Fringe Play Reviews

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Heart-Strings

By: Written by Tanya Elchuk with original music by Amy Crnkovic. Created by Tanya Elchuk and Amy Crnkovic.

Tanya Elchuk & Amy Crnkovic / Thunder Bay, ON

07/14/2010 9:40 PM | Comments: 0 (including replies) Our Rating: Your Average Rating:

The Thunder Bay tandem of Tanya Elchuk and Amy Crnkovic have penned and perform a modest but sweet meditation on the enduring internal battle between a person’s heart and her brain. In this 40-minute physical comedy, a red-headed girl in a plaid jumper receives her heart in a box without instructions and struggles to make it do what she wants.

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In the key heart-wants-what-it-wants scene, the girl’s ticker is attracted to several guys in the audience and pulls at the girl to join it in gleeful pursuit. It graphically dramatizes how people are at the mercy of their heart’s desires and how it's at the root of many questionable hook-ups. Red is appalled by her love connections and fears she has a defective heart, so trades it in for a better model at a pawnshop.

Of course, the girl and her heart are reconciled and come together in a symbolic dance of mutual admiration.

As the heart of the show, Crnkovic has more fun, singing and physical demands but Elchuk succeeds at being believable to anybody who ever has been appalled at what they are attracted to.

— Kevin Prokosh

From the official Fringe Festival guide:

"A brave work. Authentic, original, innovative, positive, entertaining and delightful" – The Chronicle Journal

"Stretches its viewers from shock through hilarity to mush" – Kenora Daily Miner

A rollicking, irreverent adventure through love, hope, despair and self-discovery, Heart-Strings is a surrealist romantic comedy about a girl and her heart. Physical theatre, storytelling and live music.

http://www.heartstringstheplay.blogspot.com

Warnings: Subject Matter, Language,
RECOMMENDED: General Audience

45 min

Venue 10 (Rachel Browne Theatre)

Tickets: $10

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