Festival Archive

Five people outside sitting and leaning against a stone wall. Four people wear light green jumpsuits and golden headpieces. The fifth person wears a grey jumpsuit.

Ephemeral Public Art at the Kick & Push Festival

  • Centre culturel Frontenac
  • Corpus Dance Projects
  • Festival
  • Kick & Push Festival
  • Kingston Theatre Alliance
  • Review

From singing goddesses to living sculptures, strange and striking works of art have been appearing downtown as the 2024 Kick & Push Festival rolls out its summer programming. Specializing in one-of-a-kind, immersive theatre experiences, the festival’s tenth season offers a range of blink-and-you’ll-miss-it performances from July 25 to August 18.  Corpus Dance Projects’ Divine Interventions made a brief appearance at the start of the festival, bringing celestial wonder to three […]

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Poster for 'The Cape as Red as Blood' playing at the 2024 TK Fringe Festival. The TK Fringe logo is in the top right. The Kick & Push Festival logo is in the bottom left. The dates of the festival are in the top right. The text: "3 venues, 11 days, 18 shows" is at the top. In the middle left, is an image of a silhouette against a red curtain and an orange ring surrounding with the show's title and the location of the show. The location is listed again to the right with all the dates and times. The box office phone number and website are at the bottom with Theatre Kingston's website the Kingston Grand Theatre's website and K&P's website.

Little Red Riding Hood Bares her Teeth in ‘The Cape as Red as Blood’

  • Festival
  • Kick & Push Festival
  • Kingston Theatre Alliance
  • Review
  • Theatre Kingston
  • TK Fringe

Listen to the wind whisper the story of The Cape as Red as Blood—a loose retelling of the Little Red Riding Hood folktale as a folk musical. Written by Kathleen Greening, this is a contemporary version of the story with a powerfully feminine vibe—soft and caring, but not weak by any means, and not to be underestimated. The five storytellers—Nightingale (Syd Chinnick), Crow (Meg Gibson), Phoenix (Hailey Hatfield), Bluebird (Elsa […]

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Poster for 'Circus Gothic' playing at the 2024 TK Fringe Festival. The TK Fringe logo is in the top left. The Kick & Push Festival logo is in the top right. The dates of the festival are top centre. In the middle, is an image of a woman posing on the floor with an image of a clown behind her and a purple ring surrounding with the show's title and the location of the show.

The Circus is Scarier than Clowns: ‘Circus Gothic’ Takes Apart the Big Top

  • Festival
  • Kick & Push Festival
  • Kingston Theatre Alliance
  • Review
  • Theatre Kingston
  • TK Fringe

With 23 characters, including two animals, Circus Gothic is a unique one-woman show. Jan Kudelka plays all the roles in a truly incredible performance, as might be expected given that she’s had fifty years (yes, fifty) of performing this particular show in order to perfect it. This fact alone makes it worth seeing and informs a really powerful performance.  The story is a memoir of Kudelka’s experience joining the circus […]

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Poster for 'Crazy Bitch/Boss Bitch' in TK Fringe. The TK Fringe logo is in the top left. The Kick & Push Festival logo is in the top right. The dates of the festival are top centre. In the middle, is an image of a woman covered in post-it notes and a purple ring surrounding with the show's title and the location of the show.

Lions Don’t Lean In: ‘Crazy Bitch/Boss Bitch’ on Working Women

  • Festival
  • Kick & Push Festival
  • Kingston Theatre Alliance
  • Review
  • Theatre Kingston
  • TK Fringe

A self-identified bitch and a boss—Crazy Bitch/Boss Bitch is a one-woman show written by and starring Thea Fitz-James, and centering around a millennial woman’s experience of being a corporate worker. She has 18 people directly reporting to her and is on the executive track but lately, she’s been wondering if she might be a bit crazy. The show follows her struggles with work and the prospect of a promotion, while […]

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Poster for 'ABD with Mark the C' playing at the 2024 TK Fringe Festival. The TK Fringe logo is in the top left. The Kick & Push Festival logo is in the top right. The dates of the festival are top centre. In the middle, is an image of a young boy with the show's title and a purple ring surrounding with the show's title again and the location of the show.

A DJ’s-Eye View of Hotel Bar Bacchanalia: ‘ABD with Mark the C’

  • Festival
  • Kick & Push Festival
  • Kingston Theatre Alliance
  • Review
  • Theatre Kingston
  • TK Fringe

“I was in the car the other day, listening to music and thinking about loss.” So begins Threshold Theatre’s ABD with Mark the C, a gently humorous memoir of the 60s and 70s delivered from inside a DJ booth. Written and performed by Mark Cassidy and directed by Hume Baugh, the show traces Cassidy’s journey through small-town Ontario as a child of hotel entrepreneurs.  Let’s tackle the title letter by […]

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Image of a person with a phone in front of them. Phone shows a picture of them with a phone in front of them. That phone shows a picture of them with a phone in front of them, so on and so forth.

Fun at FOLDA: Exploring the Festival of Live Digital Art 2024, Part Two

  • Festival
  • FOLDA
  • Review
  • Spiderwebshow

The cardinal rules of theatre: sit still, don’t chitchat, and make sure your phone is on silent and put away. Adrienne Wong chooses to challenge these conventions, exploring our relationships with our devices through audience participation. 

The 2024 Festival of Live Digital Art (FOLDA), produced by SpiderWebShowPerformance, took place from June 13-15. In this section (catch Part One here!), I take a deep dive into SmartSmart, an interactive performance by Adrienne Wong that was staged at the Isabel Bader Centre for the Performing Arts. In my previous review of FOLDA 2024, I mentioned that the festival promotes innovation, creativity, and reflection, and SmartSmart very much embodies these values.

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Festival of Live Digital Art 2024's logo is in the top left corner. In the top right corner is an image of people skating. In the bottom left corner is a graphic of someone playing the guitar surrounded by many colours. On the bottom right is an image of a woman onstage wearing headphones and a dress.

Fun at FOLDA: Exploring the Festival of Live Digital Art 2024, Part One

  • Festival
  • FOLDA
  • Review
  • Spiderwebshow

Where can you catch a groovy concert, talk to a multimedia AI interface, and take in a 360-degree film in a dome, all in one weekend? FOLDA, of course!  The Festival of Live Digital Art (FOLDA), produced by SpiderWebShowPerformance, promotes live digital art with the hopes of empowering communities, creating connections, and inspiring critique. The 2024 festival took place from June 13-15, and I was fortunate to have the opportunity […]

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2024 FOLDA logo. Text includes: "FOLDA Festival of Live Digital Art".

Kingston’s Annual Digital Arts Fest: Live in Two Days

  • Festival
  • FOLDA
  • Interview
  • Spiderwebshow

Kingston’s annual Festival of Live Digital Arts (FOLDA) is once again on the horizon (and no, that is not a pun directed at HORIZON 360°—a film in this year’s lineup). As a hectic week is underway for the team and busy schedules abound in summer months, I conducted an eight-question email interview with Co-Curator Michael Wheeler about an intensive run alongside FOLDA in partnership with Ingenuity Labs: The StartUp. This […]

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Two individuals hugging in nature. One is dressed in traditional Indigenous wear.

Experiencing the Cedar Island Residency

  • Festival
  • Indigenous Theatre
  • Kick & Push Festival
  • Kingston Theatre Alliance
  • Review

On Tuesday, August 15th I was invited to see the first viewing of the Cedar Island Residency performance taking place the following day. I was not told much about the performance, giving me a feeling of nervous excitement. This is the first performance I have ever attended where I did not have much information about it beforehand. The only thing I was told was to meet at the Kingston Marina […]

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Performance of 'La Bulle'. Photo in black and white.

Bubbling with Magic: ‘La Bulle’

  • Centre culturel Frontenac
  • Corpus Dance Projects
  • Festival
  • Kick & Push Festival
  • Kingston Theatre Alliance
  • Review

Feeling curious about seeing a mime roam the ins and outs of a giant translucent bubble? See La Bulle in Kingston this weekend.  La Bulle is a mime show produced by CORPUS Dance Projects and is being presented at the Kick & Push Festival by the Kingston Theatre Alliance and Le Centre Culturel Frontenac.  The show follows a lonely mime, Pierrot (David Danzon / Guy Marsan; the performer at the […]

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Poster for 'A Perfect Bowl of Pho'. There is red background. Music notes with the shows title on top appear in a wave. A bowl of pho eating itself is seen. A cartoon of a bull singing is seen.

Pho Sure, You’ll Like it a Lot

  • Festival
  • Kick & Push Festival
  • Kingston Theatre Alliance
  • Review

A deliciously funny show. A Perfect Bowl of Pho is a meta-musical created and written by Nam Nguyen, music composed by Wilfred Moeschter, and directed by Steven Hao. The story is centered around a procrastinating University of Toronto student, Nam, performed by Chris Vergara. The story follows Nam as he struggles to write a musical about… I think you guessed it… Pho.  A meta-musical is a play within a play. […]

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Poster of 'One Night Only'. A man looking distressed and exhausted holds his arm in the air. Text reads: "duhdumduhdum productions presents ONE NIGHT ONLY WRITTEN AND PERFORMED BY NICHOLAS EDDIE WRITTEN BY: NICHOLAS EDDIE DIRECTOR: SEPEHR REYBOD PRODUCER: NICHOLAS EDDIE ASSOCIATE PRODUCER: ADRIAN CHEVALIER"

‘One Night Only’ is One Not to Forget

  • Festival
  • Kick & Push Festival
  • Kingston Theatre Alliance
  • Review
  • Theatre Kingston
  • TK Fringe

An experience I don’t think I will ever forget. One Night Only is a one man show written, produced, and performed by Nicholas Eddie, directed by Sepehr Reybod, and assistant producer is Adrian Chevalier. An audience follows Eddie throughout the night as he is faced with a challenge which can only be completed in the following morning.  This review has mentions of suicide. This show felt like an experience rather […]

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