All the World's a Stage- Opening Night

Today was the formal opening of the Fringe Festival, though preview shows have been playing all week. You cannot possibly imagine the glorious mayhem, flurry, and electricity in every cobbled alleyway across the city. Full headed alligators, vengeful brides, French playboys, bawdy pirates, 1920’s flappers, boys in short skirts and loooooooong jackets….everyone here is dressed for Tim Burton’s Halloween Town, fools everyone and it’s a fool’s paradise.

To talk about performers one has to talk in EXTREMES. They are the most, least, greatest, bestest, loudest, people in the world. And here, in the backroom, castle nook spaces, one has as much of an opportunity to see their show as to pass them toilet paper underneath a graffitied stall.

I have never been anywhere more decidedly cool, everything pulsates alive, friendly and all of it is underlined by the already Euro-trash-grunge-thrift that already distinguishes Edinburgh from your everything but especially your average American metropolitan.

...CONTINUE READING ENTRY

THEATER REVIEW- Rose Gets Shot

Rose Gets Shot is a highly stylized piece of “who dunnit?” theater noir. Set in a brothel, everyone is suspect when the Madame, Rose, goes missing. Detective Buchanan is determined to discover the truth, as he paces the “winding streets” and a voiceover rings out the contents of his troubled mind, “Who was she? What was she doing? Who wanted her shot? And mostly, who wanted to shoot her?”

Comical in the way it is dead serious, it was fun to watch, though entirely devoid of the deeper thematic undertones the playwright alleged to intend.

...CONTINUE READING ENTRY

THEATER REVIEW- Mouse

Paul Trussel is the extremely talented actor starring in his own one-man show, "Mouse."

The character is a unassuming megalomaniac, in other words an IT professional (think Steve Buscemi and Dwight Schrute) named Procter, who confirms our worst fears about the know-it-alls who not-so-humbly smooth out our computer glitches. For some time now, Procter has been quietly and systematically intercepting e-mail correspondences between a loathed co-worker, Wayne, and his own object of obsessive desire, the woman in the green dress.

Now, with life-and-death hanging in the balance, Procter must decide how to use his moment center-stage.

Trussel is a master storyteller and his elastic expressions capture every delightfully neurotic twist of this unconventional black comedy.

...CONTINUE READING ENTRY

THEATER REVIEW- Greedy

I obviously have a weakness for sketch comedy. Like the “News Revue” show I reviewed last night, “Greedy” is another 4-person team and likewise, they are not amateurs (I am still mentally scarred from the shit I had to laugh at to keep my friends friendly in high school).

In my mind, the two cannot escape comparison.

Not nearly as offensive as the Revue, this humor was much more situational than political (or musical). The performances while running the gambit of topics, take special delight in the rich material provided by dating, love and T-rex (yes, you read correctly). “Greedy” spent a lot more time laying the scene for the joke, and though I was laughing the whole time, I also (gratefully) had time to breathe.

...CONTINUE READING ENTRY

THEATER REVIEW- Just So!

“Just So!” is a wonderfully colorful musical about growing up, finding your wings, and always asking why. Based on Rudyard Kipling’s beloved book of animal short stories (one I always meant to read having been almost-inspired by an obscure reference in “Matilda”), it falls on the heels of other musical adaptations, especially Dr. Seuss’s Horton Hears a Who (which I thought was “hoot” for the longest time).

The young elephant child, along with the saucy Kolokolo bird, must find and stop the crab Pau Amma (whose off-stage voice most closely resembles “Fat Bastard”). He has grown to such enormous proportions that his underwater movements are flooding the land with sea. The young, talented cast is composed of recent art-school graduates and they are genuine triple-threats; their energy will delight audiences of old ages, though parents with especially young children should be warned that the nearly 90 minute show has no intermissions.

...CONTINUE READING ENTRY

THEATER REVIEW- Tapestry

Tapestry is series of vignettes and monologues (mostly the latter) that seek to span the childlike wonder at the beauty of stars, to first love, being jealous, thrill-seeking, experimenting, defying authority, and that nagging need to belong. It pushes no new boundaries, though the angry swearing accompanying every other scene change did help to keep me awake (it was a late show).

They were well written pieces, but with little to bind them together other than poetic beatnik about human emotion spanning the blink of eye, the tick before the tock, the so on and so forth…a very convenient way to create unity among vignettes, but much less whimsical or creative than say, Ray Bradbury’s “Illustrated Man.”

The kaleidoscope effect was a “this is our youth hear us roar” frustration. Every now and then it reassures me to see that teen angst did not die in the 60’s.

...CONTINUE READING ENTRY