If you see this guy, Ben Elliott, who performs in the short play Father’s Day, grab a seat nearby.

I love it when a show makes me work and The Café had me hoppin’. The evening also offers a tasty tasting menu of emerging and established local talent.

In The Café, which was conceived by Fay Nass, seven short plays are performed at tables scattered around Kafka’s, which is a real-world café on Great Northern Way. The scripts unfold simultaneously, but each is repeated three times, so your job as an audience member is to catch as many of the offerings as you can — especially the ones you’re particularly eager to see. Don’t worry, there’s no audience participation, but you are encouraged to sidle right up to the performers, to sit and stand beside them.

And you’re going to want to do that because it’s magical. How often do you get to sit just a couple of feet away from somebody as they completely — deliberately, skilfully — transform themselves into a different human being? Every time an actor does that, it’s like they’re opening a portal to a parallel universe. And, unless you’re an actor yourself, you rarely get to see it this close up.   [Read more…]