Mixed bag

Mesmerizing clowns, Houdini returns
and the lucky Fringe winners

SERIOUS CLOWNING AROUND: Slava’s Snowshow

By NEIL BOYCE

It’s a mixed bag this week—a rake through the ashes of the Fringe, a big audience remount of a local musical and a touring spectacle of spectacles coming our way...

First, Just for Laughs brings back Slava’s Snowshow. Russian clown Slava Polunin’s creation is that rare show that carries an audience into a larger than life event. The production, where it is made to snow indoors, has a cast of clowns using water, cobwebs, bubbles and dry ice to dazzling effect.

Polunin’s eccentric pantomime, which he affectionately dubs “Expressive Idiotism,” blends humour, poignancy and breathtaking imagery into a show that brings to mind the startling fantasies of Fellini’s films, or the explosive performances of Gilles Maheu’s Carbone 14: “A world of wonder in which a bed becomes a boat, a web of cotton envelops the audience and one tiny piece of paper begins a blinding, sparkling snowstorm.”

The show, which last visited Montreal in 2002, has since toured to worldwide acclaim, and must be seen to be believed. To July 20 at Théâtre Maisonneuve. Info at www.slavasnowshow.com.

Elsewhere, Houdini, The Musical continues to July 5 at Théâtre Outremont, part of the Jazz Festival and its larger potential audience. First presented last February in the Montreal Highlights Festival—another tentacle of the Spectra octopus that oversees both events—the rejigged production brings back Kevin Kraft as the celebrated escape artist, setting it to live period jazz from John Roney and his sextet. Théâtre Outremont (1248 Bernard W.), info: www.montrealjazzfest.com

Fringe crowns its winners

A deadline that fell before the end of the Fringe delayed listing this year’s winners, so without further ado:

Best French-language Text award went to the marionette theatre adventure Shavirez, le tsigane des mers, with First Hand Woman from Toronto winning for best script in English.

Best Choreography went to Montreal group Fodire Fouillis Danse for their show Fonction Phatique.

Best English-language Production was given to “Astrid” and “Otto” for their crowd-pleasing Die Roten Punkte (but since their prize is a slot in the Centaur Wildside series next January, and the pair hail from Australia, it might prove logistically difficult). The Particulars and Dishpig ran two and three. Best Production in French, and a cheque for $1,000, went to Les Dames.

The Cody Rivers Show Presents: Stick to Glue won the Comedy Award and a place in this year’s Just for Laughs fest (Blastback Babyzap was runner-up), while the Development Award for most promising show at the Fringe was Stéfan Perreault’s Scènes de lits, winning a run at Théâtre Ste-Catherine.

Open to any act appearing in the Fringe afterhours show, The 13th Hour Award winner was another Australian import, Greed, with contortionist Andréanne Leclerc runner-up.

Drag Piper won MainLine’s Next Stage dramaturgy award, getting script and story development and a staging at the theatre this October.

The Spirit of the Fringe Award, traditionally given to the most dedicated artists at the festival (volunteering, working the venues, drinking lots of beer), went to the dancers of Inertia Productions and their show Diverge. Alan Shain’s story of love and physical obstacles, Time to Put My Socks On, was runner-up. The paraplegic performer gave the ceremony its most touching moment when he was carried to the stage to accept his prize. Both get slots in next year’s Fringe.