Fringe Play Reviews

Winnipeg Free Press - ONLINE EDITION

The Green Room

By: Scott Cranwill and Kevin Doherty

Magic Toaster Productions / Winnipeg

07/13/2010 8:57 PM | Comments: 0 (including replies) Our Rating: Your Average Rating:

This locally produced satire about a Hollywood career resurrection starts auspiciously with an episode of In the Actor’s Face, an interview show wherein the newly revived actor Jonathan Harvey (Scott Cranwill, who co-wrote The Green Room with Kevin Doherty) shares his genius with the show’s unctuous, celeb-worshipping host (a very funny bit by Peter Nadolny).

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What Harvey doesn’t share is the truth behind his resuscitated career — the secret program known as the "Green Room," which involves assuming the identity of a capitalist preacher attempting to insert a Walmart-like retail outlet into the little burg of Hiatus, Wis.

The comedy has its share of interesting ideas and performances (Chantel Marostica melds an animal-shelter volunteer with a Bond villain). But the tone and the writing are often uneven (i.e. not funny) and in need of judicious trimming. The Green Room illustrates a fringe maxim: Inside every bloated 80-minute play, there’s a better, leaner 60-minute play dying to get out.

— Randall King

From the official Fringe Festival guide:

When a scandal derails movie star Johnathan Harvey's career, a bizarre performance rehabilitation program known as The Green Room is the only way back to the top. Taking on a new identity, his every move watched, he fakes his way into the hearts of a small town community.

A tale of love, lies and redemption… not necessarily in that order.

In 3-D.

Warnings: Subject Matter, Language, Gunshots, Strobe Lights, Herbal Cigarettes,
RECOMMENDED: Mature Audience

75 min

Tickets: $10
Discount Tickets: $8 for Matinees

Babes in arms permitted.

MTC Warehouse (Venue 6), to July 24

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