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From here to Infinity >> Plenty of plays in six-week festival by AMY BARRATT
That was Theatre 1774 a year ago. Recently reborn as infinitheatre, the company is busting out of its shell this fall--with a bigger, better play series and a bigger space. Some of the plays featured in the six-week long Infinite Festival will not be unfamiliar to those who attended A November to Remember or its sequel, A May to Play. Plays like The Lonely Cowboy by Eric Goulem and Eden's Moon by William R. Young have already been workshopped or given staged readings by the company. This year they're getting star treatment, with more technical resources, designers and decent rehearsal periods. New works will be introduced under more relaxed, workshoppy conditions, and at least one--The Farm, by Alex Haber--comes in under the banner of the Infinite Festival, but is actually produced by another company. Fringe-goers may also experience déjà vu, as a couple of that festival's best shows--Boys and The Full Molly--have been picked up for the Late Night and Cabaret sections of the event. For the festival, artistic director Guy Sprung and company won't be moving far from the office and rehearsal space they still maintain on St-Laurent. The new venue is just across the street: an empty loft, first used as a performance space by Dummies Theatre. Dubbed the IF space (for Infinite Festival--this gang does have a flair for catchy names), it seats 130--more than double the capacity of the Infinite space. Sprung says he wanted to bring back these plays to bring them to the wider audience they deserve. In fact, of the five infinitheatre productions in the festival--Hitching a Ride, The Lonely Cowboy, Eden's Moon, Gargoyles by David Fennario and The Baumgard Cuckoos by Patrick Goddard--Sprung himself is directing three. The festival officially gets underway on Wednesday, October 21 at 8 p.m. (the 20th is a preview for members only) with Hitching a Ride by Celia McBride, followed by The Lonely Cowboy at 10 p.m. Those two plays continue throughout the week and the weekend line-up includes a midnight performance of Boys, written and performed by Paul Dunn. On Sunday, October 25, the performances are at 2 p.m., 4 p.m. and 7 p.m., respectively. If you wanted to attend one of these 3-play marathons, the total cost would be $28 (10 bucks for infinitheatre productions and $8 for "guest shows": Boys is being presented by Dunn's own Lick the Cat Productions.) It's already not a bad deal for a full evening's entertainment, but it becomes a lot cheaper with the purchase of an infinitheatre membership. Members pay only 5 bucks for any performance and the $10 membership fee includes one Tuesday, Wednesday or Sunday performance of any in-house production. Sure to be a hit, The Full Molly premieres Thursday, Oct. 29 and runs through that weekend and the next. The Late Night/Cabaret line-up also includes Dunghill, Dunghill, Dunghill by Robert Ross Parker (opening Nov. 19) and Put Another Monologue on the Fire, the latest offering from Titters, alias Janis Kirshner and Laura Mitchell (opening Dec. 2). For more information, call the infinitheatre hotline at 987-1774 or visit their website at www.generation.net/~infinite. The Infinite Festival runs Oct. 20Dec. 12. All performances at Espace IF Space, 3997 St-Laurent
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You're a medium-sized theatre company in its ninth year, you have no performance space of your own and very little capital. What do you do? You convert your tiny third-floor rehearsal hall into "the infinite space" and stage a series of small, offbeat productions. You call this event A November to Remember, open the doors to members only (though anyone can buy a membership for $10) and end up creating more good buzz than many full-scale productions at other theatres.