Big, honest talent brings theatrical joy to Toronto’s Videofag thanks to Birdtown and Swanville
In a very small white cube of gallery space, I sit as an outsider among friends. It feels like I’ve walked in on somebody else’s cozy gathering of long-time playmates: it’s a reunion of some very funny people and I am now a willing confidante. I receive a warm welcome from Birdtown and Swanville’s Nika Mistruzzi and as the pieces that comprise Friends and Outsidersgo on, I understand more deeply why those in company seem all to be so happy.
What is it that gives people the strength to live by their convictions?
From press release:
The Taliban Don’t Like My Knickers is a stylized two-hander inspired by the novel, ‘In The Hands of the Taliban’, written by British journalist Yvonne Ridley after she was captured by the Taliban in 2001.
The play, while based on Yvonne Ridley remarkable accounts while in captivity, also questions universal metaphors about home and prison, freedom and sacrifice and the cost of our convictions.
Our protagonist is on a mission to, “get the story” at any cost, even at the risk of never seeing her 8 year old daughter again. What is it that gives people the strength to live by their convictions?
Perhaps it is it the pursuit of the truth or at least the desire to know one’s self and our maker; better?
“[A] darker tone and feel than Mort, but the wit and satire that are Pratchett’s trademarks are still there!”
From press release:
Socratic Theatre Collective is proud to conclude its third season with a sitespecific production of Terry Pratchett’s Monstrous Regiment, adapted by Stephen Briggs, presented at the Toronto Fringe Festival.
Terry Pratchett’s Monstrous Regiment is the stage adaptation of the thirty-first novel in Pratchett’s award-winning Discworld series. It tells the story of Polly Perks, a Borogravian barmaid who disguises herself as a boy to join the army in search of her lost brother, and the band of misfits who make up her regiment.
Celebrate the bicentennial of Pride and Prejudice by diving into Elizabeth - Darcy, a fresh twist on a classic.
From press release:
Tom Arthur Davis (smash hit award winning Mamoud, Toronto and NYC Fringe 2012) is directing Hallie Burt (John and Beatrice, The Queer Bathroom Monologues: Patron’s Pick Toronto Fringe 2011) and Kate Werneburg (The Centre of Everything Civilised, A Midwinter’s Dream Tale) in a new adaptation of Pride and Prejudice that promises to be fast-paced and fun: the 75 minute site–specific Elizabeth – Darcy at the Campbell House Museum during this year’s Toronto Fringe.
Audiences will experience the beautiful and historic home in a truly immersive way, by following the players through the house as the action moves from room to room. Burt and Werneburg take on all the parts, but this genderbending version is more than just a sight gag.
“I went there to find myself, but lost my mind instead.”
From press release:
Sometimes it takes years to get a story right.
The true events in Alex Eddington’s new storytelling-and-music show Yarn happened a decade ago, when he took a summer job on the remote Isle of Mull, Scotland. Yarn will run at this year’s Toronto Fringe Festival (July 3-14, 2013) – but this isn’t the first time he’s shared these stories.
Alex wrote Wool in 2006 and toured it to the Winnipeg, Saskatoon and Edmonton Fringe festivals – his first Fringe tour of five. Back then, he was a composer newly turning his hand to writing; Wool was a poetic travelogue without a strong story arc. Alex put Wool in his back drawer and wrote several very different plays, including the solo musicological comedy-thriller The Fugue Code in which he played 11 characters at the 2007 Toronto Fringe.
But the Mull stories kept resurfacing. In 2011 he created Fuzzy Logic, a composition for narrator and six musicians based on his observations on the habits of sheep written during that summer on Mull.
