Arts

September 9, 2004

Vancouver Fringe Festival Shows

PATTI FEDY IN... THE HUNT
Local clown Patti Fedy has taken a trip to the dark side and it has really paid off. In The Hunt , Patti's creator, Emilia Symington Fedy, and the show's director, Anita Rochon, play innocence against rage with explosive results. Nerdy, lonely, sweet little Patti imagines capturing the wish-fulfilling unicorn: "I'll get him in a choke hold and I'll say, 'You're mine, bitch!' Oh, I'm sorry. I had a Coca-Cola today and it's making me crazy." More than in her previous outing, Patti Fedy... Be Prepared to Fall in Love , the author pushes things to audacious extremes. Struggling against the self-indulgence of her sadness, Patti says, "There's probably a poor little girl in Uzbekistan right now, looking out of her one brown eye..." The script would be more powerful if its conventions were more consistent, but The Hunt is the genuine Fringe article: edgy and hilarious. At Stage 5, Festival House, on September 9 (10 p.m.), 10 (midnight), 12 (12:15 a.m.) and (11 p.m.), 13 (9 p.m.), and 17 (10 p.m.) * Colin Thomas

THE YEAR OF THE PANDA
An hour at the Fringe has rarely passed more quickly. Claire, in her 20s, is hanging out with her best friend, Isabel, following the funeral of Claire's mother. This premise provides a springboard for a loosely associative and often hilarious conversation, touching on bad dates ("Ever been fingered in a Dairy Queen?"), hangovers ("I need someone to come over and clean under my arms"), and other embarrassing memories. Tricia Cooper's Claire is warm and sweet, while Vanessa Macrae, as Isabel, is her acerbic foil. The two play off each other with a winning naturalness, and the show is an irresistible celebration of their willingness to make fools of themselves. Don't miss it. At Stage 6, Lind Hall, on September 11 (6:15 p.m.), 12 (noon), 13 (9 p.m.), 15 (5:30 p.m.), 17 (7:45 p.m.), and 18 (3:15 p.m.) * Kathleen Oliver

THE REEFER MAN
Criminally entertaining. Russell Bennett draws us into the world of lawyer and pot enthusiast Charlie Kovacs, whose grow-op gets busted after years of supplying marijuana to everyone from fellow law professionals to the local compassion centre's clients. Bennett provides exquisitely differentiated characterizations of Kovacs and a host of others, including his parents and his hilarious dealer-partner, Max. The script is beautifully structured, whimsically funny, and full of details both poetic ("cotton-candy fingers reached down to lick our cheeks," recalls Charlie of getting high for the first time) and provocative (Charlie questioning the racism of Canada's early drug laws). Bennett's boyish exuberance carries the show, whether he's tenderly describing his "garden" or working himself into an orgasmic frenzy by reciting a list of varieties of marijuana. At Stage 5, Festival House, on September 11 (noon), 14 (6:30 p.m.), 15 (11:15 p.m.), 16 (9:30 p.m.), 18 (10:45 p.m.), and 19 (noon) * KO

THE WET SPOTS IN SING YOUR WAY TO BETTER SEX
Now here's a Fringe show that I can really get behind. Or under. Whatever position suits them best, really. Sing Your Way to Better Sex is a refreshing celebration of the libido in all of its variety. Husband-and-wife team John Woods and Cass King sing hilarious original tunes. Favourite lyric, voiced by Woods: "I am the very model of a modern metrosexual/My manicure is perfect and my gender is contextual." King and Woods spice their variety show with pump-'em-up exercises for the Kegel muscles and give helpful hints on lube and delayed ejaculation. Kink- and queer-friendly, these folks are missionaries of liberation, with new positions to suggest. At Stage 8, Performance Works, on September 10 (8:15 p.m.), 11 (11:30 p.m.), 12 (7 p.m.), 14 (8:45 p.m.), 18 (11:30 p.m.), and 19 (2:45 p.m.) * CT

MY OWN PRIVATE ETOBICOKE
"Some people say they wouldn't trade their lives for anyone else's," says Eufemia Fantetti late in this riveting account of her suburban childhood. "I'm not one of those people." No wonder. Fantetti was the only child in a deeply troubled family; her abusive mother was eventually diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia. But even when revealing her personal demons, Fantetti never gives in to self-pity, and her story is leavened by tremendous craft and frequent humour, particularly in her observations about Italian culture: "Insulting an Italian man's mother is similar to swimming in shark-infested waters wearing a bathing suit made of steaks." Her understated delivery and generous self-revelation make for an unforgettable visit to Etobicoke. At Stage 6, Lind Hall, on September 10 (8:15 p.m.), 11 (11:30 p.m.), 12 (7:15 p.m.), 14 (8:45 p.m.), 18 (midnight), and 19 (2:45 p.m.) * KO

ARTICULATE
This could be an excellent date play, especially if you're new to the partner-auditioning scene. Cayman Duncan's script isn't perfect--it racks up three false endings, which must be some kind of record--but it charms in its exploration of a fear we all share: saying something stupid. The context is a first date and the form is playful; Duncan has fun with rhythm, repetition, time, and internal monologues. Those monologues outstay their welcome and the play's ending would be sharper if the author realized how secondary his job-search subplot is. Still, Articulate manages to take apparently slight material and make it innocently moving. At Stage 8, Performance Works, on September 10 (10 p.m.), 11 (2:45 p.m.), 12 (5:15 p.m.), 15 (7:15 p.m.), 16 (11 p.m.), and 18 (4:30 p.m.) * CT

CACTUS
Of the shows I saw that didn't quite work, this one is the smartest and most charming. Australian monologist Jonno Katz ambitiously tackles the relationship between performer and audience, specifically the underlying loneliness. His persona is beguiling in an ironic, naughty way, and the piece is layered; Katz addresses us as himself and takes breaks to perform a story about a guy named Phil who's wandering through the desert with a compulsive liar and a sensitive gay guy. The ending, in which the actor directly asks for love, is surprisingly moving but the preceding bits aren't as funny as they want to be, partly because Katz doesn't have the physical precision needed to carry off the creation of quickly overlapping realities. At Stage 4, Waterfront Theatre, on September 11 (8:15 p.m.), 14 (6:15 p.m.), 15 (11:30 p.m.), 16 (9:30 p.m.), 18 (9:30 p.m.), and 19 (1 p.m.) * CT

ADULT CHILD/DEAD CHILD
As it turns out, the show with the worst title in the festival ain't so bad. The theme of madness is a Fringe cliché and the black-clad opening movement sequence of Adult Child/Dead Child made me fear the earnest worst. But Claire Dowie's story of an unloved girl who grows into a schizoid adult is so full of detail--the ashtray the girl's father threatened to throw at her, the china dog the girl delivers to a friendly neighbour--that it could be documentary. Rarely sentimental or sensational, the articulation of extreme emotional states contains some rough-hewn poetry: "It's like living in a day that doesn't exist in anybody else's world, like May 33rd." In this production from Wolverhampton, England, three actresses deliver the troubled character's words with the honesty they deserve. At Stage 2, Studio 16, on September 11(8:45 p.m.), 12 (8:15 p.m.), 16 (5 p.m.), 17 (7:15 p.m.), 18 (7 p.m.), and 19 (noon) * CT

THE HOPE SLIDE
It's a classic, but it feels dated. The Hope Slide revolves around Irene, an actor having a restless night on tour. She recalls her teenage obsession with the Doukhobors--"a community under attack"--and sets up a thematic link with her theatre community, threatened both by funding cutbacks and by AIDS. It's a fault of Joan MacLeod's script that the analogy seems contrived, but her writing is full of subtle, detailed observations. "I don't know how someone builds a bomb," says Irene. "I think of it like wrapping presents." Solo performer Terri-Lyn Storey imbues the adult Irene with an affecting candour, but she overplays the comedy of her nerdy teenage incarnation. Still, everything about this show, including the superb sound and lighting design, is solid, a well-realized piece of the Canadian canon. At Stage 2, Studio 16, on September 11 (5 p.m.), 12 (12:15 p.m.), 13 (8 p.m.), 15 (4:45 p.m.), 16 (8:45 p.m.), and 18 (3 p.m.) * KO

ONE MAN LORD OF THE RINGS
Charles Ross is probably the most skilled thespian you'll encounter at the Fringe and one of the most charismatic, but if you're not a devotee of the Lord of the Rings cycle, this show will leave you feeling hooped, as it did me. Ross's voice is a spectacular instrument and he moves with the precision of a martial artist. But admiration only got me through about 10 minutes. Last year, Ross's One Man Star Wars Trilogy was easier for non-fans to follow, probably because the plotting in that series is less baroque. Sadly, a smart-ass tone sometimes taints this year's offering. Actor: 10. Material: 3--unless you've got the movies memorized. At Stage 4, Waterfront Theatre, on September 9 (11:30 p.m.), 11 (11:45 p.m.), 12 (6:15 p.m.), 14 (8 p.m.), 18 (11 p.m.), and 19 (2:45 p.m.) * CT

PILK'S MADHOUSE
"Don't try to follow it, just go limp," advise the performers at the beginning of this 1973 collection of absurdist sketches by the pseudonymous Henry Pilk. It's easy enough to be bowled over by the supreme talents of Scott Walters, Jon Paterson, Andrew Bursey, and Andrea Shawcross with their frenetic energy, comic precision, and breathtaking four-part harmonies. There are some wonderful moments, but even with the company's occasional updates, much of the material--insane doctors at an orgasm-dysfunction clinic, parallel universes, surreal monologues--feels half-baked, kind of like Monty Python castoffs. It's an unfortunate waste of tremendous skill. But if sense doesn't matter to you, go and enjoy the ride. At Stage 7, The Gym at False Creek Community Centre, on September 11 (2:30 p.m.), 12 (4:30 p.m.), 13 (9:45 p.m.), 16 (11:30 p.m.), 18 (5:15 p.m.), and 19 (7:45 p.m.) * KO

CUPPA JO: NEW WORKS
The first two pieces on soloist Jolene Bailie's four-part program feel like generic modern dance: a figure struggles through a torturous journey of more interest to her than to me. With the third number, Gaile Petursson-Hiley's After Words , the program suddenly acquires edge; brutal falls to the floor erase the memory of soulful extensions. And the fourth bit, Joe Laughlin's walking thru myself , gets really interesting. Wearing a bobbed black wig, Bailie wanders through letters of the alphabet that are scattered around the stage; she poses coquettishly, and walks awkwardly, feet on her hands. Her character seems to be both a club kid and a goddess, a giddy fool engaged in the serious process of creation. Whoever she is, this creature is revelling in the world of dance: associative, celebratory, visceral. At Stage 6, Lind Hall, on September 11 (8 p.m.), 14 (7 p.m.), 15 (11:15 p.m.), 16 (9:15 p.m.), 18 (10:15 p.m.), and 19 (1 p.m.) * CT

PINOCCHIO
Definitely not Disney. Screwed & Clued's take on the classic story of the wooden puppet is decidedly darker. The block from which Gepetto carves Pinocchio is "barely large enough to batter a man after too many drinks on a Friday night"; Cat and Fox try to draw the wayward puppet into a pyramid scheme; and Candlewick and Lampwick keep Pinocchio in a dungeon as their sex slave. Writer-performers Stewart Matthews and Justin Sage-Passant tell the story as little boys in their pyjamas, so the source of their adult perspective is a mystery. Their delivery is extremely fast and extremely physical--it's impressive, but it sometimes obscures the storytelling, and the relentless pace can become alienating. At Stage 8, Performance Works, on September 11 (6:15 p.m.), 12 (1:45 p.m.), 13 (9 p.m.), 15 (5:30 p.m.), 17 (7:45 p.m.), and 18 (2:15 p.m.) * KO

THE CURSE OF THE TRICKSTER
Fringe favourite TJ Dawe could retitle his newest monologue The Curse of Having Done Better . There are plenty of funny bits in The Curse of the Trickster , but at 90 minutes, it's at least half an hour too long and the show lacks the personal generosity and narrative satisfaction that made Tired Clichés , his first Fringe effort, such a pleasure. Dawe's ideas--the body as trickster (stories of diarrhea and mononucleosis), the absurdities of consumerism (why would anybody amass a DVD collection?), and things you'll never hear people say ("The food in this theme park is so reasonably priced!")--don't add up to anything larger, and some bits, including the DVD rant, last far too long. Dawe has more talent than he's letting on. At Stage 8,Performance Works, on September 10 (6 p.m.), 12 (10:30 p.m.), 14 (10:30 p.m.), 15 (9 p.m.), 16 (5:15 p.m.), and 19 (4:30 p.m.) * CT

@WITSEND
Wit from the other end of the world. Standup comic Benjamin Crellin makes the most of the similarities between Canada and his homeland of New Zealand, "or the Shire, as you probably know it". There's our shared horror of the United States and its current president, who poses unique problems for a standup comic: "How do you mock someone who speaks in punch lines?" In a freewheeling one-hour set, Crellin takes on politics, the Internet, kids' toys, Christmas ("the time of year when everyone comes together to realize why they live apart"), and a whole lot else that's wrong with our world. He's very funny, often irreverent, and extremely skilled at working the audience. Go. Laugh. Enjoy. At Stage 3, Elliott Louis Gallery, on September 10 (10:15 p.m.), 11 (2 p.m.), 15 (7:30 p.m.), 17 (6:15 p.m.), 18 (1 p.m.), and 19 (9 p.m.) * KO

THE TOUR
I didn't get a lot of new information, but I did pay attention. Writerperformer Miranda Huba's story of a post-heartbreak trip to Europe feels autobiographical--if it's not, that's a compliment--and its emotional rawness, including a bit about the narrator's agoraphobic uncle, is engaging. The convention of the tour is intimate; Huba acts as our guide and moves among us. And the acting style she has chosen, with its hyperarticulated speech, manic expressions, and tight physicality, carries tensions of its own. I would have appreciated some stylistic variation however, and more differentiation between Huba's two characters, the guide and the romantic casualty. Besides, The Tour didn't significantly deepen my understanding of either sorrow or resilience. At Stage 3, Elliott Louis Gallery, on September 11 (5:45 p.m.), 12 (12:30 p.m.), 13 (8:30 p.m.), 15 (5:45 p.m.), 17 (8 p.m.), and 18 (4:30 p.m.) * CT

SWIMMING LESSONS WITH PAISLEY KITE
Young Nina Finkleman (aka Paisley Kite) is decidedly a misfit, with her big headphones, punk couture ("My mother doesn't like my clothes. She says they draw attention to my angst. I tell her that's the point"), and ability to sing the periodic table to a Gilbert and Sullivan tune. So her separation from her youth group ("like hippies, but with less hugging and self-evaluation") on a tour of Israel is both deliberate and liberating, as she discovers the Wailing Wall, the Dead Sea, and a lot about herself. Writer-performer Emily Pearlman's youthful sensibility makes the show fresh and unpolished; while her detailed writing is witty, the structure is loose and the projected drawings rarely contribute much. At Stage 1, Masonic Hall, on September 9 (8 p.m.), 10 (9:30 p.m.), 11 (1:45 p.m.), 15 (7:15 p.m.), 17 (5:45 p.m.), and 19 (8:45 p.m.) * KO

KRESKINNED
Mercifully, it's not a date from hell. The premise of Kreskinned --a blind date at a Kreskin show leads to more dates when Joyce and Dennis realize they have the power to hypnotize each other--shouldn't justify more than a skit. But amazingly, the script has enough twists to keep the idea alive, if not always fresh, for a whole hour. The lovers use their mental abilities to erase offensive comments, conceal disappointing sexual performance, and remedy lapses of manners like farts and forgotten birthdays. The humour isn't subtle, but T Weir and Bert Steinmanis are solid performers, and the show provides more laughs than your average blind date. At Stage 1, Masonic Hall, on September 9 (9:45 p.m.), 11 (9 p.m.), 12 (7 p.m.), 14 (8 p.m.), 18 (11:15 p.m.), and 19 (2:45p.m.) * KO

TEACHING SHAKESPEARE: A PARODY
Don't believe the out-of-town reviews; Teaching Shakespeare: A Parody isn't nearly as clever as they say. In this solo show, Keir Cutler plays an untenured Shakespeare prof with a bad case of Bardolatry: "Assume the artist is infallible. Remember: whatever we don't like, we don't understand." Cutler's parodic point quickly dulls. On the upside, his discussion of the variations in iambic pentameter is genuinely interesting. Unfortunately, we have to wade through the instructor's personal story to get to it. The professor says he would have been an actor but his performances lacked emotional truth. The same could be said of Cutler: his characterization is too superficial to invest in. At Stage 1, Masonic Hall, on September 10 (11:15 p.m.), 11 (7:15 p.m.), 12 (3:15 p.m.), 13 (9:45 p.m.), 17 (9:15 p.m.), and 18 (2:15 p.m.) * CT

WATER
Water is all over the place. Writer-performer Brad Curtin attempts to tell the story of the Walkerton tragedy, but he fails to find a narrative focus and ends up with a messy wash. His performance style, including the annoying mask work, is aggressively broad and the script's analysis amounts to little more than generalized outrage. This doesn't mean that Curtin is a terrible actor; within the unfortunate overall tone, he delivers clearly differentiated characterizations and he leavens the proceedings with some humour. At Stage 2, Studio 16, on September 9 (9:45 p.m.), 13 (10 p.m.), 14 (5 p.m.), 16 (7 p.m.), 17 (9:15 p.m.), and 18 (1:15 p.m.)

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