Bathroom Stalls and Blanket Forts: Day One of TK Theo Fringe
I spent last evening exploring Theological Hall and finding theatre in unexpected places. In partnership with Theatre Kingston, Queen’s students in DRAM 339 present the inaugural TK Theo Fringe, a showcase of short solo works that celebrate the style and format of fringe theatre.
Over the course of the two-day mini fringe festival, I’ll be catching as many shows as I can and writing about them in the little pockets of time between performances. With shows taking place simultaneously in the building’s traditional theatre spaces—the Rotunda Theatre and Convocation Hall—and in miscellaneous spots around Theo, it’s impossible to catch every performance. Yesterday, my focus was on site-specific pieces. Here’s what Theological Hall had to offer.
This article contains strong language and mentions sexual violence.
Manic Pixie Dream Slut (Sara Starling) invites spectators into a single-stall washroom for an intimate portrait of internalized misogyny and rape culture. Crammed together in the small space, Wednesday evening’s audience listened raptly to Starling’s stark description of the confining boxes she’s fit herself into to please men. Dressed in a white t-shirt and armed with a can of cranberry sauce, Starling reflects on experiences that are jarring, heartbreaking, and all too common among young women.
My One And Only (Deanna Cervi), performed in a basement dressing room, follows the love story of Isabelle and Nora, who are—as the title suggests, and the script repeatedly confirms—each other’s one and only. “This is not a coming out story,” Cervi proclaims at the beginning, grounding the performance as a confident celebration of long-term queer love. Cervi’s voice and stage presence are commanding, and the show follows the characters’ lives together through joy and tragedy, exploring what it means to support one another for better and for worse.
Presenting: Yours Truly (Cauwê Garcia) is advertised in the program as “a wild ride through breakups and how to get over them.” Garcia delivers on the wildness, taking a vulnerable, if somewhat directionless, journey through a series of anecdotes featuring exes, sweaters, drunken escapades, and Queen’s homecoming shenanigans. Garcia’s fun costumes and carefree charisma carry the show, and elements of audience participation—you, yes, you, get to decide what kind of milkshake Garcia will make and drink onstage!—give Yours Truly the energy of an encounter with a funny friend at a party.
Let Women Do Their Fucking Jobs (Sophie Buchkowsky) transforms Theo’s carpentry shop into a site of workplace reckoning. Buchkowsky achieves excellent tension between levity and despair, discussing harrowing experiences with a sharpness that provokes laughter and sympathetic cringes in equal measure. Sweeping the sawdust-covered floor and picking up costume pieces along the way, she recounts unpleasant encounters with men at work and does some stellar impressions of quintessential creeps. Let Women Do Their Fucking Jobs (the title is fun to say aloud!) stands out as one of the strongest pieces I’ve seen in this festival so far—I immediately bought into Buchkowsky’s interactions with the audience, and her use of the space feels dynamic and engaging.
After an intense evening of monologues, we lie in the shadows (Kate Greening) made for a relaxing closing experience. Tucked between a photocopier and my fellow audience members on the floor of the old drama box office, I felt safe and cosy under a canopy of blankets. Having admired Greening’s set and lighting work in previous Queen’s productions this semester, I was pleased to attend a show that focuses fully on her artistry. Greening’s shadow puppetry is slow-paced and trippy, like falling asleep, and her simple setup of an overhead projector and a folder of cut paper transforms the cloth screen into a spectacular series of dream landscapes.
As I nursed the grief that lingered in my psyche after seeing two heavy shows about misogyny, there was something soothing about watching the little triangle-bodied protagonist—the simplest symbolic image of ‘girl’—explore strange worlds with fearless ease. Quiet pre-recorded music accompanies we lie in the shadows, and while I couldn’t always make out the lyrics, the faraway feeling evoked something sleepy and serene that suited the shadow puppet performance.
TK Theo Fringe runs from November 22nd to 23rd, 2023, at Theological Hall and features solo shows written and performed by students in DRAM 339. More information can be found here.
This article was edited on December 1st, 2023 to update formatting.