Wellington Oracle

For up-to-date reviews of every show at this year’s Ottawa Fringe Festival check our coverage at FullyFringed.ca – a co-production of the Wellington Oracle and Apartment613.

We’re really proud of the site; it’s the first time such ambitious coverage of Ottawa’s premier theatre festival has been attempted by anyone, and we’re thrilled to be the first media outlet giving full coverage to what we believe is the most creative annual event in the nation’s capital.

Theatre review by Jared Davidson

A suicide of a friend, rampant paranoia and loneliness punctuated by naughty comments from dirty old men – make no mistake, Heroes is a comedy. But there is more than a quick laugh to be had at Lise Ann Johnson’s production of this translated French play. At its core, the play contemplates suffering, life and death. It follows three old men as they attempt to escape their veteran’s group home while dealing with the consequences of the first world war and their growing disconnection from the world.

At the same time, it delivers some of the best laughs available anywhere. Truly, the effective delivery of such a funny script is an achievement in itself, but Peter Froehlich, John Koensgen and Paul Rainville go above and beyond in their interpretation of the characters. Each of them wonderfully portrays a different portion of the spectrum of aging. They never resort to stereotypes; their characters are well-rounded, realistic old men. It is their performances that make the play as engaging and hilarious as it is. Their control of the audience is remarkable; they skilfully guide the audience through the quick turns in the emotion of the play so that the play moves fluidly from laughter to sorrow and back again, which would be jarring were it not done so well. (more…)

According to Judi Varga-Toth, her Credible Edibles café just may offer the “greenest lunch” in Ottawa. Already known for its use of locally-sourced organic ingredients, the café has recently teamed up with Gary Watson Cycling Courier to deliver school lunches to Turnbull School on Fisher Avenue.

Though her café just passed its first anniversary, it’s not the first green partnership for Varga-Toth’s young business. Since last summer, Credible has been a leader in the Green Buildings and Workplaces Challenge, a program run by local non-profit group Ecology Ottawa. The café has a reputation for putting the environment front and centre in its business practices, so much so that Jess Wells of Ecology Ottawa calls it a “shining example of a workplace committed to minimizing its ecological footprint however possible.”

Bike courier Gary Watson is a long-time courier who has been using pedal power to make deliveries since the 1980s, and recently added a cargo bike (shown above making a delivery on Wellington Street) to his fleet, enabling the kind bulk of delivery service needed by food service clients.

Business owners along the Wellington strip may be able to take advantage of Watson’s routing now that he has customers in the area. Delivery runs coming from Centretown to outlets like Herb and Spice currently see him returning empty to his Bank Street base “but we’d love to offer our east-bound capacity to Hintonburg and West Wellington businesses with customers downtown”, Watson says.

Close-up views of the cargo bike’s features can be seen here.

By Heather Marie Scheerschmidt

For most of us, the subject of airport security is all too familiar: the little plastic bags for liquids and gels, the ever-changing rules about carry-on luggage, lining up to go through metal detectors, being questioned by stern looking security officers, having bags opened and inspected, and these days, even full body scans. Hardly a week goes by without an airport security issue in the news. And the fear those stories produce means we put up with delays and inconveniences because we understand the system is in place to protect us.

But are we actually any safer?

That is the question raised in “Airport Security”, a new play from indie theatre company Gruppo Rubato.

Hot on the heels of his RBC Emerging Artist of the Year Award, Patrick Gauthier wears the playwright, producer, and director hats on this project. The last show he directed, “Countries Shaped Like Stars” for Mi Casa Theatre, recently took home “Outstanding Fringe Production” and “Outstanding New Creation” at the third annual Les Prix Rideau Awards. “What’s beautiful about using the topic of airports and airport security” Patrick tells me, “is that everybody has a story connected to it…so you can draw on that energy in the rehearsal hall but you can also then draw on that energy from the audience. Everyone has a story, and everyone’s interested in it.”

Gruppo Rubato is a company Patrick founded with Tania Levy and Gavriella Silverstone in 2002. Local actor Kris Joseph joined the company in 2004, and to date they have produced seven original shows – including 2007’s Fringe Festival hit, “Churchill Protocol” which won the Rideau Award that year for “Best New Creation”. The idea for “Airport Security” came during that tour, when they were spending a lot of time in airports, dealing with all of the inconveniences of air travel and watching the experiences of travellers around them. “Airport security is designed to do two things,” Patrick states, “it’s designed to actually make us safer, but I think it’s primary design is to make us feel safer; which I call the pageantry of security.” (more…)