Geek Life - A Guy You'd Want to Have a Beer With

We are all geeky about something. To be a geek means to be unapologetically passionate about something that you love and mediums that move you. What are you geeky about?
This is the premise of Geek Life.

The lights go down and a geeky sound montage begins. Star Wars. Star Trek. Doctor Who. Aji, pronounced, “Awe gee,” Slater enters the stage and presents us with a stream of consciousness about how he came to be a geek that literally grew up to run away with the circus. The simple staging works and Slater is a loveable and non-threatening presence. He is the kind of guy you would want to sit down to have a beer with, while listening to stories about his love of juggling and his online dating trials and tribulations.

While watching from an audience however I found myself wanting less talking and more doing. The physical moments, the juggling and the pratfall, those were the moments when the show really crackled. The pop culture references were fun and he puts his heart on his sleeve. He could be your friend; your brother or your classmate and his stories are relatable. My friend next to me found herself reacting out loud to a particularly awkward break up story. She forgot she was in a theatre and that he was on stage. In that moment it was as if they were in a pub together. The fourth wall didn’t exist. When an audience member reacts that strongly to a story you are telling you are doing something right. He acknowledged her reaction but then moved on quite quickly. He is naturally a playful performer and in a moment such as that there was more fun to be had.

I found myself waiting for him to loosen up. The difficulty in touring a show is re-living those moments with an audience as if you have never lived them before. There was a feeling of going through the motions. There were times the monologue seemed forced. In particular when it came to him speaking about conversations with his parents. Instead of re-living he just re-told. He never fully committed to embodying his parents so those moments fell a bit flat even though there was potential for development. Slater lights up when he tells a story about juggling in an airport for 250 tired travelers during Christmas. His eyes shone as he relived that memory. He was in it and we were there with him. That was the first time those passengers had gotten to exhale in hours and Slater reminds us all of why the arts exist, to bring joy in an otherwise mundane situation. Those moments we come alive and we come together. The show was fun. There was laughter. There was juggling. There was the word, “whovian,” used more than once. Slater asks us what it means to be a clown and what it means to be a geek in the circus of life.

If you are interested in catching Geek Life try to attend the Monday Sept 9th 9:15pm showing. Half of the ticket sales will be going to suicide prevention and the show is dedicated to a friend that recently passed away.