If I’m honest, (and normally I am), I was hoping for something more. The idea was an interesting one, a re-telling of Orpheus and Eurydice with a slightly different ending, and in a circus hell-scape, and that sounded pretty cool.
Unfortunately, the execution was lacking some. The show itself felt less like a story, and more of a showcase for the puppets, operated by one man and one woman.The show itself was slow, and felt like it took second place.
The puppet work was very good, and there were certainly some interesting puppets to look at, but it was executed slightly awkwardly, and had a hard time keeping the audience’s attention.
Tall girls are gorgeous; short girls are gorgeous; thin girls are gorgeous; and fat girls are gorgeous. That’s what this play focuses on—the ability to love yourself and feel beautiful, even though you do not fall into the dictum of what Vogue deems as beauty.
As a feminist, I love this show—I love that bold and brave women willingly come on stage to show their beauty, despite society’s censure about the “perfect” body. This complete package has heart-tugging moments, when a girl wonders why she’s rejected because her legs aren’t as slim as sticks. It has confident moments when you feel comfortable enough to come out and say, “I’m fat—and I’m gorgeous.” Importantly, it has bold moments, when you find out that “f**king a fatty” could be the ride of your life.
I enjoyed the show immensely, but the opening night presentation did not go off without its problems. The faulty microphone cut out more often than it stayed live. The poor actors had a rough time maintaining audibility—but they maintained their composure effortlessly. Some work needs to be done with their synchronicity routines and the scene breaks last a little bit too long.
This effort started five minutes late and ended ten minutes early, essentially making it a 45-minute cabaret, rather than the advertised hour. It’s short, but it’s brave, bold and beautiful—cheers to ChubRub!
The ropes and bondage purport to emphasize love and trust. The opening enactment sees the (what’s the right word here? Not victim, or target. Let’s call her…) submissive party, trusting the dominant party implicitly.
It starts off benign enough but after a while, I couldn’t help but feel claustrophobic for the submissive person. Although she looked relaxed and at ease, I felt squirmy.
The second segment downright disturbed me, since it depicted an abduction/kidnapping. The narrator explained that ancient law enforcement used shibari to detain criminals and suspects, but the abduction was nothing of the sort.
The third installment, featuring a person in a gold body suit, showed more of the elegance and the beauty of a willing and athletic participant. This is more like what I expected.
At times, I felt like a voyeur and, at times, I felt like pulling out a knife and cutting the bound person free. The show had some beautiful moments to go with its beautiful music, but there were also some icky moments. Maybe it’s just me—and as a feminist, perhaps it tweaked me somewhat that this is a return to a time when men were always dominant and women were always objectified. You’ll have to make your own judgment.
Astrid: “They were killed by a train”.
Otto: “A lion.”
Astrid: “Train!”
Now there’s your problem, folks, right there in a nuthouse shell. If you can’t agree on how your parents died, where does that leave you?
Apparently, it leaves you playing to a packed and cheering crowd of fans at The Pyramid Wednesday night, delighting in the rawk power, the humour, the pathos, and the musical chops and tight vocals of Die Roten Punkte, Berlin’s Prince and Princess of Rock and Roll.
The one part of their story they seemed to agree on was how horrible it was being raised by their relatives after their parents died (somehow). But then, as their story goes, so did they. Astrid took Otto in the middle of the night and they ran away to Berlin, home-schooling, and ultimate fame, loved by their devoted fans as Die Roten Punkte, German for The Red Dots, although to our English-speaking ears it carries a hint of something more, something about rotten punks, perhaps?
The intimate sidetrips into their personal life helped us come to accept Astrid’s reliance on sausages, and Otto’s idealistic dreams of a world dancing and singing together, But their appeal (like a banana) also relies on the sweet taste of rock and roll inside the Fringe Festival skin.
Astrid makes her miniature drum kit sound huge, especially in her big and I do mean BIG showpiece BODY SLAM)
And Otto plays a rare instrument, a ruby red Flying V, but not just any Flying V, this is a half-sized version made by Epiphone called the Epiphone Flying Vee Wee. And yet Otto turns it into a monster power pop axe with his impeccable playing.
Die Roten Punkte play and sing hard and fast and brilliantly and manage to riff their way through a mountain of rock history tropes, all while bubbling over with bawdy humour and entendres single, double, and more.
At one point Astrid picked an unsuspecting guy out of the audience to help her remove her new costume top designed for the show’s opening blast-off. The undressing process practically screamed wardrobe malfunction; and there was a moment when there was a noticeable holding of breath by everyone, particularly by the guy who found himself holding one end of twenty feet of sash fastened to Astrid’s d⁄ecolletage.
Rock musicians are known for being loud and, dare I say it, a little arrogant—volume to eleven and all that. In that respect the Die Roten Punkte show, EUROSMASH! deviated significantly from the usual rock concert. In addition to obviously being extremely comfortable communicating directly with their audience. Die Roten Punkte displayed an impressive amount of empathy.
It worried both Astrid and Otto that, as the show got underway, one woman near the front might be seated too close to the speaker, as Astrid thought she had seen the woman put her hands near her ears. The band immediately stopped the show completely and made sure that the woman was feeling no pain before continuing. As Otto said apologetically, “We are having a lot of fun, but it could be a long show for you.”
Lots of fun indeed. Buy a banana machine. Rock Bang!
This 45-minute story needs more time to develop the characters. The protagonists jump from setting to setting quickly and not enough happens at each stop. It feels like watching the climax without seeing the plot develop, so you never really dig your heels into the characters.
There were some laughs as well as some catchy gags (the facial expressions made the show) but the plot was too fractured to mould any continuity. While the main characters put on a great show, some of the supporting cast struggled somewhat.
Overall, it’s an enjoyable romp, but there’s potential for so much more.
All right, I admit it. Last night, I played hooky from the Fringe.
Between sending the opening issue to press and awaiting copy for this one, I watched as every type of weather common to a prairie summer played out as afternoon turned to dusk.
After baking in the heat, I liked the breeze—until it blew everything all over the room.
“You know,” I said, as intrepid Jenny photographer, David Nishikawa rescued the TV from the torrential rain suddenly coming through the dining room window side ways, “Maybe I don’t have to go to the Fringe.”
“What?” He hollered, unable to hear me over nature’s extended drum solo on the tin roof next door.
“I’m telling you I’m not going.”
(This should have been followed by a big, show stopping Broadway number, but wasn’t, for which anyone in earshot should be thankful).
Seeing is Believing—Why is it that people believe in all sorts of deities, aliens, and assorted spirits that they’ve never actually seen; but when it comes to The Jenny, despite its 22-year history, it’s not until it’s actually there, in their hands and before their eyes, that any but the true believers recall that we are here, wanting you to submit to: jennyrevue@shaw.ca
But now that you have our email address at your fngertips along with our web address at www.jennyrevue.com, you can access our friendly, searchable Fringe guide, link directly to our Email with your reviews and letters, or to the Fringe web site, and read the latest issue.
Going and Gone—Are we to assume from the cancellation of their final Sunday shows, that both Penny Ashton and Sound and Fury are signaling their intentions of feeing town before the Fabulous Jenny Awards? (If not, let us know.)
I see Giovanni!, and Pair of Animals… have both cancelled all performances. So there are only 174 shows—and a gang of slightly sodden outdoor performers —with a shot at Jenny coverage and attendant Jenny Award eligibility, which is based on getting any ink (SSPs included) in these pages.
So if you’ve either mounted or witnessed a spectacle so spectacular it deserves a chance at winning a Jenny, let us know about it. (And if you’re a company who won’t be here at 11(ish) PM on Sunday the 27th, let us know that, too.
Here it is for the 23rd time—The Jenny Revue, your Fringe forum on paper and on-line.
You could be holding an actual paper booklet in your hands or checking us out on your mobile device, where you can also access our own on-line Fringe program, at http://www.jennyrevue.com/schedule/
There you can sort alphabetically by the first letter of the show title or by venue. It also has a groovy search component where entering just one significant word in either the title or company name (or description gets you the listing for that show—as long as it’s a word like Starbucks or Marketplace.
Words like dance or comedy will give you every show with that word in its title, company name, or show description. A less broad search, i.e., ‘devil’ brings up six shows, one with devil in the title, four with devil in their hellishly inclined show descriptions, and one group who describes itself as “devil-may-care.”
The Jenny Revue’s web weaver, Murray Hunter put this easy glide site together when he tired of scrolling endlessly through the Fringe’s own on-line program which lacks a quick search component. And I, for one, was always forgetting to un-check the boxes that sort by genre, Audience Classification, date, and venue, leading to unsatisfying search results.
I think you’ll like it. I also think we should call it the Hunter (the Hunter Show Hunter being a trifle unwieldy) since it describes both its function and its creator.
Ch-ch-ch-changes—Intrepid Jenny reporter Kevin Longfield crossed the bridge to the basilica last night to view Quo Vadis and found Ross McMillan, “script in hand,” having replaced the hospitalized Kevin Klassen only two days before opening. He describes McMillan’s performance as an “an admirable job, which I expect will only get better as time passes.”
Let’s hope Mr. Klassen’s also gets better as his time in the hospital passes quickly, toward recovery from whatever put him there.
Jenny start-up—Some of us got a bit of a jump on the rest of you at the July 6th Jenny Prevue. Taking the stage at the King’s Head to serve up tasty tidbits of their shows were Damn Your Eyes, (James & Jamesy in) High Tea, Bizarro Obscure, According To Harry, Understudies: A New Musical, WANDERLUST, Head of a Youth, The Storyteller, GOD: A Comedy In One Act, There are Two Errors in the the Title of This Show*, and The (Improvised) Bachelorette, all hosted by our Horrible Friend, Shawn Kowalke, who did not, on this occasion, (or ever, come to think of it), supply Free Beer.
It’s time to try to impress our new printer All Nations Printing, by being something close to on time.
Don’t forget to send your reviews, SSPs, letters and random thoughts to us at jennyrevue@shaw.ca or drop a paper missive in a Jenny box. I look forward to reading you.
Jurasco
Home—Red River Collegiate
Pull a device from ones pocket, and call it magic. Summon the stars and call it wizardry.
We live in an age where money dominates our politics, our lives, our actions—actions that have created a new geological epoch, and alienates us from the living world. We have forgotten the old ways of ancient wisdom, traded it for bubbles and beads.
With Steven Harper as the high priest, Home is Wayne James’ fourth appearance at the Winnipeg fringe festival.
You Rung? Productions
Mr. and Mrs. Alexander: Sideshows & Psychics—W.E.C.C.
1888. Meet the most notorious couple in colonial showbiz.
Two award winning variety entertainers from the upside down of the world bring you a story told with sideshow stunts, mindreading and magic. Will you be fooled? Five stars from Onstage Ottawa within its first few days on tour!
Animal Engine Theatre Company
Petunia and Chicken—Cinematheque
My wife and I created Petunia and Chicken when we were engage, and drunk on the nectar of love!
This classic love story combines the epic scale of romance movies, the heartbreaking struggle of pioneers as depicted in the works of author Willa Cather, and the poignant beauty of old time music. We often describe it as “Gone With the Wind on the turn of the century American prairie,” and we’d love to share it with you!
