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 […]
HORROR AT FRINGE 2019: St. Kilda a terrifying tale
St. Kilda Stage 11 (Nordic Studio Theatre) New York’s Jody Christopherson is a quintuple threat – playwright, actor, master of dialects, singer, and most distractingly impressive: An operator of the dreaded “looper.” You know, that thing where you record a segment of sound, hit a switch and it repeats over and over again? Ed Sheeran […]
FRINGE 2019: 2 scary HORROR SHOWS
It’s been a years-long quest to find a good horror at the Fringe that isn’t a comedy. Pickin’s are slim, lemme tell ya. Are artists SCARED they won’t be able to really scare people without having to yuk it up at every turn? Must they laugh in the face of DEATH? Short answer: Maybe. However, […]
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 […]
FRINGE 2019: Zack Adams turns pain to mirth in inspiring one-man show
Zack Adams: Love Songs For Future Girl Stage 10 – (Acacia Hall) The last entry in our foreign Fringer sweepstakes is Australian Zack Adams in his one man comedic musical escapade, Zack Adams: Love Songs For Future Girl. Spoiler alert: This is a 10-year-old piece that’s been brought back into the future, retooled a bit […]
FRINGE 2019: Surreal Japanese satire soars
Are You Lovin’ It? Stage 5 (King Edward Elementary School) The Fringe program stole a bit of reviewer’s thunder in their capsule synopsis of this piece by Theatre Group GUMBO of Osaka, Japan: “A surreal romp” – there is no better term. You could add “zany, wackadoodle, looney tunes” … whatever. This is really out […]
FRINGE FOREIGNERS in our MIDST: 3 Plays from Artists not from Around Here
Since Canada is all about embracing cultures, attitudes and perspectives different from our own, here are three plays from non-Canadian performers for your 2019 Fringe consideration! No, You Can’t Return Discount Shrimp Stage 9 (Telus Phone Museum) You can’t get much more foreign to a Canadian Fringe audience than in this play by American writer […]
FRINGE 2019 OPERA: Gianni Schicchi è un’opera deliziosa!
Gianni Schicchi Stage 16 (Holy Trinity Sanctuary Stage) Those agile artists known as “Pop Goes The Opera” are back at it. After captivating and ingeniously staged Fringe productions, including Pagliacci and Cavalleria Rusticana, this time they are floating Puccini’s last opera, Gianni Schicchi. The pocket comic opera with its madcap characters and humorous plot were […]
