Hook, line and sinker: even more fringe play reviews

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 20/07/2024 (455 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Agency

Broken Record Productions

Asper Centre for Theatre and Film at U of W (Venue 10), to Saturday, July 27

The problem with a lot of stories about social problems is many of them try to solve those problems. Sometimes just telling the story lights a fire under those in power who can do something about it. This is the strength of Agency: it isn’t trying to give an easy answer to a hard question.

This 75-minute drama by Barb Janes follows the story of three adoptees trying to escape the endless maze of the agency that apprehended them. The three local leads shine, particularly Cynthia Wolfe-Nolin as Claire, an Anishinaabe girl who yearns for her “real” mom. The chemistry of the three actors made each reveal of their characters beyond bittersweet

Agency never provides an easy solution, because it isn’t trying to. It inspires the audience to demand an answer to the question it is asking. 🐟🐟🐟🐟 ½

— Sonya Ballantyne

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Bangs, Bobs and Banter: Confessions of a Hairstylist

Gravity Theatre

Asper Centre for Theatre and Film at U of W (Venue 10), to Saturday, July 27

Via an assortment of wigs, Vancouver’s Joanna Rannelli (Private Parts) tells the tales of patrons who frequent Nikki’s salon, the hairdresser who connects them all. (The set design, which shows all the wigs being connected to Nikki’s chair, is a great visual.)

Nikki’s clients span age and gender, but not class, mostly representing the middle and upper-middle class, which is a disadvantage to the one-hour production. Rannelli really shines when she is in the wig of the elderly woman living her life to the fullest and the wig of a woman trying to find out who she is before she dies of cancer; those characters represent women who are at a beauty disadvantage and their stories hit the hardest.

Joanna Rannelli is incredibly talented and a joy to witness. 🐟🐟🐟 ½

— Sonya Ballantyne

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House of Gold

Brighter Dark Theatre

The Output (Venue 12), to Saturday, July 27

The greedy adult children of country music legend John Gold have been milking his legacy for years. But when the family fortune dwindled, all hopes were pinned on grandson Jimmy (local playwright Thomas McLeod) to keep the cash flowing.

Now, Jimmy isn’t really Gold’s grandson — but he’s close enough. And when he doesn’t develop into the musical talent John Gold was, the desperate family pushes him along, resorting to exhaustive musical training, followed by drugs, psychological conditioning, and sabotaging his attempts at making outside friends.

Jimmy’s gentle surrogate mother Mary (Maggie Koreen) begs the family to let Jimmy live a normal life, but she is rebuffed chillingly: “You are a womb. Nothing more.” Now the family has one last extreme measure left to try…what could possibly go wrong?

McLeod wrote this darkly comedic thriller in only four months, citing The Twilight Zone and Succession as inspirations, along with input from the cast. Call it 50 minutes of fringe gold. 🐟🐟🐟🐟🐟

— Janice Sawka

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Little Red and the Werewolf

All About Theatre Kids

The Gargoyle Theatre (Venue 25), to Saturday, July 27

Having once played a Christmas tree in a school play, this reviewer immediately appreciated the tree chorus of Little Red and the Werewolf. At just under 45 minutes, this delightful little tale follows Little Red and her friend Billy as they dodge a werewolf in a forest full of vocal trees. Accompanied by multi-instrumentalist Callum, Little Red gives the feeling of a vaudeville act or a silent film.

The impromptu special effects, the fourth-wall-breaking, and the set design are wonderful. The local ensemble cast is great, with a shoutout to the actress playing Little Red for the July 19 performance (the cast alternates roles).

The venue with its gargoyle statues and goth touches adds to this adorable show. 🐟🐟🐟🐟

— Sonya Ballantyne

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My Toes Striving Till the Tips of Your Fingers

Johanne Gour Danse

Théâtre Cercle Molière (Venue 3), to Friday, July 26

This full-length contemporary dance work from Montreal choreographer Johanne Gour is an absorbing meditation on our fickle physical body, and the ways in which it works as we expect and ways in which it doesn’t.

Performed by Amélie Albert, Alexandra MacLean and choreographer Gour — who uses a wheelchair — and set to a collage score, My Toes Striving… is all about contrasts in the body: struggle and ease, freedom and confinement, stiffness and flexibility, and just how quickly it all can change.

Sometimes Albert and MacLean move around like Barbie dolls that have been animated with no articulation in their knees and elbows, all sharp angles; other times they move fluidly, their bodies round and loose. Some of the vocabulary feels repetitive, but some is achingly beautiful — especially a scene in which Gour slowly, lovingly puts on pointe shoes she cannot stand in and bangs her feet on the floor in frustration.

All three dancers must come to each other’s aid at various points, occasionally reluctantly, helping each other to sit, to stand, to lie down. Sometimes, in order to move through the world, we must learn to lean on each other.

Note: this performance ran about an hour, not 75 minutes as stated in the program. 🐟🐟🐟🐟

— Jen Zoratti

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New Wave Your Behaviour

Hamilton 7

John Hirsch Mainstage (Venue 1), to Saturday, July 27

Written and performed by Hamilton, Ont.’s Tor Lukasik-Foss, this big-hearted one-man show is about finding your way back to yourself through music — in Lukasik-Foss’s case, 1980s new wave.

Lukasik-Foss is driving his kids to an activity — or picking them up, he’s not quite sure — when he experiences the uncomfortable sensation of encountering the formative music from his youth as a middle-aged man in a minivan. As he deals with the death of his mother and dissociative episodes, he descends into a new wave obsession, codifying the genre, identifying its archetypes — no spoilers, but “The Authority” sees him doing a decent Ian Curtis from Joy Division — and writing his own songs as he puzzles through his anxiety and grief with a counsellor.

This show is tremendously well-written with sparkling turns of phrase, but it’s in the musical performances where Lukasik-Foss truly shines: he transforms behind that keyboard. It’s a love letter to new wave — some cursory knowledge of the genre will increase your mileage — but it’s also a vulnerable look at a man feeling his feelings for the first time. 🐟🐟🐟🐟 ½

— Jen Zoratti

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One-Human Being, Potentially Comedic Performance of Nightmare Before Christmas

Living the Dream

Son of Warehouse (Venue 5), to Saturday

This 60-minute one-person comedy has the exuberant “let’s put on a show” energy of a high school play — no surprise, since Winnipeg’s Alli Perlov is a high school drama teacher. She admits right off the top of this goofy, heartfelt performance that she’s no Broadway performer, but that’s partly what makes her rapid-fire re-enactment (not a parody) of Tim Burton’s stop-motion musical so charming.

Using cheap and cheerful props and costumes, and plenty of (non-cringey) audience interaction (get there early to take full advantage), Perlov tells the tale of Halloween Town’s Jack Skellington and his attempts to hijack another holiday.

Despite her ardent fandom — see her armful of Nightmare tattoos — she pauses frequently to cheekily point out problematic plotting, but sincerely delivers the songs and brings the characters to life.

Highlights include a vampy rendition of Oogie Boogie’s Song, complete with tap dancing. A fringey delight. 🐟🐟🐟🐟

— Jill Wilson

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Tales Of A Reluctant World Traveler

Randy Ross

Dave Barber Cinematheque (Venue 7), to July 28

A self-centred homebody in his 60s kvetching about his four-month solo trip to eight countries, then moaning about the ordeal of getting his travel memoir published, may not sound appealing.

But Boston writer/storyteller Randy Ross is often laugh-out-loud funny. Accompanied by a goofy low-tech slide slow, he recounts his neurotic travel preparations, rotten sightseeing letdowns and horror at everything from parasitic Guinea-worm disease and “global diarrhea hotspots” to youth-hostel revelry. “I’m not the hardiest person,” he confesses.

Ross is guilty of some cheap, silly humour, and some of his travel-related discomfort is routine.

But the 55-minute show’s biggest delight is his animated delivery in a Jewish cadence that’s almost Frank Costanza-like in its bitterness. His aggrieved take on the magnificent Angkor Wat, an ancient temple complex in Cambodia that’s a World Heritage site? “I was TEMPLED OUT!” 🐟🐟🐟🐟

— Alison Mayes

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A Taste of Blood in the Mouth

Cerridwen Productions

The Output (Venue 12), to Saturday, July 27

As the audience files in, journalist Lily (Katie Welham), is looking very stern and professional in her grey blazer and tied-back hair. She is awaiting the arrival of Eve (Winnipeg playwright Kinsey Donald), the inmate she has arranged to interview. Eve arrives in her orange prison-issue slacks. Lily begins her questions with almost gee-whiz innocence, before reminding Eve that “she is in control.”

“I could leave right now and your story would be finished,” Eve responds.

“I could leave and get another story knowing you’re still rotting in here,” Lily fires back. And so begins an escalating verbal ping-pong, with the power position constantly shifting between the two characters. Lily wants the story of how Eve murdered her husband. Eve muses that women are better at revenge “because we have to be.” Things turn absurdist and surreal as the pair make physical contact, playing cards and agreeing to switch roles and perform the interview as each other.

Well-acted and compelling, this one will keep you guessing. 🐟🐟🐟🐟

— Janice Sawka

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What the Hell Was That?!

LST Entertainment

The Output (Venue 12), to Saturday, July 27

Looking dapper in his black tuxedo and melodramatically flipping his long dark curly mane like a mad maestro or a ’70s pop star, Edmonton’s Laren Steppler leads his audience through a kind of performance-art mashup.

We get the Beatles’ Revolution 9 playing over the speakers, jokes of varying degrees of success, exclamations of “What the hell was that?” Steppler insulting his pianist Yvonne Boon and percussionist Aaron Addorisio (who turn on him later), stripping down to leopard-print short, etc.

The musicians also perform examples of various types of music, ranging from opera to ’70s soul, glam rock, blues, and a really good segment featuring Steppler on bass doing 1960s psychedelia. (All that was missing was the pulsating lights.)

The show ends with the audience “na-na”-ing” to Steppler’s purported composition Hey Dude.

By turns funny, silly and sillier, maybe this one could Get Back to Winnipeg once the show has Come Together a little better. 🐟🐟 ½

— Janice Sawka