The Fringe Festival is one of our many amazing festivals in Toronto. Fringe is dedicated to theatre and the most interesting thing about it is that anyone can be a part of Fringe. That’s right folks, you too can put on a play without any experience or know-how just by entering.
How it works is that anyone can submit their bid to perform a play and there is a lottery to choose who will have the opportunity. It means that some amazing people who would have never otherwise had the chance to produce a play or perform in a play get their moment in the spotlight and we as lucky Torontonians get the luxury of seeing them perform some really stunning works.
On the flipside however, because there are no guidelines or quality control you also get total, utter crap. And with that in mind, allow me to share with you my experience last Thursday night at the Bathurst Street Theatre.
I was feeling quite excited about the play. An impromptu outing guided by the desire to see a musical about God and Satan- something that would usually be right up my alley. It took about 2.5 seconds for me to regret my decision to come and to begin counting down the precious minutes until the horror show ended.
You may think I am saying horror show because of the Satanic aspect of the play.
No.
I mean that it was horrifically bad. Maybe painfully bad. And certainly bad enough that I shrunk in my seat and prayed for a fire alarm.
The premise of the play was this: what if you came to a hotel for a doctor conference with your assistant who is in love with you and you had a big life question of “why” on your mind. What if, at the same hotel a multi millionaire brother with his assistant and sister came to make a business deal and confront a torrid past where their father died after a horrible fight with the sister- are you now confused by this motley crew of characters? Me too.
Now- and you may want to sit down for this one, what if the hotel was run by a hotel manager who was really God and 7 arc angels? AND Satan and the 7 deadly sins ran the hotel lounge? Is your mind blown or what?
Blown- right?
I know.
Now, before I continue I will note that it took a tremendous amount of effort I am sure to put together this performance. There were at least 10 musical numbers that had full out dance choreography for the entire big cast- so that deserves a mini applause and an A for effort.
Unfortunately, the songs were just as bad as the plot and the dancing at times was uncomfortable to watch. In one scene, while the devil is tempting the doctor’s soul (and just, don’t ask, because it was such a shit plot that to really expand on it is just like beating a dead horse) he sends in one of the sins- all of whom looked like hookers-to dance for the doctor.
Most.uncomfortable.2.minutes.ever.
Her writhing was as cringe worthy as Curb Your Enthusiasm- cant watch but cant turn away.
Now, my friend and I differ about who our favorite cast member was but mine was most definitely the super lanky guy in the blue silk shirt who played some sin and whose only function in the whole performance was to kind of hump that writhing girl in her dance. That is a well-developed character if I ever saw one.
By the time the play ended- and hour and a half later I was ready to do just about anything to leave that room. I had no clue what was going on by that point and had long forgotten who was who and what everyone’s purpose in the piece was.
I think I tuned out at the moment when they brought out Gluttony from the lounge kitchen and Gluttony turned out to be a 50 year old fat man in drag who was acting alongside his teenage costars. It was, as many things were in the play, uncomfortable to watch such an older man play along with these kids- I wont say pedophilic but…
The absolute highlight, to me, was watching Satan as he growled his way through the 90 minutes with a flap of toilet paper attached to his ass. NOTHING is scarier than when you get a tiny wad of TP on your clothing and it waves in the wind created by your movements. I seriously thought I was going to pee myself when the flap of paper finally fell off. This moment was well worth the 10 dollar admission fee.
There are just no more words for this.
As my friend put it- the best thing about Fringe is that you get to see truly horrible plays- and it is true. When else do you voluntarily go out to see crap? So to him I say thank you and to the members of the cast- don’t quit your day jobs.
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