A collection of everything to do with the Toronto Fringe Festival, including reviews, features, press releases etc.
Do you want to see a winner? Go see Tamaya Productions’ Checkpoint 300 written and directed by Michelle Wise, this year’s winner of the Fringe’s First Play Competition. It is indeed very well-crafted and it continuously surprises us with unexpected facts and plot twists. I will not go into details, no need for spoiler alerts.
Continue reading Checkpoint 300 (Tamaya Productions) 2019 Toronto Fringe Review
There’s still a few days left to check out the 2019 Toronto Fringe Festival! If you want to make the most out of your theatre-going this week, here’s a look at a few rave reviews.
These are shows that blew our writers’ minds, got them talking, kept them enthralled, stuck with them, and made their editor write a list of exciting descriptive actions.
While we always encourage audiences to take risks at Fringe, here are some sharp picks that especially paid off for our team:
Continue reading July 12 Rave Roundup for the 2019 Toronto Fringe
After reviewing all 149 shows* in this year’s Toronto Fringe Festival we shared our list of the shows our staff recommend.
Now it’s your turn; we reveal the list of our readers’ most buzzed-about shows based on the popularity of their Mooney on Theatre reviews. So here’s the list of the top ten (ish) most-read Fringe reviews on Mooney on Theatre this year**: Continue reading Mooney on Theatre’s Most-Read Reviews for the 2019 Toronto Fringe Festival
Week two of the 2019 Toronto Fringe Festival is upon us, and we’re counting up our rave reviews from our hard-won list of 149 reviews of the entire (review-eligible) festival! Plenty of those shows have been marked as RAVES by our reviewers, and we’re here today to highlight a few more of them!
What’s a rave, you might ask? Simply put: our reviewer loved it. Sometimes a rave is ‘I’d see that a second, third, fourth time’; sometimes a rave is ‘I’m STILL thinking about this show days later’; sometimes it’s as simple as ‘I had a really fabulous time at this show.’
Really, it’s all subjective, because theatre is subjective. These raves caught our reviewers’ attention, though–perhaps they’ll snag yours as well?
Continue reading July 11 Rave Roundup for the 2019 Toronto Fringe Festival
If you’re new to Fringing our rave reviews can help you decide which shows to see. They’re the ones with the little green Rave Review in brackets next to them on the Fringe Reviews list.
These are the shows that made our reviewers want to run out of the theatre, grab people, and tell them that they absolutely ‘have to go see this show, it’s amazing’. Well, they make me want to do that.
It’s not the only way to pick a show but it’s one way to get started. Here are a few that our writers have raved about.
Continue reading July 10 Rave Roundup for the 2019 Toronto Fringe Festival
Based on the synopsis of Murmurs in the Toronto Fringe Festival online program I was expecting a story – a monologue that focused on Drew Taylor and his relationship with his father. A tribute to his father; the tribute that Taylor didn’t deliver at his funeral.
Continue reading Murmurs (Drew Taylor Productions) 2019 Toronto Fringe Review
While you absolutely shouldn’t only stick to shows with rave reviews (there’s so much great stuff playing at the Toronto Fringe Festival!) they do give you a place to start.
Personally, I’m a big fan of picking a show that I’m pretty sure is going to be a good one and then just taking a chance on whatever is playing before or after it at the same venue. I have seen some really great stuff that way that otherwise wouldn’t have been on my radar.
In the meantime, here are some shows our writers have been raving about to get you started.
Continue reading July 9 Rave Roundup for the 2019 Toronto Fringe Festival
This past weekend Mooney on Theatre sent its dedicated team of 22 writers and editors to cover all 148 shows* in this year’s Toronto Fringe Festival! With the sheer number of shows available at the festival, picking the ones you want to see can be a daunting task.
If you’re feeling a bit overwhelmed by the number of shows and you’re looking for a place to start, we’ve asked our staff to tell us about their favourite shows they’ve seen at this year’s festival. We hope our staff picks can help you navigate the Fringe.
If you’ve seen something you think is amazing that you think others should go see please let us know by leaving a comment.
And don’t forget to check out our complete list of Fringe reviews.
Happy Fringing!
Mooney on Theatre Staff Picks – 2019 Toronto Fringe Festival Continue reading Mooney on Theatre Recommends – 2019 Toronto Fringe Festival
Week two of the 2019 Toronto Fringe Festival. *phew*
We’ve finished reviewing all the shows (except the two that requested no reviews). And now you have a list of 148 reviews you can read through. You may have noticed some have a little thing next to them that says ‘Rave Review!’ So what’s that about?
We very purposefully don’t use a star rating system here at Mooney on Theatre (but if we did, surely they’d be moons, yes?). We believe that a review only captures one person’s opinion, and my 5-star review might be someone else’s 3-star review, and with so many writers covering Fringe, there would be no way to provide consistency in those ratings.
I don’t think there is anything wrong with star ratings, I just made a decision a long time ago that they don’t fit in with Mooney on Theatre’s approach to things. During Fringe though, when there are so many reviews to read through, we needed something to let readers see at a glance which shows writers are raving about.
This week we’ll be taking some time to highlight those shows; starting right now.
Continue reading July 8 Rave Roundup for the 2019 Toronto Fringe Festival
Outside Ethel: Inside is a show created by Dora-nominated Christine Moynihan for NACS Productions, playing now at the Toronto Fringe Festival. It focuses on a lonely elderly woman who needs a lot of courage to leave her home together with her friends, three stuffed toys.
Continue reading Outside Ethel: Inside (NACS Productions) 2019 Toronto Fringe Review
Drama 101, A New Musical by Steven Gallagher and Kevin Wong, presented by Bravo Academy for the Performing Arts as part of the Toronto Fringe Festival, is a beautiful tribute to anyone whose life has ever been impacted by arts education.