Nancy's MUST SEE List at the 2010 Toronto Fringe

I'm currently in between shows in Morrisburg.  With two performances left, I'm fighting the blues by focusing on the trip I'm going on tomorrow to the Toronto Fringe Festival.  I'm itching to get my hands on a program, but until I do, here's a list of shows I would like to catch while I'm down there. In the spirit of my past Must-See lists, I probably have not seen these shows already and can't comment on them directly, but each one comes with it's own pedigree as to why I want to catch them.  I've seen enough Fringe now in the past 8 years that you can probably count on what I'm putting down here, but if that's not enough, fellow performer Alex Eddington's list has a lot of overlap with mine.

I won't be linking to each individual show description, but the whole list can be found here.

First up: The Ones I Missed in Ottawa!

Although I was able to see 15 shows at the Ottawa Fringe Festival, there wasn't enough time to see everything I wanted.  Here are some of the shows with great buzz that I'm planning to catch in Toronto.  We had two Best of Venue winners in the Duck Wife and Dale Beaner and the Turtle Boy.  There was also the absolutely stunning Lindsay Sutherland Boal's Purely Cabaret and Jonno Katz's Cactus: The Seduction.  I also heard really great things about Phone Whore, but I plan to catch her in Calgary.  If you're not going to be in any other Fringe cities, then I highly suggest you see her now.  I really want to see MAL.  Rachelle Elie's concept really interests me.  Oh and although it's not the same show, I really think it's about time I saw something by Barry Smith.  This time he's got Me, My Stuff, and I: a Multimedia Comedy.

The Ones I've Already Seen

Having been a fringe patron for so long, there's bound to be stuff that I've already seen at various other festivals.  Here's what I know is bound to be good.  Rob Gee's Fruitcake is a hit wherever he goes and I remember enjoying Raven for a Lark (though be warned it's not exactly a comedy) when I saw it in Ottawa last year.

The Ones from my Favourite Non-Fringe Festival

I met them at the Big Comedy Go-To in London (ON) last year and so I'm looking forward to Jimmy Hogg and Christel Bartelse's Wisdom: Part One & ONEymoon.  Same goes for Rob Salerno with Big in Germany (who's got the very awesome Mikeala Dyke working behind the scenes).  Morro was flying solo at the time in what I had dubbed "the bravest and funniest piece of theatre I'd seen in a long time" so I'm excited to see her again with her partner in Morro and Jasp GONE WILD.  Oh and the Go-To also first introduced me to the amazing work of the Cody Rivers duo (gosh, the Go-To is quite the festival now, isn't it?) and one of it's members wrote Poison the Well, which stars the fantastic Elison Zasko (who was one of my Fringe Crushes in Ottawa this year.  That talent! That style! That accent!)

Everything Else that Is Probably Going to Rock my World

Speaking of rocking my world, Die Roten Punke is back with Die Roten Punkte: KUNST ROCK (ART ROCK). I don't know what it's about, but I want more of this:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M-003rK1vt8]

Monster Theatre has a soft spot in my heart for the Canada Show from many moons ago and I think they win the prize for longest Fringe play title ever with The Shakespeare Show: Or, how an illiterate son of a Glover became the Greatest Playwright in the World.

Can you believe with all my years doing Fringe, I have yet to see something by the "undisputed" Gods of Fringe like TJ Dawe and Keir Cutler?  It might be time for me to correct that with Lucky 9 and Teaching Shakespeare respectively.

Some of the guys from Uncalled For are involved with Dance Animal & You & Me and Me & You (this last one includes Kirsten Rasmussen who is one of the funniest improvisers I have ever seen).

Oh and remember BASH'd? Well the guy who created that, Chris Craddock, has got a new show called PUBLIC SPEAKING.  It's been getting A LOT of advance buzz in every article about the Fringe I read and I just hope it isn't sold out before I get a chance to see it.

So that's abou 20 shows in one week and doesn't include everything else I will hear about once I'm on location.  I can't guarantee I'll get to see it all - Toronto Fringe has yet to consider me a VIP like it's Ottawa counterpart has and money is tight now that my contracts are ending - but I will try my best.

What are you going to see?

What A Week!

Things were off to a great start last Sunday with the closing performance of BASH'd: A Gay Rap Opera at the GCTC followed by a theatre audition for a company in town. Then I spent some time with a friend and watched Heath Ledger's last performance in The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnasus, an odd little film in which I learned it's best not to make a deal with Tom Waits. I had taken the time on the prior Saturday to come in and complete the finishing touches on a big project I was involved with at the GCTC. Oddly enough, my boss also decided to come in that day. There really is nothing better than choosing to work overtime and having your boss catch you at it. It's just like How To Succeed in Business Without Really Trying, only I was really trying. I was then able to take Monday off without much fuss.

It only got better after that. I received a call from a friend. Apparently their non-union film project got approved for union status and would I happen to be available on Thursday for a shoot? (More on this in my next blog post.)

Needless to say, I was super excited to be on set again and even more so when I contacted my union's branch office and found out that I would be getting another apprentice credit for my work. When you start out with ACTRA (The Alliance of Canadian Cinema, Television and Radio Artists), you typically begin as an Apprentice Member and you need to collect 6 credits before you can become a Full Member. More details on being an Apprentice can be found here. In the past, only one low budget film could be used towards your six credits. The reasoning being, I guess, that anyone could go out and make their own low budget films and get all their credits. However times change and so do some rules and regulations. I am now only one credit away from Full Member status (and some kind of minimal health insurance coverage!)

Oh and my agent also contacted me to let me know that I would be auditioning for a feature film on the Friday. so who knows, maybe I'm not that far away from Full Member status after all...

Somehow, I managed to do all this while juggling 40 hours of work and the big audience development project we had going on over the weekend. Oh and Thursday was also payday! Gosh, I wish all my weeks could be like that, but right now I am just grateful that everything just came together so well.

BASH'd Reviews

Okay, just so everyone doesn't think it's all doom and gloom. BASH'd! A Gay Rap Opera has been receiving incredibly positive reviews across the board and so I thought I'd give you a sampling of them here.

Oh and if you'd like to meet the guys from BASH'd, Chris Craddock and Nathan Cuckow will be at The Lookout Bar in Ottawa tonight. Tomorrow's show (affectionately dubbed BASH'd Bash) is also a fundraiser for a variety of local groups in town, including Toto Too Theatre. The guys will be participating in a post-show talkback and there will be a reception following the performance and chat at the GCTC. Click on the links for ticket information.

What the critics are saying:

"…BASH’d is simply that good." - Denis Armstrong, Ottawa Sun

"...a performance that, on Thursday night, left the audience practically humming with energy." Patrick Langston, Ottawa Citizen

"The rapping… is very clever and easy to follow." - Katie Marsh, Apartment 613

"BASH'd: a gay rap opera for everyone." - Wayne Current, The Wellington Oracle

"I defy anyone to keep their foot from tapping or head from bobbing…" - Connie Meng, North Country Public Radio

"Don't fear the rapper" - Andrew Snowdon, Ottawa Tonite

What the audience is saying:

“Amazing show. You Rock.”

“It was brilliant on every level!”

“That was friggin awesome!”

Remember, those are their Viewpoints, come on down and let us know yours! BASH’d! A Gay Rap Opera continues until January 31.

Convenient Veggies

Here's a little something you may not know about me. Since probably August/September, I've been making a conscious effort to have at least one "meatless" meal per day. There are a couple of reasons for this: - I have a guilt factor when I eat meat. Ever see that Simpsons' episode where Lisa becomes a vegetarian? "Liiiiiiiiisa, I thought you loooooooooooved me." Yeah. That.

- Consuming less meat has been shown have great environmental and health benefits, as I learned from the absolute authority that is Wikipedia.

- A surprisingly large number of my friends are vegetarians which makes it easy to enjoy a meal.

- But the number one reason I've been cutting back on meat? It's just too expensive. Yeah, I know, I'm a great humanitarian here. Just worried about my bottom line. The ends still justify the means though, right? Or did I miss a memo?

Anyway, don't get me wrong, I don't consider myself a vegetarian. Fish and seafood don't count as "meat" in my book. And, well, over the holidays, all bets were kind of off when it came to what I ate.

That said, once I was back in town, the lack of meat in my fridge and the ready availability of vegetarian restaurants around my workplace (I'm kind of drooling as I think about Viva Loca's tomato, cheese and pesto panini on jalapeno bread), means that I've suddenly realized I hadn't eaten meat in the last four days (and the last four days before that). Didn't plan it that way, it just happened.

My reason for talking about all this now? Yesterday was Tuesday. Tuesday is typically wing night with a good buddy of mine. I had trouble finishing my wings this time. The guilt factor was stronger than usual (Was that a tendon? *gulp*) and there was an odd rumbling in my tummy. Perhaps the early signs of revolt. Some of it even looked undercooked, though I was assured that was all in my head. Either way, I couldn't finish my plate and so passed it on to my friend. A few hours later and I'm having problems. Problems that require the most immediate access to a washroom.

This morning, I'm still not feeling all that well, but we've got a media call today for BASH'd so I'm trying to ignore it (I'm so smart aren't I?)

Now, to be fair, just when I was ready to lay the blame on all of this on the evil chicken flesh I ingested into my body, I got twittered this PSA from the City of Ottawa (yes, the City is on Twitter!)

It seems something is going around of the gastrointestinal variety although, I had actually made sure to thoroughly clean my hands yesterday because we were at the dirty Oak.

Then again, who knows? I just wanted to get a bit of a conversation going on the merits/demerits of eating meat. Feel free to get things started below.

Just Like Opening Night, Only Cheaper

In an awesome post giving us a glimpse of the behind the scenes adventures of the National Arts Centre's Resident Acting Company's production of Mother Courage, local muckraker Kris Joseph declares: This is a week when I must remind myself that there is a difference between a preview performance (which is still a rehearsal) and an actual performance; and even though we will have members of the public watching us work as of Tuesday, we don’t actually open until Friday. Our preview audiences will, I expect, get a few glimpses of the foundation as we put the finishing touches on the walls.

It's true. When a show has never before been seen in front of an audience, it needs those previews to find its legs. It's not uncommon in New York for a new show to be in previews for a month before its official opening night. That's because the audience is the last key component to any performance. The audience response will affect everything from timing to actor reactions to, sometimes, entire sections of the script.

But what happens when a show has been on tour for years?

BASH'd: A Gay Rap Opera goes into previews tonight and tomorrow at the Great Canadian Theatre Company. It was written by Chris Craddock and Nathan Cuckow with music by Aaron Macri.

I had the pleasure of meeting Chris (can't believe I know someone in the Canadian Theatre Encyclopedia) at the Winnipeg Fringe Festival this past year (we were billet neighbours), but Ottawa audiences might remember his writing from the sold out one-woman show, PornStar (and if Brian Carroll is reading this, he will probably have a list of other shows that have also been seen in town).

BASH'd toured the Fringe Festival Circuit in 2007 before being picked up for an off-Broadway (yes, THAT Broadway) run in 2008. Recently, it was seen in Toronto at Theatre Passe-Muraille and it held its dress rehearsal at the Irving Greenberg Theatre Centre on Sunday. Overheard by one of the guests in attendance at the dress rehearsal: "This is probably the most polished dress I have ever seen on the GCTC stage."

As I said, BASH'd goes into previews tonight and tomorrow at 8 p.m. and these guys are ready to go! So, dear readers, as a special public service announcement to you (and as a part of my promotion work at the GCTC), I'm letting you know that you can see the full production of BASH'd at rates that are heavily reduced from the regular run because, well, that's how things are scheduled.

In addition, I just found out that the theatre has implemented a new Rush Ticket policy for every performance. As of noon (NOON!) on show day, you can contact the Box Office for your Rush Tickets which are $10 for students and $20 for adults.

Since it's about 1 p.m., you could get ridiculously cheap tickets for an amazing performance right now! Call 613-236-5196 to reserve your spot.

I'll be seeing you at the Theatre!

*Side note: I wonder if my blog stats will go up now that I have PornStar in the tags?