I managed to misread the synopsis for The Girl Who Was Raised by Wolverine, so I was expecting a dystopian future made bearable for a teenager through the influence of comic books...

In reality the Wolverine mentioned in the Fringe Program Guide is of First Nations, not Marvel, fame. It is a narrator/trickster/guardian figure that facilitates the action of the plot. Wolverine presents the "case"  to the audience, asking us to decide the characters’ fate at the end. Not a bad premise. It takes audience participation up a notch while allowing the play to stay a drama, and it encourages us to look at the whole experience as a social...

Leaving the auditorium after Nerdfucker, I felt like a defiant teenager. I found the performance charming and heart wrenching. I was rooting vehemently for the main character by the end of the play, and was ready to rush out and tell all my friends to see this great show! 

But after the audience’s enthusiastic applause was shushed into silence by Cameryn Moore’s insistence that we tell everyone we know about the show because this play deserves a bigger audience than it had (at 7:30 on opening Thursday), I was left feeling like my appreciation was underappreciated. My experience of the past hour...

A farce, acted out by two men, as travelling players. Beginning in darkness with whispers about an accidental murder of an audience member during last night’s show, you are greeted with gusto and enthusiasm. Perpetual Wednesday is a wonderfully funny and energetic show. Presented by White Collar Crimes, this hilarious and absurd tale is going to have your cheeks aching from laughter.

As my second show at the Fringe I walked in having no idea about what to expect; all I had to go on was something about a murdered audience member. Within the first five minutes my cheeks were...

Jeff Leard is relatively new to the relatively long tradition of high-energy, fast-talking one-man Fringe shows. He's deservedly getting great reviews – lots of four or five stars and a “best of fest” award too.

This one, The Jupiter Rebellion: A Zach Zultana Adventure, opens in 2193, some 150 years in the future. Our hero, Zach Zultana, is a geominer out in space. His working conditions are not so good and after the Big Boss turns on him, things get much worse, for him and for his co-workers.

He's demoted to custodial staff but winds up being a force for...

First off, I'll say I liked the first half of the performance a lot more than the second half. But I liked the first half a lot. A wacky troupe of clowns take on WWII while tripping over one another, deflowering mops, and attempting cannibalism. It was very classic slapstick clown comedy, with trashy hobo-esque clowns clattering into each other, attempting to eat their fallen friends, casually murdering one another and taking obscenely loud squelching steps with wet socks. I loved the choreography and how much they tumbled around the stage like sad kittens in a drier. I also really...

“It doesn't remember who liked it... who didn't like it... it just remembers that it was”

Aux.La.More is an intimate storytelling and dance performance by Kara Nolte – and she has such a presence on stage. The way she tells her story and explains the way dance has allowed her to express herself is disarming and at the same time very comfortable.

I found myself wrapped up in the way she moved and tumbled and was marionetted on the dance floor – the way her suit jacket trailed behind her. She'd dance to a piece of music, and then she'd...

The show is written and performed by Megan Phillips and directed by TJ Dawe. Megan Phillips is a performer from Vancouver, BC, Canada. The story is based on her Vipassana 10-day silent meditation experience. It is a one woman performance, a true story of change, personal growth, forgiveness and becoming “enough”.

Not Enough is a story of a young woman who’s reached a crisis point in her life and career, who needs change and growth. She tells the story of her transformation from a shallow, ill-focused individual who creates chaos around her, which is frustrating to friends, family, workmates and,...

From all of the plays I have attended, I would definitely give The Dance Teacher first place in being the most emotionally intense.

The story is about a dance teacher, Justin, who was put in jail for sexual assault of his boy students. We learn during the play that he, in his turn, was assaulted and abused by his former teacher when he was young boy and he was left by his mother at the age of 15. Or was he? Everything that Justin tells us is put under question. We learn that he is the biggest manipulator and that...

I'm trying to think of a good comparison here. Windy Wynazz is – like a volcano of energy. Like a sexually obsessed teenager in hotpants. Like a lace-legged fire tornado.

When I walked into the theatre the first thing I saw were a pair of shapely legs in fishnet stockings bent over their owners' body in classic autofellatio pose, feet spilling over onto the first step of the audience gallery. The lady herself. She popped up from the floor like an excited emo fountain of nervous energy and showed people to the front rows – ushering people away from what she called...

Frank: To Be Frank is a hilarious performance put on by the Fran Frimself. Frank is charismatic and talented – the greatest thing since cable tv, he takes water and turns it into golden water – the crossdressing showstopper himself – FRANK!

The show was awesome. I was laughing embarassingly hard the whole time. Frank draws the audience into hilarious anti-comedy, getting us to clap for shitty synth drumbeats and constant reappearances onstage. He beat an audience member in a game of name that song that I suspect may have been rigged; he double boob-edly held a beer and then drank said beer...

Vancouver’s Kevin Kraussler and Ming Hudson wrote and perform the show. It alternates between two separate stories and time periods: the first recorded case of schizophrenia, James Matthews, hospitalized in London’s ‘Bedlam’ asylum in the late 18th century and a current story of a delusional woman and her daughter that was drawn from the real-life exposure of the cast.

The play opens with a male physician speaking to our audience as if we were a professional jury. He presents a patient suffering from delusions who has been hospitalized for many years. They are reviewing his mental status in order to...

Chelsey Stuyt is a comedian and performer from Vancouver, BC, Canada. The story is based on her personal experience.

Although Stuyt is well known as a comedian,The Secret is a great balanced combination of serious and funny! She tells stories inside of stories. Multilayered, emotional, sophisticated and excellent storytelling. The Secret weaves together psychology, mythology, personal exploration and a parent’s love, culminating in a heartbreaking, unexpected reveal you won’t soon forget.

Chelsey talks about human nature, the mistakes we make and what and how we learn from them. She elaborates on questions such as, “Why do we keep secrets?” and “Why do we...

The whole set of this play takes place in the bar. The story is not very original to start with. It is about a guy who is pretending to be a widower in order to hook up with an attractive girl at the bar. The play's forty minutes consist of them going back and forth with standard pleasantries just in time for him to agree to go back to her place and – you guessed it – that is when his “deceased” wife appears to bust him. Somehow, I saw that coming—wouldn't you?

The story does not end quite yet and takes you a...

Whenever I go to a one man show I am always a bit worried. In my opinion the play and the act has to be exceptional in order for one man to keep your attention throughout. This was not a problem for Brent Hirose acting as Alex in Sea Wall.

Alex tells you the story of his life and love for his wife and daughter. He talks about love for his wife in such a romantic and beautiful way that leaves you admiring such a relationship. He describes his most profound feeling for their daughter, making you see what it means to be...

This show was sold out within a few days of opening at the Fringe. If you were lucky like me to get to see the performance you most likely enjoyed it. However I am attributing the success of the sales mainly to the character in the center – D. Trump. I mean he is already funny so it is no brainer to make a comedy out of it.

The show runs in a musical format with many great song parodies and I found the singing to be quite good. The story line takes many turns into Star Wars with characters twisted to reflect...

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