RED BASTARD: LIE WITH ME
For a guy who wants to seduce his audience, Red Bastard (Eric Davis) spends an awful lot of time talking down to them. Davis uses Lie with Me as a soapbox to promote polyamory. The opening and closing sequences are engaging, but there’s long, boring middle. Off the...
5-STEP GUIDE TO BEING GERMAN 2.0
To be fair, all sorts of people in the audience found this show hilarious. The performance I was at sold out. There was even a guy outside trying to buy a ticket from people who had theirs already. But I don’t get it. Stand-up comic Paco Erhard traffics in cultural...
A BRIEF HISTORY OF BEER
A Brief History of Beer is a (barely) glorified drinking game. Writers/performers Will Glenn and Trish Parry become a pair of time travelers who guide the audience through the history of beer to find out when, exactly, beer became corporatized. Whenever our time...
Guys and Dolls: Don’t bet on this production
The musical Guys and Dolls is immortal, which means that it will survive this production. Based on stories by Damon Runyon, Guys and Dolls is set in New York in the ‘30s in the underworld of gambling. Nathan Detroit, who runs a floating crap game, bets high-roller Sky...
5 quick tips for writing a readable review
Hey. I’m looking for emerging critics who would be interested in helping me to cover the Vancouver Fringe Festival. If you’re interested in this gig—which will involve a little money, although not tons—please submit a sample review of between 200 and 600 words...
Dark Road: don’t feel compelled to go down it
A crime thriller, Dark Road feels much more suited to television than the stage. And, if it were on television, I’d turn it off. (The production is strong, but that’s not my point.) In Dark Road, Isobel McArthur, the first female Chief Constable in Scotland, is about...
The Beauty Queen of Leenane: impressive performances in sensationalistic script
It’s a nasty play well performed. In Martin McDonagh’s The Beauty Queen of Leenane, it’s the early 90s and Maureen is caring for her mother Mag in the claustrophobic Irish village of the title. The two women hate each other. Forty-year-old Maureen is a virgin who has...
This, Here: a good place to visit
In This, Here, the central character struggles with the alienation and egotism of making a living from your feelings, which is one of the downsides of being an artist Alison, who is an actor, has lost her joy in performing. And her partner Maddie is just about...
Oh What a Beautiful Morning! traps itself in an analytical mode
Oh What a Beautiful Morning! feels like the most sophisticated Powerpoint presentation the world has ever known, but it still feels like a Powerpoint presentation. My point is that it’s illustrative. Created and presented by Fight With a Stick, Oh What a Beautiful...
Subscribe Free!
Sign up for the FRESH SHEET newsletter and get curated local, national, and international arts coverage — all sorts of arts — every week.
Contact
Drop a line to colinthomas@telus.net.
Support
FRESH SHEET, the reviews and FRESH SHEET, the newsletter are available free. But writing them is a full-time job and arts criticism is in peril. Please support FRESH SHEET by sending an e-transfer to colinthomas@telus.net or by becoming a patron on Patreon.
Website by Mighty Sparrow Design.