Big Top Fringe Tattler

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 15/07/2011 (5543 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

FRINGE RINGMASTER Chuck McEwen is bursting his clown buttons over opening night attendance for Big Top Fringe. “We broke another record for first day with 4,108 tickets sold for our indoor shows,” he says. “That’s up 17 per cent from last year! Remember this was only a partial day with 54 performances — an average of 76 people per show, and that’s amazing!”

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CURTAIN FALL: On opening night, lawyer Lyle Smordin of Smordin Pauls was playing Albert Einstein in The Physicists at the Warehouse in front of more than 200 people, and all was going swimmingly. “At the end I was to give a speech and exit between the curtains. But, I walked off in a complete black-out, and walked right off the stage,” he laughs. “I landed on my knee and had to scramble back up the stairs to take bows.” No serious damage but no tennis for him today.

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ART IMITATES LIFE: Not many people know Julie Horbal, who plays “Claw” in the show So You Think You Can Be a Music Theatre Idol: All-Stars, actually tried out for the real Canadian Idol. Her teacher encouraged her to leave class and go right down to do the tryouts. Horbal arrived on a bad hair day wearing old grey sweats and sang Cowboy Take Me Away. “And then they bounced me right out!” says Horbal.

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VICTOR GOMEZ of the one-man show Lizardboy is giving away 15 pairs of tickets to his Saturday performance at 11:15 p.m. Gomez plays a nine-year-old, trouble-making rascal from the barrio (the hood) revealing twin themes of violence and innocence. His show arises from his own experiences as a child in the violent Colombia of the ’80s. If you’d like a pair of free tickets, email mscurf@shaw.ca to get your names on the guest list at the Venue 8 Rachel Browne Theatre door, and claim them at least 30 minutes before showtime. You’ll be notified by email if you win. Today’s show is at noon, tickets $10.

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TALK ABOUT FRUSTRATION! The Post No Bills gang struggled all opening day in the wind and heat to get up just the bare bones of their rectangular scaffolding, losing a whole day of showcasing local art on a white cube at the fringe. “We had thought we could start the day before, but it turned out we couldn’t,” says Joe Kalturnyk. The concept is noble — get real paintings by local artists out to the public, which they can buy for $40-$2,000. Look for works by artists such as Noam Gonick, Guy Maddin, Diana Thornycroft and Paul Butler. Check them out at Arthur Street at McDermot Avenue, near the Free Press News Café.

mscurf@shaw.ca