Toronto Fringe Festival 2014

Every year, I try to see at least a couple of plays at Toronto's Fringe Festival, and every year it's a treat to see innovative, honest, creative, low-budget shows.  As much as I love the overblown, million dollar Broadway productions, there's something special about seeing smaller scale (much smaller!) where the script and the acting really survive on their own merits. 

 (For more about the Fringe Festival, including festivals in other cities, click here.)

The first play of the evening was a light family comedy called "If It's Not Too Much Trouble".  I liked it well enough, but to me the acting was a bit uneven.  The character Glen was my favourite and the actor playing him did a great job, but a couple of the others need a bit of polishing.  In my opinion, the script also needs a bit of tweaking - it felt like too much was squeezed into a one act play.  That, plus there was one blip in script continuity that irked me. Nevertheless, there were a few good lines and I generally liked the ways the characters were drawn.  

Ha ha Ha!  My friend and I didn't plan to see this one - the show we wanted to see was sold out, so we rolled our eyes and bought tickets to this one.  It was terrific!!!  It's about two men, who've know each other since they were kids, and the competitiveness that permeates their friendship.  The approach (sort of like a boxing match, with a winner declared for each round) was original.  The "referee" was a young girl the men knew when they were growing up.  The actors had their timing down pat, the script was terrific, the execution was great.  So glad to have stumbled onto this play!  

Hmmm... This was okay, but quite different from what I'd thought it would be.  It wasn't quite a musical, but it did have some songs in it (I'd expected more of a musical comedy).   It was a bit of a tongue in cheek, old west story about frontier justice, and while it had some very funny moments, it definitely wasn't a comedy.  However, I liked the characters and I think the acting was quite good, it's just that overall the story wasn't really my cup of tea.