This glorious musical retelling of Orpheus and Eurydice explodes out of the starting gate—and almost self-destructs on its high-octane ambitions.

Jasper loves Agnes. Agnes dives off a cliff. Jasper follows her into the underworld. Divine shenanigans ensue.

The production is snappy and inventive in its manipulation of fabric and crates. The actors are winning and likable. And the choice to cast Jasper as a woman (Merewyn Comeau) injects an understated and appreciated queerness. Awkward Stage Productions confidently sails this musical down hell’s river.

Then the tech nearly sinks it. The lighting (especially early on) is unforgivably patchy. And the sound design is wretched: the five-piece band routinely overpowers the singers, and Ryan Scott Oliver’s clever lyrics are often garbled in the mix. Because they’re the only performers whose mics are reliably balanced, corporate villainess Mrs. Lethe (Natalie Backerman) and tour guide Gretchen (Lucia Forward) very nearly steal the show.

Transferred to a better theatre with a professional sound technician, Jasper in Deadlandwould be unstoppable. At present? It’s still worthwhile. But clean your ears first.

Remaining performances at the Firehall Arts Centre on September 8 (6 p.m.), 9 (3:15 p.m.), 12 (8:45 p.m.), 13 (5:30 p.m.), 14 (9 p.m.), 15 (4 p.m.), 16 (6:30 p.m.) > David Johnston

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This is a guest review.

David Johnston is a Vancouver-based actor, aerialist, and writer, not in that order. He recently hailed from the Edmonton Fringe, where he saw many excellent shows and also ate a green onion cake. The green onion cake got three-and-a-half stars. David is a recent graduate of Studio 58, and is currently writing a script about reviews, so this should be a rather meta experience. He’s delighted to join FRESH SHEET for the Vancouver Fringe.

Sign up—free!—for Colin Thomas’s FRESH SHEET and get daily reviews from the Vancouver Fringe. (During the regular season, FRESH SHEET is stuffed with the world’s most fascinating theatre news. Here’s a taste.)

And, because theatre needs informed, independent criticism if it’s going to thrive, check out Colin’s Patreon campaign. (It takes a village to feed a critic.)

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Gili Roskies as Girl and Adrian Glynn McMorran as Guy in Once. Kiss one another already. (Photo by Emily Cooper)

Once is more than enough.

Yes, Once won Tony Awards for Best Musical and Best Book of a Musical in 2012, along with six other Tonys. And it has hauled in a bunch of other prizes, too, but man it’s boring!

Here’s the plot: boy meets girl; they dither endlessly. To be more specific, in working-class Dublin, a young Irishman who’s identified only as Guy meets a young Czech immigrant whom the script calls Girl. Guy is depressed—he’s just been dumped—and he has given up on his dreams of having a musical career. Then, through her sheer perkiness, Girl lifts Guy out of his funk. A musician herself, she presses Guy not to abandon his music. As this is going on, Girl and Guy waver about whether or not to act on the romantic feelings they obviously have for one another. They waver. And waver. Then, after the intermission, they waver some more. This kind of romantic indecision is just fine in friends but when you go to the theatre, you don’t want to feel like you’re spending the night stuck in a stalled car. [Read more…]

Give yourself the gift of smart, openhearted sensuality this season: see Onegin. (That’s Lauren Jackson on the left and Josh Epstein on the right. David Cooper took the photo)

I saw Onegin again last night and, not to put too fine a point on it, it was like falling back into the arms of a favourite lover. [Read more…]

If it were legal to adopt marionettes, I would apply for guardianship of Schnitzel.

Puppeteer Ronnie Burkett is a genius. He just is. Another blunt truth: Little Dickens isn’t his best show—at least it isn’t yet.

As the full title makes clear, Little Dickens: The Daisy Theatre Presents A Christmas Carol is yet another riff on Charles Dickens’s classic seasonal ghost story.

Burkett has been mounting evenings called The Daisy Theatre at The Cultch for four years now. The Daisy Theatre itself is kind of a rep company of marionettes: we see the same characters every winter. The idea behind this is that it allows audiences to spend more time with favourites and it lets Burkett put up an annual holiday entertainment without having to carve a whole new cast of characters every time.

In Little Dickens, the bitter old showgirl Esmé Massingill becomes Scrooge, the stout Prairie housewife, Edna Rural takes on the role of Christmas Present, and the irresistible fairy Schnitzel becomes Tiny Tim. [Read more…]

Peter Anderson (Titus) should not be allowed to play with dolls. (Photo by Steven Drover)

At the beginning of The Society for the Destitute Presents Titus Bouffonius, I was so stimulated—so shocked, laughing so hard—that I was afraid I was going to start shouting things. Unplanned, random shit. You’ve got to love a show that makes you feel like you might lose your mind. [Read more…]