Oh! the Humanity – and Other Good Intentions – Not Just Good Intentions

Oh! the Humanity lived up to my high expectations. The description of “a masterfully witty script” through a “filter of jet black comedy” is exactly my favorite kind of Fringe show. And I got not one, not two, but five great scripts.

Maryanne Renzetti and Brad Duffy take the play through the characters' range of emotions from confusion, loss, anger, frustration in a way that even a day later makes me smile and chuckle as I write this. The situations are ones we've either been in or been exposed to. Will Eno's words, however, help us look more closely (incidentally, “look” is a word used a lot in the show). So we've watched the coach who's just lost the season and may be about to lose his job, but here we get to hear what else he's losing. A Hospitality graduate has to deliver the news to the relatives of those killed in a plane crash and she just knows it's not appropriate to talk about her father who died recently in his armchair. But she does.

I do believe it will make me look more carefully and more kindly on those who make difficult public speeches. (Just in time for Election 2015).

Both main actors manage to play the range from subtle to over-the-top, in a good way.

Some Fringe shows are categorized as “in your face”; this one more inserts itself into your mind and into your heart.

The final short play is the most absurd and reflects to us that we never know whether we're experiencing a beginning or an ending. This is the only one where the third actor, Tom Pickett, appears. And there's a car. Or is there?

I absolutely recommend this one. I know it's hard to leave Granville Island to go to the Downtown Eastside, but there are several excellent shows down there, so make it worth the trip and find two. You can grab a quick dinner at New Mitzie's at Pender and Main (eggplant dish is wonderful. And it comes with wifi).

Final note: If, like me, you weren't sure where the phrase comes from, here's what Urban Dictionary explains: “Oh the humanity” is a phrase equivalent to “Oh my God!!!,” but with more emotion. Assosciated with the Hindenburg disaster, Herb Morrison, a reporter for WLS Radio in Chicago, who was covering the event live, cried out, “It's burst into flames! Get out of the way! please! Oh my, this is terrible... Oh, the humanity! ... and all the passengers!”

By Mary Bennett