On Tuesday i carry your heart with me was dark (that’s Michelle Martin’s intimate and musical story of family and resilience). It’s back on tomorrow at Sugar Swing Ballroom Upstairs at 7:45 pm.
So I had the chance to fit in five shows that have been getting good buzz, and I was not disappointed in any of them.
Tiger Lady. This play by Dead Rabbits Theatre out of the UK drew the audience in immediately to its setting of a travelling circus in the 1930s in the USA, with ensemble members in trenchcoats with musical instruments engaging with the entering audience members. Their accents were appropriate to the characters and era – occasionally a little hard for me to understand but adding to the atmosphere. I was reminded of the Edmonton instance of the musical Hadestown, with its workers’ chorus and storytelling musicians, and I was reminded several times of kristine nutting’s Devour Content Here: Of Love and Wheat. A young woman escapes her Presbyterian aunties to follow the circus, discovering a vocation as tiger tamer and a human love with another circus worker. The characters are a bit archetypical, but not stereotypical – the dancer has agency and supports Mabel, the animal handler Louis confides “I’d want to marry you, if I swung that way”. Some beautiful and impressive acrobatics, puppetry, and excellent use of the large Westbury stage and lighting instruments. Stage 1, Westbury Theatre.
Breaking Bard. Another talented ensemble, this one seven young improvisers from Vancouver creating a Shakespearean tragedy complete with iambic pentameter which sometimes even rhymed, from a couple of audience suggestions (“arrogant” and “mountains”). Right from the land acknowledgement’s nod to improvised Shakespeare being the most colonial of choices, to the spoken prologue delivered in rhyming couplets by alternating pairs of performers, I was delighted. As another playgoer and I discussed afterwards, they touched on all kinds of Shakespearean tropes and plot devices that we hadn’t even realized were classic. The main characters (the arrogant Lord Peckington and his betrothed Olivia) each had a best friend/supporter, who also end up pairing up. There were shepherds who gave us some backstory about life around the mountain lord’s domain, mountain elves playing tricks like the fairies in Midsummer Night’s Dream, and Mountain Men miners trying to protect their territory and livelihood. Partway through I remembered that they had promised us a tragedy and wondered if they would follow through, but oh they sure did. Clever and entertaining. Stage 4, Walterdale Theatre.
muse: an experiment in storytelling and life drawing. Someone I met in another lineup told me that for her it was a calming experience in a rushed day. Two other people told me I would like it, though one of them is a trained visual artist. I am not. But I showed up where the assistants were handing out charcoal and sketching pads, and the performer Cameryn Moore told us to leave the chairs where they were so everyone could have elbow room. Then she disrobed (literally – she had a great satin robe!) and performed a series of poses as she would do when modelling for a life-drawing class. Once she was holding longer poses, she told some of her story of how she got into modelling for art classes and how it affected her, and the Fringe audience asked questions as we drew. Apparently artists and life-drawing classes are excited about drawing diverse bodies such as Cameryn’s plus-sized middle-aged one. At the end, there was an optional “gallery” with our work on the floor to show each other and our muse. This was a surprisingly profound experience for me. I do not know which was more empowering, the reminder that it is okay for me to draw, or the reminder that it is okay for me to enjoy my own body the way it is. I loved that the other audience members were un-self-conscious enough, or at least quiet enough, that I didn’t hear other people’s self-deprecation or embarrassment about being bad at drawing. (Like in exercise classes – some of them have a culture of commenting on one’s own inadequacy, and some really don’t, and the latter is refreshing.) Stage 5, Acacia Hall.
Old God. Alex Jones-Trujillo prances onto the stage in an ornate jesterish outfit and pantomime whiteface, poking gentle fun at audience members and giving a character backstory so vague that it sets them up to do anything. Which the character then pretty much does. Some of it is crude, some of it is thought-provoking, some of it is delightful physical theatre, and all of it is funny. The performer steps out of character. Literally – they had explained earlier that the decorative floor lighting bounds the “stage” for “theatre”, so when he steps out of it and takes off his headcovering, he becomes Alex the performer speaking to the audience rather than Old God the character. Both of them are great – creators of discomfort in the best bouffon traditions, but including the audience in the laughter and agreement. Stage 20, The Sewing Machine Factory. (This is a Fringe Shuttle stop, if you’re en route to or from La Cite. )
Sweet Jesus (the gospel according to felt). I did not know before this that filmmaker, director, and actor Randy Brososky was also a puppeteer – but he’s a good one! His Jesus was in the Muppet tradition, with one hand manipulating his head/mouth and the other embodying one of his arms. It was easy to watch the puppet instead of the puppeteer, and interact with him – because there are a lot of conversations with audience members. He even shook my hand! I was completely engaged with this narrative and I didn’t disagree with any of the things he said. His version of Jesus was in the tradition of angrily overturning the ripoff merchants’ tables – he swore a lot, but it seemed to me he was swearing about the right things. The present-day parables were great, including the subtle detail that all the characters in them had non-Anglo names or (for the ones represented by Barbie dolls) were non-white. Stage 29. Lorne Cardinal Theatre at The Roxy.
Ephemeral Pleasures 