was both clever and charming, and the young cast served it well. A threehander about artsy high-schoolers with a penchant for communicating via the interweb, the play was a tongue-in-cheek, gender-reversing revision of Cyrano de Bergerac. Serena, played charismatically by Chloe Sullivan, acts as the go-between for her two best friends Rob and Christy. By LOLing her way across cyberspace, Serena manages to convince Rob that Christy is his kind of girl by writing for her friend. It sounds a little sociopathic, but it all works out swimmingly in the end. The great part was watching Serena realize her true feelings for Rob, and vice versa. A little predictable, but altogether a fun show with great performances and a satisfying payoff at the end. Bonus: you have to admire playwright and director Siddiqui for her ability to write teens so sympathetically spot-on and still manage to comment wittily on some of the more asinine aspects-like the jabs at internet spelling. LMAO, RLY.-NS
Rating: VVV
I Keep Dropping Sh*t – The MaRS Centre
A lecture on Newtonian physics, complete with white board (and board game) demonstrations, is the platform for the latest installment in Small Wooden Shoe’s Dedicated to the Revolutions series. What makes I Keep Dropping Sht so appealing is that the spirited cast use Newton’s laws as a wry analogy for psychological, existential, and will-based “drops.” The performer/lecturers work on a variety of levels, shifting between funny factrelation and well-guarded personal undertones. A particularly funny moment came when the six-and-a-half foot Brendan Gall explained that objects with greater mass possess more gravitational pull, and was interrupted by the more diminutive Evan Webber who stated that smaller objects possess, um, attractive qualities as well. What elevated I Keep Dropping Sht beyond the ironic spectacle of theatre artists wearing ties and talkin’ science was the pleasure the company obviously took in sharing the information. The unique venue in the daunting MaRS facility added to the institutional feel, but “The Inertia Song” and a spirited round of Jenga helped undercut that vibe. Definitely a Fringe fave.-NS
Rating: VVVV
Betrayal – Theatre Passe Muraille
At the fringe, straight fare doesn’t usually go over as well as the “one crazy guy, talking about his opinions” kind of show-mainly due to production constraints and a sort of repulsive earnestness. Happily, Betrayal is definitely the exception. Brian Rintoul’s logically frenetic direction enhanced the tense relationships in Pinter’s 1978 relationship drama, which uses reverse chronology to reveal the various betrayals in question. The attention to set, costume and music was also well-executed: empty bottles and glasses progressively crowded the set, which was also rigged with frayed ropes, as the action moved backwards to the source of the adulterous affair between Jerry and Emma. The acting was uniformly strong, and the three performers evoked much humanity in their sometimes selfish, often callous characters. Pinterrific.-NS
Rating: VVVV
Ubu Roi (Massacred) – Hub 14
Alfred Jarry’s Ubu Roi is not an easy play to enjoy, crammed as it is with grotesque images, sounds, and characters. Nonetheless, it was hysterically good-particularly when performed by a shortened cast of three who, like a trio of seething and sweating Gollums, cycled through the multifarious characters with dizzying energy. Packed into the intimate and appropriately stuffy Hub 14, Rob Baker, Lisa Codrington and Erin Shields do-it-themselves to the extreme under Gideon Arthur’s dynamic direction and simple-but-effective design. Thanks to the skill and dexterity of the company, Ubu Roi (Massacred) fully expresses the greed and gluttony of Pere Ubu and his minions, somehow evoking Shakespeare and contemporary consumerism while yelling the word “shitter” and nailing amorphous pantyhose shapes at each other.-NS
Rating: VVVVV
Monkey Love – Theatre Passe Muraille
Maureen Gualtieri’s clever script about battling behavior psychologists was enjoyable and witty. The staging was creative, if not altogether seamless, and the actors did their best to keep up with all of the location changes- even crawling into cages to pose as the rhesus monkeys who were the subjects of study. As energetic as the cast was, some of the performances were either incredibly broad or completely innocuous. Monkey Love faltered in weaving together the various subplots, which were over-ambitiousness in their scope. The quirky peripheral events were charming, but detracted from some of the more contemplative aspects of Gualtieri’s script. Still, gotta love a good Ordinary People joke: “Timothy Hutton gave me the shivers!” And that’s the truth.-NS
Rating: VVV
Kafka and Son – Tarragon Mainspace
Alon Nashman gives a performance that is both absorbing and humane, bringing to life material culled from Franz Kafka’s epic letter to his father- a letter that, ultimately, was never sent. Nashman is able to embody both Kafkas, shifting deftly from the slight and sickly Franz to the more brutish Kafka Sr. with ease. Contributing to Nashman’s performance was the overall design-set pieces constructed of rusty steel cages and black feathers underscored Kafka’s all-consuming neuroses. Andrea Lundy’s spectacular lighting further evoked Kafka’s psychological retreat, at one point relying on a handheld (but well-hidden) light that Nashman used to illuminate just his face, otherwise surrounded by undisturbed blackness. But Kafka’s words themselves wavered. lthough moving, the admissions and appeals to his absent father occasionally turned into mere self-flagellation, and there was little sense of accomplishment- although that may have been the point.-NS
Rating: VVVv
Legoland – Theatre Passe Muraille
“Wrestling is real-it’s the world that’s set up.” So goes the closing line of Jacob Richmond’s humorous and poignant two-hander, spoken by the bespectacled ADHD-afflicted Ezra Lamb. Legoland is the Ritalin-fuelled “presentation” of the Lamb siblings, sixteenyear- old Penny and thirteen-year-old Ezra. What starts as Penny’s funny and eccentric vaudevillian attempt to shorten her community service soon segues into a story of siblings who, continually alienated, embark on a Greyhound quest across the U.S. of A. Britt Small’s creative direction, combined with Celine Stubel and Amitai Marmorstein’s performances, made Legoland a highlight of the festival. Use of projections, ukulele, and puppets further enhanced the production- for example, when Penny was named “the school lesbian” by a bouquet of Barbies brandished by puppetmaster Ezra.-NS
Rating: VVVVv
