The indefatigable Jonno Katz brings his frenetic physicality back to this year’s Fringe with Cactus: The Seduction…, a surreal exploration of the artist’s psyche. Katz wanders through a barren desert with two mysterious companions, in constant pursuit of a distant figure on the horizon. He periodically lapses from this ‘reality’ into a dreamlike ‘fantasy’, during which points he engages the audience in conversation and delivers personal anecdotes.
Inveterate monologuist TJ Dawe returns from a Fringe sabbatical with his newest show Lucky 9, though something seems different this year. Notorious for his rapid fire, scattershot diatribes on any number of interwoven topics, Dawe usually comes across like Jerry Seinfeld on speed. In this instance the topics on hand include parenting, personality tests, addiction and HBO’s hit crime drama The Wire, though the most noteworthy theme weaving betwixt all his anecdotes and observations is the developments in the performer’s life over the previous year.
The hypothesis that the works of Shakespeare were penned by someone other than the Bard himself is hardly new or shocking; the academic world is fairly glutted with advocates of the point. Monster Theatre’s The Shakespeare Show offers a fairly lighthearted approach to this age-old scandal, telling a theoretical tale of how the talented and conflicted Earl of Oxford used an illiterate horseholder named Shakespeare to vicariously express his theatrical passions.
Raven for a Lark, the dark, two-person drama by Elise Newman presented by quoi quoi quoi, is stirring, disturbing and deeply effective. In it, two actors play two actors talking about their opening night in Titus Andronicus. Of all Shakespeare’s tragedies, this one is generally agreed to be his most violent work.
Five high school friends are stalked by two masked killers in this thematically confusing tribute to slasher films from Desk Rabbit Productions. Though I’m generally a fan of genre work on the stage, Oh (It Is Love) doesn’t seem entirely certain which genre it’s meant to fall under, wobbling unsteadily through bouts of comedy, romance, coming of age and, of course, horror. Far too much to try to cram into a feature film, let alone a one hour Fringe play.
Writers Warren MacDonald and Ryan Sero have crafted a stylistic tribute to the noir classics in their script for The Big Lie, presented by Audeamus, in which newshawk Danny Bell seeks to unravel the truth behind a mysterious mentalist who claims to communicate with the dead. Danny’s saucy editor and the Magnificent Bugiardo’s sultry assistant make up the femme fatales of this caper in which the truth is more mercurial than a hard boiled reporter is willing to admit.
Seven of Us, by Goldenberg Productions and currently on as part of the Toronto Fringe, is a mediocre musical whose success or failure depends mostly on the audience’s standards. Anyone looking for some unremarkable songs, plenty of kissing on stage, a few laughs and an evening’s distraction should be satisfied. If you’re looking for musical invention, consistent performances or dramatic poignancy, keep on looking.
Budding playwright Spencer Smith tackles tough material in A Rush of Blood to the Head, presented by Water's Edge Productions and currently on at the Toronto Fringe. He examines the value of every day moments, how the choices that don’t seem to matter wind up deciding who we are. The play follows a family through seemingly mundane days. Her boys grow up, decide what to do with their lives, fall in love and out of love. All of it happens within a moment, as a bullet pierces the head of the main character, Christopher. The question Smith raises is, who...
Despite the title, this play only skirts around Trudeau the man, featuring him in collage like tidbits, and instead focuses on the often sordid behind-the-scenes machinations of the FLQ crisis.
This condensed and selective bio piece about English bawdy poet Algernon Swinburne is a theatrical delight full of surprises, imaginative puppetry, and authentic tenderness.
Kissing Swinburne proving that perverts and puppets are a natural
