Wednesday, September 23, 2015
Monday, September 14, 2015
Saturday, September 5, 2015
Friday, September 4, 2015
Soul - a Fringe Festival Review 2015
I'm not a mom but I work with adults who have developmental
disabilities so I can completely empathize with the kind of stresses and
sadness and joy that Maxine shares in her Soul
performance. I love the people I
work with, and I get a chance to miss them on my days off. Parents raising special needs people
don't get a break from it, a chance to put it all in perspective, to take some
time for themselves and recharge their batteries. Maxine has created her own space with this show, and within
that space she tells a story of struggle and survival.
Brain - a Fringe Festival Review 2015
Brain wasn't at
all what I expected. I don't know why, but I thought
it'd be some kind of scientific explanation about how the brain functions. Instead it's a very personal story
that's both amusing and disturbing.
It helped me understand a bit more about how my own brain functions, and
I left with a new awareness of how OCD, the obsessive compulsive disorder that
so many of us joke about, can actually take over someone's mind.
If this is Brendan McLeod's own story, as his indicates it
is, he's a very brave man. It's
not easy to live with a history of mental illness, there's always judgment and
stigma associated with that. It's
strange that it's called "illness," really, when it's really just
about people trying to sort out who they are and what it's all about. Thanks to Brendan who confidently and
skillfully guides us through the adolescent brain with its conflicting hormonal
influences and rebellious attitudes, to describe the moment his brain and body
disassociated entirely in an experience of pure psychosis, to the educated
University brain/mind/body/ego/self combination that seeks to find meaning and
direction from life.
Camel Camel - a Fringe Festival Review 2015
Camel Camel is laugh
out loud funny. I left the show wondering
if that's all I was supposed to do, though, or maybe there was some deep
philosophical underlying message that I should be taking away with me?
Janessa Johnsrude and Meghan Frank's show is described as
"David Lynch meets Abbott and Costello." It's definitely strange, weird, surreal, fantastical ... but
it also seems to invite us to question our awareness of self, identity,
dualism, the doppelganger phenomenon.
We're told early on that the story we'll hear is somehow
connected to what's going on in the head of a Ukranian prisoner, then we're led
on a journey of self exploration that seems to include gender bending, gender
confusion, an exploration of sexuality and self discovery where mind over
matter meets matter over mind. The
sisters seem aware of being observed while overtly unaware of their own
selves. "How can I be
beginning and ending all at once?" is one question left unanswered.
Sid: the Handsome Bum - a Fringe Festival Review 2015
Sid the Handsome Bum
is a sensitive, thoughtful portrayal of a variety of personalities who inhabit
the DTES, all rolled into one. It's
written by Ira Cooper who mentioned, while promoting the show in another Fringe
lineup, that he invested considerable time in the DTES talking to some of the
characters there. He said he listened
carefully and wanted us to know that his motive is to help tell their stories,
not to exploit them. Sid is
beautifully portrayed by actor Joanna Rannelli. Ira and Jo are members of Vancouver's Spec Theatre (https://spectheatre.wordpress.com)
Sid invites us to look at shopping carts, and the people who
call them home, in a whole new way.
In fact, it's difficult to look at a shopping cart the same way again
after meeting Sid, and the various characters who contribute to his DID -
Disassociative Identity Disorder.
Despite his multiple personalities, at one point Sid describes himself
as a nobody. "I'm
no-one." Is it surprising to
think that this is how a homeless person might feel?
Thursday, September 3, 2015
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)