FRINGE 2019: Early David Mamet lacks impact of his later work
A Life In The Theatre Stage 29 (The Playhouse) David Mamet was just coming off a career as a failed actor in 1977 when we wrote A Life in the Theatre. It was a sardonic love letter to the theatre community, and a very young Mamet was just flexing his writing muscles. Later to come […]
FRINGE 2019: 2 dramatic DRAMAS
After Miss Julie Stage 22 (The Grindstone) It’s 1888, and that Swedish rascal August Strindberg has done it again. In his best naturalistic style, he’s written a play about a bored aristocratic young lady named Miss Julie, who goes searching for sexual adventure below stairs, and finds a ready accomplice with the well-travelled, cultured Jean, […]
FRINGE 2019: It don’t mean a thing if it ain’t got that SWING!
Swing Showcase Stage 18 (Sugar Swing Ballroom) Ah, the Fringe! At 258 shows, if you turn to the right you might enjoy one of a couple of burlesque shows. If you turn to the left – you might come up with Swing Showcase. Such was the case last year when we were pleasantly surprised by […]
FRINGE 2019: 2 amazing DANCE shows
Swipe Stage 4 (King Edward Elementary School) A few years back an inventive local dance company called Synaethesis Dance Theatre came up with a movement experience called Letters & Words. At its base, it was really a dance show but the company made it much more. It was a multimedia marvel – an immersing theatrical […]
FRINGE 2019: Field Zoology 101 lecture riddled with penis jokes
Field Zoology 101 Stage 37 (Auditorium at Campus Saint-Jean) Why has the world of science ignored the genius of zoologist and world adventurer Professor Bradley Q. Gooseberry? With his Tilly hat at a sober angle, his bony knees sticking out under his cargo shorts and his (suspicious) black mustache, he has set out on a […]
FRINGE 2019: 2 Hilarious Dick Comedies
Crazy For Dick Tricks: A Dirk Darrow Investigation Stage 18 (Sugar Swing Ballroom) A quick look at Dirk Darrow’s show titles will give you a good idea of what to expect from this sunny Australian entertainer: 6 Quick Dick Tricks, 2 Ruby Knockers, 1 Jaded Dick and now his latest, Crazy For Dick Tricks. […]
FRINGE 2019: Foote in the Door tackles the ’50s with fun, soul and heart
The Marvelous Wonderettes ’58 Stage 27 (Hi-Edmonton Hostel) Oh horrors! It’s a disaster. It’s 1958 at the Springfield High School prom (Go Chipmunks) and the entertainment for the evening was to be the hot guy quartet called the Crooning Crab Cakes. But the group can’t make it because the leader was caught smoking behind the […]
FRINGE 2019: Tymisha Harris gives life, passion to remarkable musical biography
Josephine Stage 1 (ATB Westbury Theatre) Josephine Baker lived so full and adventurous a life that it challenges belief. Born into poverty and stark racism in Missouri, she ran off to France, took off her clothes (except for a few well-placed bananas), causing a sensation and becoming one of the most celebrated performers ever to […]
FRINGE 2019: Melanie Gall soars in Golden Age Hollywood Musical
Ingenue: Deanna Durbin, Judy Garland and the Golden Age Of Hollywood Stage 7 (Chianti Yardbird Suite) There is a Hollywood legend that the mighty Louis B. Meyer, head of MGM, once demanded his minion to fire “the fat one.” So the flunky jettisoned Deanna Durbin (Winnipeg’s Sweetheart), she of the crystalline legit soprano voice and […]
FRINGE 2019: Four of Colin MacLean’s Favourite Musicals
Coat of Many Colours Stage 41 (CKUA Performance Space) Andrea House is one of our best singers. She gives each song she sings a specific life of its own. Like Streisand and Lady Gaga you feel that the song has been wrung out of every subtlety, lyric intelligence and musical significance it can possibly offer. […]
FRINGE 2019: Saga of World War I nurses comes off like a work in progress
Bluebirds Stage 40 (The Al & Trish Huehn Theatre, Concordia College) A large troop ship is caught in a mighty gale while carrying Canadian troops and a contingent of 19 Bluebirds to Europe at the beginning of World War I. “Bluebirds” is the affectionate name Canadian nurses earned first in the 1899 South African campaign […]
MASTER OF FRINGE 2019: Underneath the Lintel a triumphant tale
Underneath the Lintel Stage 14 (Holy Trinity Anglican Church) A rumpled man shuffles through a dusty Dutch library. His job is to track down those “miscreants” who are late returning borrowed books. One night, a tattered tome falls through the overnight slot. The book is 113 years overdue. The librarian is thunderstruck, then intrigued, and […]
