Kick & Push Festival — Kingston Theatre Alliance

How can you prove what only you know to be true? How do you prove it to yourself? I recently caught the Theatre Kingston Fringe production of Speaking of Hilary, written by Elias Campbell, at the Tett Centre for Creativity and Learning. Stuck in a pent up wave of dissatisfaction, Hilary (Mimi Matamoros) becomes obsessive over her health concerns and conditions, diagnosing all negative feelings as physical malady. Often confiding […]

Content Warning: ‘Who is Esther?’ deals with mentions of racism and sexual harassment. Although this review does not discuss these topics in depth, they are general themes in the performance.

Your wedding, your way— and what a way to go! Sandy Gibson is a marriage officiate, privy to the wild wild world of weddings. I recently caught a showing of this hour-long comedy special, Making It Official, at the 2026 TK Fringe Festival. Gibson outlines his amusing career experience, guiding the audience down  the rocky road of nuptial affairs.  Running a diverse selection of gags, sketches, and bits, this entertaining […]

Set in the rural villages of Sierra Leone in the 1970s-1980s, Nancy Edwards’ Rethinking Good Intentions retraces the steps taken towards providing medicinal aid during her teaching nurse residency at Serabu Hospital. I was lucky enough to attend one of her performances as a part of Theatre Kingston’s Fringe Festival. Driven by a deep respect for the oral traditions of the Mende people, Edwards delivers her story as a one-woman […]

“A desired object is still an object” Presented by the Theatre Kingston Fringe 2026 and Of The Sea Productions, There is No Anger Like That of a Woman, written by Grace Delamere, takes place in a present-day brothel over the course of one hour. This small window of time is shared between Eve (Grace Delamere), a sex worker, and Adam (Liam Armstrong), a banker; yet what occurs is beyond their […]

A unique collaborative piece questioning the space between reception and comprehension, Speaking Vibrations is a Deaf and hearing-friendly performance exploring the many facets of identity as shaped by communication, which ran from August 7th to 9th as part of TK Fringe.  Technically innovative and exciting, this piece includes the option to watch the show with the aid of a vibrating pillow. Audience members can keep the pillow on their lap […]

Rulers, a well-loved Kingston creation written by Gord Love,  won both People’s Choice and Best Production from its turn at Domino Theatre’s Come Play by the Lake One-Act Festival this year.  During my visit to PubShed Productions’ TK Fringe presentation of the Limestone Teachers Theatre original, I learned exactly why.  Following the story of a first-time teacher’s tumultuous first day, Rulers is a heartfelt comedic musical exploring the student-teacher relationship. […]

Roller Derby Saved My Soul by Nancy Kenny is a fantastic and tender-hearted script selection for any Fringe Festival—but Theatre Kingston’s Fringe Festival has the unique advantage of also featuring Jen Buder.  A one woman show is an entirely independent spectacle: it is the responsibility of the sole performer to fill the entire theatre space all on her own. In the snug boundaries of the Tett Centre’s TK Studio, Jen […]

Content Warning: ‘DADS’ includes discussion of suicide. Although this review does not discuss these topics, there is compassionate mention of it within the performance.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.  Perhaps unsurprisingly, the moment my call with Ewerton Martins begins, we both find ourselves laughing.  Originally from Brazil, Martins is the creator and performer of El Diablo of the Cards. He is nothing but joyful as he greets me via video call from Manitoba, where he has just completed a sold-out run at the Winnipeg Fringe Festival. A graduate of École […]

Matt Shepherd is the leading man and creative mind behind the Kingston Fringe Festival’s upcoming show, Let Us Sit In Goddamn Silence for One Hour. This past Friday I got to speak with him concerning the show’s origins, intentions, and lingering questions.  This interview has been edited for length and clarity.  Why Fringe? This feels like the kind of show you can only see at a fringe festival; did the […]

The Caretaker walks through the empty halls of a high school, paying no mind to the 20 people following him. He occasionally pauses to drink from the fountain, or to tune his radio to the right station. All the while, myself and 19 others fan out around him, taking in the different angles of this Caretaker’s nightly routine of monotonous and essential work. Le Concierge (The Caretaker) opened on Thursday […]