Fringe Play Reviews

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No Traveler: A comedy about suicide

By: Penny Pollak

Pennypollak, New York, NY

07/16/2011 2:00 PM | Comments: 0 (including replies) Our Rating:

Playhouse Studio (Venue 3), to Sunday

No Traveler: A comedy about suicide

Fringe Festival

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In a wine- and pill-fuelled fit of anger and despair, a young woman decides to punish her neglectful father by turning a straight razor on herself.

She wakes up in a vomit-filled tin bucket. And in purgatory. Her only way out is to return to Earth and stop other self-destructive women from doing what she did.

This dark and slightly creepy solo version of It’s a Wonderful Life is inventive and brilliantly executed. New York’s Penny Pollak, with her intense eyes and wild mane, is a charismatic and very physical performer.

But a fractured script makes it hard to keep track of the so-called body count as Pollak, between monologues, handles both sides of the conversations between the "angel" from the bucket and the person she’s trying to convince that life is worth living.

And despite the title, there’s only a touch of gallows humour. Unless you’re into edgy theatre, the hour might feel like purgatory.

— Carolin Vesely

From the official Fringe Festival program:

Penny Pollak exposes a flashing razor blade, heaven, hell, musical dance numbers, a bucket and a body count of nine. No Traveler combines vaudevillian moments, original music and the universal experience of the heartbreaking act of suicide with the one thing that helps us keep going … laughter. Did I mention there's a body count of nine?

Recommended For: General Audience

Length: 60 MIN

Tickets: $10

Discount Tickets: $7 for Students, Seniors, Fringe performers

Warnings: Gunshots

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History

Updated on Saturday, July 16, 2011 at 2:00 PM CDT:
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