Give Up the Ghost, playing at the Annex Theatre as part of this year’s Fringe, has some great moments. Overall, I wasn’t in love with this production, but I see it as a piece with future potential.

It takes place at a cottage in Northern Ontario and follows a group of uncommunicative siblings/relatives as they try to come to terms with the death of their philandering grandfather.

The Ontario part is pretty cool, references the characters make to places you may have visited like Huntsville or Santa’s Village are gratifyingly localizing – this is supposed to be “an Ontario tale” and many will likely recognize themselves or someone they know in this piece. Continue reading Give Up the Ghost (Slumgum & Quaqua) 2013 Toronto Fringe Review →

With a tagline as gaudy as, “You are not going to believe what happened at The Oak Room”, The Oak Room is a play that is so much smarter than advertised.

The foreboding ‘description’ of the performance by Fracas Theatre for the Toronto Fringe Festival sets both the eerie tone and the precision of writer Peter Genoway’s style that is apparent in The Oak Room. Genoway’s fascination with narrative underlies the sneaky plot of his play, in which a single story line has been broken up and pieced together very elegantly with a bright cast of five men.

Continue reading The Oak Room (Fracas Theatre) 2013 Toronto Fringe Review →

Theatre of the Beat borrows its name from the Beatniks. It is a theatre company that looks to deliver the kind of nervous energy that fueled the polemical practices of the Beat writers – a loose group who I’ll identify here by its common dissatisfaction with the times, people who could no longer stand the passivity of citizenship. This is the appeal of This Prison Or: He Came Through the Floor, Theatre of the Beat’s contribution to the Toronto Fringe Festival this year.

Continue reading This Prison Or: He Came Through the Floor (Theatre of the Beat) 2013 Toronto Fringe Review →

Comedy is not just about timing.  Y’know what’s an equally important ingredient?—energy!  Tales of Whoa! presented by Not Bad Abe Productions at the Helen Gardiner Phelan Playhouse is all about perfect energy, and it never falters—not once!  If high energy sketch comedy is your thing, this is one show not to miss at Toronto Fringe 2013!

The set-up is fairly sophomoric, but that’s really not the point.  Sketch comedy needs to be framed—it’s just a structural thing. The frame is just a necessary evil, much like the prep-work required before a big party; it must be done so that you can then relax and have a good time with your friends, knowing your house won’t fall apart while you’re acting like crazy people. Continue reading Tales of Whoa! (Not Bad Abe Productions) 2013 Toronto Fringe Review →