Ludwig and Lohengrin is now my top pick out of 21 shows. Kyall Rakoz has researched the life of Ludwig II of Bavaria and retells it on stage through bit players in Ludwig's life. One of the characters is the tour guide in Ludwig's fairy tale castle and I was transported back to my visit there with the familiar information. There are mysteries in Ludwig's life so Rakoz may be taking liberties with the "facts" from time to time but it is all plausible.
The words I've used most often to describe this show have been brilliant...
“Ladies and Gentlemen, Mr. Magnificent welcomes you to the Greatest Monkey Show on Earth. For what you are about to experience, You’re Welcome.” Meet Charles the Monkey, the most intelligent monkey performing today. There will be no trainers or handlers in attendance at this show, just Charles and the audience, but never fear there are safeguards in place to ensure that the audience is safe.
Be assured that no monkeys were harmed in the making of this show. Ross Travis becomes Charles the monkey so completely that you will forget that there is a man onstage and only see a...
The first 16 bars of the Jurassic Park Theme song are perhaps my most favourite instrumental 16 bars of music. Walking into a theatre that happened to be playing these bars raised my expectations pretty high. Were they met? Very nearly yes.
Written and performed by Kira Hall and directed by Andrew Young, this 60-minute solo show was a late addition to the Fringe Festival, finding out only a few weeks before the Festival began that they got in. It is to the benefit of Vancouver audiences that they did.
As you enter Studio 16 you are greeted by your host The Hatter (Andrew Wade) who offers you a spot of tea from a table that has piles of all types of tea spread around it. I had a cup of chamomile which was lovely and made me feel welcome at his tea party. This is not just any tea party but one hosted by the famous Mad Hatter, although as we are soon to find out he is not very mad anymore, in fact he is quite sane and thus has been cast out of Wonderland. This show is...
I didn’t know what to expect from “Lovelash”. I originally thought it was “Love Lash”, and therefore anticipated a mascara and drag queen show. But Entr’acte Studios from Scarborough, Ontario serves up a “whiplash from the heart”. And you never know what will hit you at the Fringe.
Thank you for the polished, well-published Playbill programme so that I could quote the Writer’s [Terrence Vince] Desk, which was very insightful. I was just happy to receive a programme at the venerable doors of The Cultch Historic Theatre (aka VECC) as the grande dame has had a facelift, but...
Fringe Description: Funny · Musical · Family Friendly
What a perfect way to start my Fringe. Chase Padget (6 Guitars) and Stacey Hallal (Curious Comedy) have created a wickedly funny and perfectly paced piece with Joyride. The show lives up perfectly to its description, “a musical comedy mix of Reggie Watts and I Love Lucy while exploring moments in life when we feel thrilled and terrified…at the same time”. Consisting of 12 sketches and a few surprises, Chase and Stacey leave it in the hands of the audience to decide what they will perform next. From ribbon dance commenters having a love affair to...
Brain Apple Theatre invites you to the dark forest that is the post-apocalyptic ruins of Vancouver, where a few survivors exist along with ghosts, monsters and one possibly radioactive duck in this adaptation of Hansel and Gretel.
The forest is actually the Sculpture Garden located behind Performance Works and the area was used well by this production. This is a processional play, which means that the audience follows the action of the show to several locations moving as the action does. By having the audience move with the play it allows the production to use the beauty of Granville...
MacBeth is part of the new Drama Works series at The Fringe this year. Increasing the allowable show time for this series from 75 minutes to 120 minutes opens up the availability of published scripts. As well, the Fringe is providing a subsidy to cover royalty fees. There are six plays in the series all being performed at that Cultch’s Vancity Culture Lab and all are worth supporting.
So far the shows I have seen as part of this series have been sold out, proving that there is the audience support for dramatic, longer pieces. Such is the case with...
Armed with a guitar, a piano and a bit of a humour, Ellen Johnston deconstructs our notion of “God” through the eyes of various deities – Madonna, Athena, Isis.
“On the run from a terrible pain" our protagonist clings to hope before a shrine found in a dirty parking lot as “waiting for a miracle that doesn’t want to come” she searches for her very own deus ex machina or, as it translates, God from the Machine, to quickly bring her problems to an end.
Ellen Johnston is a competent actor and a talented musician accompanying herself on guitar and piano....
Fringe Description: Musical · In Your Face · Intellectual
Lord of the Flies: Remixed is the result of The Only Animal Summer Theatre Project, a collaboration with Camp Fircom, funded by the B.C. Arts Council and the City of Vancouver, an initiative providing leadership, mentorship, theatre training, creation, production, and performance opportunities to male B.C. youth.
Within a camp experience on Gambier Island and later rehearsals on Granville Island, the chosen teenaged boys (Calvin Campbell, William Canero, Dominic Duff, Raphael Diangkinay and Darragh Lysaght) under the mentorship of theatre professionals Eric Rhys Miller and Chris Ross, mined the novel and their own personal experiences and using dialogue, music and poetry,...
