Fringe Character

One of the country’s best-known theatre personalities, TJ Dawe has authored six shows (including Labrador, The Doctor Is Sick and The Curse of the Trickster) and a handful of adaptations of literary works. The script to his original show The Slip-Knot was recently nominated for a Stephen Leacock Memorial Medal for Humour.

In addition to being a prolific writer, Dawe is also a tireless performer — he devotes a good chunk of every year touring his plays. He’s been on stage at everything from the Just For Laughs Festival in Montreal to the Piccolo Spoleto Festival in Charleston, South Carolina and is a mainstay of the Canadian Fringe theatre festivals. Dawe is currently on a cross-Canada tour of the Fringe circuit, which takes him to Toronto (July 6-16), Winnipeg (July 20-30), Saskatoon (August 5-14), Victoria (August 25-September 5) and Vancouver (September 8-18). His diary of this year’s Fringe circuit will be updated throughout the summer.

Part 4

The Slip-Knot’s going well. Big crowds, lots of laughter. It’s been running overtime, in fact. I keep wanting to throw in lines that occur to me. Stopped the show at one point because someone’s cell phone rang. You can’t ignore a cell phone. We all heard it. And I’m there, it’s all live. But those things add up when you’re on a strict schedule. So now I’m pruning the script. The show’s done at a breakneck speed anyway, but now I’m fighting to get it all in under the 90-minute mark. I could cut a few monologues, but the parts that don’t advance the story are the funniest ones.

Local television station CITY TV came in during the middle of a show to film a bit, and I stopped everything to get a lapel mike, clip it on, put the battery pack on my belt and then went on with the show. They filmed from the back of the theatre. After ten minutes or so, I asked if they had what they needed. They did. I gave the mike back. They left. Everyone applauded. After the show, people told me that was their favourite part.

Been talking with other performers about the Fringe circuit, and what an unusual thing it is. No other country has anything like it. The Fringe newsletter The Harold has an article by British performance poet Jem Rolls on the subject:

“Nowhere else allows artists who have no great name to do so many shows in so little time. And, even better, you don’t have to bulls--- anyone to get here… No arse-licking. No networking. No rubbing up of egos. No planning shows to suit some manky establishment’s tastes. No spending years knocking at someone’s door waiting to be allowed in. All you have to do is perform shows people want to see and, because there is so much audience out there, they will show up. In big numbers.”

Two years ago, Jem (whose show this year is Jem Rolls’ Charm Offensive) got a five-star review in the Winnipeg Free Press. He remarked to me later, “Where else would the headline in the paper say, ‘Five Stars — Performance Poetry’ and then there’s a queue around the block?”

New York’s Eleanor O’Brien said a similar thing in the program to Girl’s Guide, her excellent solo show about learning to be a dominatrix:

“I fell in love. I saw some of the best theatre I’d ever seen (and for only $8!)(Canadian)! I saw people producing their own work, not waiting to be cast. I had interesting conversations in the beer tent, and not once did anyone ask me who my agent was, or which casting directors I’d worked with. It was everything I loved about theatre before it became my career. I knew I had to come back.”

Jonno Katz from Australia (doing the not-for-kids puppet show Jolly Roger) said in the Harold:

“Coming back year after year you get to see where peoples’ peculiar imaginations take them as they push to come up with another show that is more original and innovative than the last one.”

I think people who don’t do the tour — audience members, artists — can’t really appreciate what a great thing the organized east-to-west Canadian Fringe circuit is. Especially for a country that isn’t well known for theatre. For there to be festivals not just of theatre, but of new, unpublished, experimental theatre — that draw big crowds??

Time to start dusting off my show A Canadian Bartender at Butlin’s. I’ll be doing it in Winnipeg in a little over a week. It was my touring show in 2003, but I didn’t do it in Winnipeg. I’ve been a year behind there for a while. I did it once this past May as a fundraiser for the Toronto Fringe. It’s a good show, but complicated. I’ll start running through the script every day or two.