FRINGE: 2 ‘One Man’ parodies
When faced with the rash of “one man” plays at this year’s Fringe – that is, single actors attempting to render an entire popular movie or TV series in a comedic manner – a nagging question comes up:
Do you have to be a diehard fan of the original material to fully appreciate its lampoon?
Short answer: Yes.
The more you know, the more you’ll laugh. There’s the peril of riffing on ephemeral and esoteric pop culture. Not everybody gets what you get. Is merely understanding that something is an inside reference satisfying enough without knowing where it came from? Almost. Ha, ha – you laugh because you don’t want to feel out of touch. Is that any way to present compelling theatre at the Fringe?! It is not.
The “rash” turns out to be just two guys: Charles Ross and Mark Meer, two giants of Canadian comedy theatre and nerds of the highest order.
Ross is legendary for his brilliant One Man Lord of the Rings, which he’s brought back to Stage 37 this year. He’s also doing One Man Pride and Prejudice (Stage 16), a bit more highbrow of a parody. This reviewer has not read the book.
His new play is One Man Stranger Things (Stage 37), a hit ‘n’ miss affair for those who might not be huge fans of the series, or maybe they only saw Season One and then lost interest. Stranger Things may not be not as high on the pop culture radar as some fans imagine it is.
However, most nerds (this reviewer included) know The Lord of the Rings backwards and forwards, along with the movies – and so Ross’s every joke, every subtle nuance, hits home. He’s a masterful performer who manages to deftly recap the plot, play every character, tear apart continuity errors, crack his own timely jokes – and make it a musical, too!
In One Man Stranger Things, Ross likewise does all the voices, getting lots of laughs from the lisping kid. He also riffs absurd plot points into in songs by Jefferson Airplane, the Police, and does a pretty bang-on impression of Peter Gabriel. He makes little in-jokes – like about the Christmas lights the mom of the dead kid hangs in the house: “Who knew crazy could be so festive?” – and because Ross probably can’t help himself, inserts several references from The Lord of the Rings. Wonder if he ever gets confused which show he’s doing.
Meanwhile, we have Edmonton’s own Mark Meer doing ALL EIGHT SEASONS of The Walking Dead in ONE MAN WALKING DEAD at the Garneau Theatre (Stage 22). In one hour. For someone who’s NEVER SEEN A SINGLE EPISODE of The Walking Dead – like his reviewer – this show is as much an ordeal as being a zombie killer is for Rick Grimes, whoever that is.
What saves Meer’s show for the non-fans are his formidable voice skills. He is of course famous for being the voice of Commander Shepard in the Mass Effect video game series, no accident, and in this show pulls off a huge variety of voices and accents, many convincingly from the American South, and perfectly mimicking – or so I assume – most of the characters from The Walking Dead.
There are also various burns on plot gaffes and inside production woes (also helpful to know about). “Now play a Bob Dylan song,” one of the characters says, “but not one of the expensive ones. We wanna see how the show does first.” Or another: “I got a big death scene coming up – now that people are starting to like me.” One more: “There ain’t never been a problem that guns can’t solve – except the gun problem.”
A lot of the rest is Greek to Noobs, and despite enjoying the gifts of a truly great performer like Meer, this play may leave you as cold as a white walker. Whoops, wrong show. But what a great idea! One Man Game of Thrones! They can use that if they want to.
One Man Stranger Things – 3 out of 5
One Man Walking Dead – 3 out of 5
