Toronto Fringe Festival 2024 Round 1

Toronto Fringe Festival : Round 1

A+ – A fantastic show, on my “Must See” List for the year.

A – A great show, but with a few bumps to smoothen out. Still worth seeing.

B – Has many elements of a great show, but needs work before the next production. Go into the show with an open mind. 

C – May not be the best show out there, but I can appreciate their hard work and recognize the courage it takes to put on a show. Proceed with a very open mind if attending. 

D – Needs a lot of work before giving it another go. Don’t give up, creating theatre is not easy! 

The Toronto Fringe Festival is here, and with it a cornucopia of theatre! The Toronto Fringe allows for creators to produce pieces with any level of experience, which can make for some really interesting and innovative theatre. Though I can’t see it all, I am delighted to get a chance to see a bunch of theatre and give you my opinions and critiques. These aren’t as in-depth as my regular reviews, but they’ll give you my overall, condensed feelings. 

James Roque: Champorado 

Rating: A

New Zealand, Filipino, and now Canadian comedian James Roque presented a funny, yet meaningful stand-up set centered around his Filipino identity, his take on success, and very relatable family stories. Or as he called it a “Silly, goofy boy show”. 

James makes you feel like you’re listening to a friend telling you stories, and I really appreciate that. Another thing that I appreciated is that he took the time to explain every cultural reference so that the entire audience could laugh along, and no one felt excluded. 

His comedy however isn’t for everyone, but if you don’t mind or even like a dash of offensive and slightly dark comedy then you will have a good time at his show. Also, he uses a good amount of audience participation, which I know makes many people uncomfortable, so if that’s you, sit further back. 

Unfortunately, I felt that there were points where he lost the audience, and though he was trying hard, sometimes it wasn’t working. He got everyone in the end with a few very nostalgic, and heartfelt moments, but when no one laughed, it was evident. 

The only real criticism that I have to be honest, is that his storytelling felt a little jumpy and disconnected. The transitions between points didn’t always feel smooth, even though they were always in theme. I would encourage Roque to take a bit of time and look at the overall structure of the piece, and see if he can find even more smoothness in the transitions and the overall flow. 

 Overall, I had a great time at “Champorado”, and am excited to see more of Roque’s comedy. I think this is worth a ticket, and being in the Solo Room at the Tarragon, will sell out. 

 

Get a Clue 

Rating: B

I love a good murder mystery, and I also believe that we should support the next generation of theatre, arts, and culture. The cast of “Get a Clue” did a stellar job in performing their musical based loosely on the game/movie ‘Clue’, and the ever-popular genre of Murder Mysteries. 

Every actor was able to have a few shining moments, bringing their characters to life. I was also quite impressed with many elements of the show: the set design, their harmonies, their comedic timing, and their pacing (which is a really hard thing to teach actors. Believe me, I’ve tried). 

If I had any advice to this incredible cast, as a director, theatre critic, and fellow actor it would be to sing with more confidence, and project more (some lines that appeared to be funny were lost on me because I couldn’t hear them from the back), and slow some of the lines down so they can be enunciated and understood. 

There were some hilarious little moments and lines, like, “I don’t kill, I slay”, and the first few songs were quite excellent from composition to performance. Where I find a lot of trouble unfortunately is the plot. I really don’t want to spoil much for you in case you’d like to see it, but the second half of the musical just felt rushed. It felt like the playwright(s) had a deadline approaching and needed to deliver an ending, so they created a convoluted way to keep the murders going and to then explain the said murders. The motive for most of the characters was dicy at best, and the ending is wrapped up WAY too neatly. 

The Fringe is an amazing place to test, try, and workshop, so I encourage the show creators and the performers to treat this as such: a test. With more tweaking, this piece has potential, but there are too many confusing pieces (like, spoiler alert, all the ghosts and the fact that they can taunt/influence the living, or why a certain character just accepts their fate instead of getting out of the room filling up with gas). 

However, the most important thing for me is the fact that this cast is without a doubt talented, and they looked like they were having a great time. For the Fringe when it comes to teen plays, that’s a win. 

 

Artificially Intelligent

Rating: A

A tried and true theme for any Fringe Festival is the identity play. This is a piece that explores and showcases a person’s unique identity, and how that affects their daily life. “Artificially Intelligent” is a one-person show that plays with comedy through music, and through the lens of Chat GPT and AI. This show explores Anesti Danelis’ Greek culture, bi-sexual/queer identity, and being a millennial. 

Now I will admit, I didn’t know Danelis’ comedy before this, but I quite liked it! His songs were funny, and clever, and had many people in the audience cackling. I think however, as the show progressed, he lost the audience a little because there was one song where the laughs were few and far between, but like the pro that he is, Danelis got them back. 

Why it doesn’t get my highest rating however was how the show was created and sold to the audience. “Feeling lost in life, he asked ChatGPT to write a show based on his life and this is what we got…” is the Fringe blurb that introduces us to this stand-up show, but the AI in question is, essentially, a second character in the show, one that Danelis interacts with a lot. ‘Chat GPT’ is instructed to write a show based on his life, and asks Danelis to stall for time while it writes a show (which turned out to be a single song, but more on that later). We do see a moment where Danelis creates a song through Chat GPT on the spot for an audience member, but unfortunately, there wasn’t enough time to flush that idea out on stage (the stage manager came on what’s called the God-mic and told us there wasn’t enough time). 

The finale song was allegedly written by Chat GPT after feeding the system some info, and I’m sure that song inspired the entire show piece by piece, but something just felt odd. Since I don’t know Danelis’ comedy, I don’t know what’s fresh and original to this show and what’s recycled content. For example, when he forgot the lyrics to one of his songs (not a critique, it happens) someone pulled up an audio recording of the same song which he used to figure his way back. A hilarious moment, but makes me question what’s fully original to this show, and what isn’t.

He crafted an identity play with a non-human character with recorded cues named “Chat GPT” prompting questions that Danelis would sing a song about. Danelis’ is an incredibly talented writer, and a hilarious comedian, able to roll with the punches (Especially with SO MANY tech issues. I REALLY hope they bring up the Chat GPT Audio because the bits I heard were so funny) and I think there is a reason why the show I went to was sold out, and why I believe the rest of the run will sell out too, but it did feel like it’s a little strange that Danelis the character in the show was asking Chat GPT to write him a play, and not the creator of the show as is eluded in the description (and believe me, there’s a difference). Maybe I read the description wrong, but If I read it wrong then others might too. 

Also, there was A LOT of audience participation, and though he respected people who didn’t want to talk to him, he still did talk a lot with the audience (and some who desperately wanted to talk back. Like ma’am, sorry,  this is a solo show). You have now been officially warned and may choose to sit further back. 

Still, as the son of an immigrant and a queer person myself, I laughed a lot and had a great time overall, and I think you will too! I’m excited to see what Danelis does to this piece, and how it evolves into a full-length, glitch-free production.  Again, this feels like one that will for sure sell out, so grab your tickets now! 

Grab tickets for Toronto Fringe Festival from July 3-14, 2024 

[Review by Shan Fernando]