The Best, Man is a surprisingly sweet play, considering it starts with the lines “Fuuuck!” and “Open sesame, bitch!”
The first is uttered by a groom who is contemplating making a run for it with less that an hour before his wedding ceremony, and the second is spoken by the rambunctious best man of the title, who falls flat on his face drunk (and barefoot) just after entering the hotel room.
The Best Man at first seems far too wasted to be of much use for anything but spitting out hilarious and filthy diatribes about Forrest Gump, identical twins, and strip clubs (“I just want to talk to those girls about their self-esteem and give them a happy meal.”) He accidentally spills coffee all over the Groom’s shirt, and the nervous breakdown this event triggers reveals the deeper truths, worries and resentments at the heart of both the relationship of the groom and the unseen bride, and that of the two male friends.
Arlen Kristian Tom’s script hits hard with a flurry of one-liners that had the crowd at the performance I attended howling. Some attendees were chanting “Threeway town! Threeway town!” outside after the show, which is a pretty excellent tribute to the quality of the jokes. The play takes a major tonal shift in the third act, and while the more serious material was quite effective, the change in tone could have been foreshadowed better earlier. Mack Gordon is moving and emotionally convincing as the frustrated and neurotic Groom, while John Voth as the Best Man owned the crowd from the moment of his entrance with a full throated physical performance. A pitfall of two-handers is that there’s often an imbalance between the two characters, and the Best Man does indeed get most of the best lines, and gets to both bully the Groom and play the hero.
Underneath the swearing and hilarious crudity, The Best, Man is wise about the envies and pleasures of male friendship. It accurately captures the tense feel and the epiphanies of a night of crisis. One of the Best Man’s monologues, a seemingly pointless reminiscence about a drunken high school night that turns unexpectedly poignant, will stay with this reviewer. And that line about what else is like a box of chocolates, probably will too.
Hip Hop Shakespeare Live Music Videos packs loads of fun into its 45 minute running time. It is virtuosic, danceable, provocative, and to those that know either their Shakespeare or their hip-hop, awe-inspiring.
Melanie Karin and David Benedict Brown, who married five days before their Fringe debut, take some of the best and biggest songs of 90s and 00s hip-hop, but change the lyrics to reflect the plots of Shakespeare plays. They maintain the complex flows and rhyme schemes of the original songs, dancing with energy and wit all the while. Clever references to Taylor Swift and LL Cool J videos are blended with an audacious and irreverent script that frequently causes the listener to make new connections between the violent worlds of gangsta rap and Shakespeare tragedies. The individual reinterpretations are often brilliant, as well: Othello is redone as “99 Problems” (“You crazy for this one Shakes! It’s your moor!”) with Iago playing the clueless cop. Ms. Jackson is retold as a tale of two households in Verona, with both Karin and Brown belting out “I’m Sorry Ms. Capulet!” And their choice of song for Hamlet is so genius, I don’t want to spoil it in this review – but rest assured I will be raving about it to anyone willing to listen for at least the next few months.
Oh yeah, and these kids can rap, too: Karin flows ferocious while successfully impersonating a group of very different rappers, and Brown’s solo turn on 2Pac’s “Hit ‘Em Up” (Richard III) just about knocks the crowd dead. They received a well-deserved standing O at the performance I watched, and after the show Sad Mag caught up with the couple to chat over some drinks.
SM: So how did you get the idea for Hip-Hop Shakespeare?
Melanie: I’m a huge Shakespeare fan and a huge hip-hop fan, obviously. And then a few years ago, I was auditioning for the national theatre school acting program, and I got a callback. At the callback, they make you do a play in three minutes, but when I was thinking about what play I wanted to do, Macbeth is my favorite play. But I was doing a lot of hip hop karaoke at the time and I really loved that and I was just like “I just wanna rap!” That’s how I feel most comfortable performing. And then I started thinking about making a rap parody out of Macbeth. I wanted to do a rap song where there was a little bit of back and forth. When I did Macbeth in school, my teacher said, “It’s so much sexier than people think it is,” and when I think of the sexiest hip-hop song, it’s “Doin’ It” by LL Cool J and Leshaun, because when that song came out, that was the song that you didn’t want your parents to know you were listening to. Because you’re like, “What if they think I’m masturbating right now?” Then I showed it to Dave…
Dave: I was almost in tears with pride, even though we had just started dating I was absolutely beside myself. That’s what then inspired me, because I wanted to be with Mel. I wanted to show her I could do it too. Even though she hadn’t seen Richard III the first time I did it, I essentially wrote it for her, which I guess I’ve never even told you.
SM: What do you see as the similarities between hip hop and Shakespeare?
M: People don’t realize how controversial Shakepseare was in his day, that people saw him as sort of uncouth and base. Even though he had the queen’s endorsement there were a lot of plebes that would go and see Shakespeare. There is so much violence and misogyny and a lot of the things people hate about hip-hop is actually all in Shakespeare.
D: There was a reviewer in Ottawa who said that the violence in the gangsta rap world correlates very well to the violence in the Shakespearean world.
M: I think the easiest comparison is that it’s rhythmic language. Nobody ever spoke in Shakespearean verse, ever. It is a rhythmic poetic language, so in that sense hip-hop is very similar. and hip-hop is also all about storytelling and personas and egos…
SM: And monologues.
D: And it’s a real window into the human condition.
SM: Are you concerned at all about audiences understanding the references?
D: Well, it was a concern for me from the get-go, but I think even just giving people glimpses is good. It’s the same with Shakespeare: I think there are very few people who go see a Shakespeare play, who and know and understand everything that’s going on, because it’s an advanced rhythmical language, just like hip-hop. You have to listen to it many times before it ever sets in, unless you’re Melanie, who can memorize it after listening to it once.
M: But the cool thing is, it means that people come to our shows more than once, which is great!
D: We planned that…
M: It’s like a hip-hop song, you hear it once and you’re like, ” That was amazing! I have to listen to that again so I can get it.”
SM: What kind of responses have you received from the audience?
M: The best was this older lady and her husband who saw our show the first time asked, “How did you come up with those lines? For Othello, you said ’99 problems and a bitch ain’t one.'” She didn’t get that we were parodying real hip-hop songs, which I thought was adorable. And I said “Oh, that’s actually a Jay-Z song, you should listen to him”, and she was like, “Maybe I’ll start.”
I think some people are so put off by hip-hop and are think, “I won’t like that!” and so they never expose themselves to it. And then when they actually hear it and see the energy and excitement behind it they’re like, “That’s actually kinda cool!”
The moving and funny play Loon tells a universal story, but it’s like nothing you’ve ever seen before. Kate Braidwood plays a lonely man who falls in love with the moon, and her performance is a virtuoso accomplishment of maskwork. With no speaking and without the use of facial expressions, she makes the audience live and die with the dreams and disappointments of a lovelorn hunchbacked janitor. The mask is almost impossibly expressive – its sad wide eyes, a prominent bald head and a mouth locked in a permanent pained grin tell of a lifetime of loneliness. The soundtrack employs expert music choices and a host of silent film and oldtime radio tricks to assist in winning the audience’s sympathy for this isolated and beautiful lunatic.
The janitor has few possessions: an urn containing his mother’s ashes, a transistor radio that plays old ballads, and a telephone that delivers bad news from the matchmaking service he is subscribed to as Bachelor 378. He dances alone in his room, puts on a cape and goggles and dreams of adventures in outer space. In one fantastic set piece, he acts out the last scene of Casablanca with his mop. The dancing is a marvel to watch; nobody wearing such a heavy mask and costume should be able to dance that fluidly. Especially not to mass bhangra hit “Beware of the Boys”, in one moment of hilarious incongruity.
After being stood up by a date, the janitor discovers his one true and abiding love – the moon itself, the other loon of the title. He carries the luminous orb to feed ducks in the park, watch fireworks, and even to bed. But the moon starts to wane, and the script’s metaphor of the changing phases of the moon for the fading of love is both original and utterly heartbreaking. If you loved the wordless storytelling in Pixar films, this is your opportunity to see the same feat done live. You’ll never see the moon in quite the same way again.
Catch Loon at the Fringe Festival, with five more shows from Sept 9-16! Details here.
Rachel Aberle and Adrian Glynn McMorran, by David Cooper
In 1974, Leonard Cohen was asked why his album New Skin for the Old Ceremony was a failure in North America and the U.K. but a success in Europe. “Maybe it’s because they can’t understand my lyrics,” he replied. Both Cohen’s self-deprecating wit and the achingly sad poetry of his lyrics are on display in Tracy Power’s play Chelsea Hotel, which is at Firehall Arts Centre (280 E. Cordova St) until March 3. Chelsea Hotel adds inventive dance pieces and impressionistic storytelling to Leonard Cohen’s classic songs, often totally revamping their musical arrangements so fresh associations are created. The young cast scampers around a set made of paper filled with discarded poetry drafts, while adeptly switching off on an astounding variety of instruments. Adrian Glynn McMorran stars as the Writer, who acts out romantic regret and creative struggle and sings beautifully. His solo turn, a wrenching rendition of Tonight Will Be Fine, is a show highlight.
Theatregoers familiar with Cohen’s work will hear new and often faster paced versions of his songs, such as a sexy cabaret-infused I’m Your Man and an ironic hard-rocking take on American Idol favorite Hallelujah. The cast’s voices are very, well, different from Cohen’s self-admitted limited range. Neophytes to Cohen will find Chelsea Hotel an excellent introduction to Canada’s unofficial Poet Laureate. And any audience should relish the opportunity to appreciate the depth and beauty of Cohen’s catalogue.
Rachel Aberle is a cast standout, playing a Sister of Mercy – a combination nun, nurse, and muse – with playfulness and intelligence. Sadmag spoke to Rachel Aberle about Leonard Cohen’s current caché, wanting to be a muse, and the state of the theater scene in Vancouver.
Sad Mag: How familiar were you with Cohen’s work before you started Chelsea Hotel? how did your relationship to his work evolve as you were doing the play?
Rachel Aberle: To be honest, I wasn’t super familiar with Cohen prior to this summer when I started to do some research for the auditions. I was familiar with Hallelujah, as I guess pretty much everyone in North America is – but to be honest, the version I was familiar with first was the Jeff Buckley version – which I loved. I remember when I finally heard a recording of Cohen singing Hallelujah thinking, “This is awful! This guy can’t sing!” This was several years ago, in my late teens. The cast is all within about 10 years of each other in age, and we all talked about how Cohen’s voice was something that put us off when we were younger, that it’s something we’ve grown to appreciate as we’ve grown into adulthood. Can’t remember who, but one of the cast said at a talk-back that “Cohen’s not for kids,” and I think there’s something to that.
Through working on the show I’ve come to appreciate him so much, not only in terms of music, but in terms of incredible poetry. I’ve always been a pretty lyrics driven listener, and for that you can’t get much better than Cohen. He was a poet before he was a songwriter, and it shows.
SM: Yeah, i think that’s one of the great things in the show. You can appreciate the lyrics as a captive audience
?RA: that’s great to hear. It’s been a really interesting process to connect such poetic language to some kind of playable acting
SM: Were there any Leonard Cohen songs that you wish had been used in the play, or that you rehearsed and didn’t use?
RA: Those decisions were made before I came on board. We did change and add some of the poetry used in the piece – just certain pieces getting moved around or shortened or changed to other things that Tracey felt told the story and got the audience on board faster and more effectively than what she had originally chosen. Because my knowledge of Cohen was admittedly pretty low before the show, and because we use so many songs (27 to be precise) there aren’t any that I wish were there that aren’t.
SM: Were the writer’s lines in between songs also snippets of cohen poetry?
RA: Yes. Every word spoken or sung in the show comes from Cohen.
?SM: OK, a couple more Cohen questions…Do you have a favorite song? Or a favorite line from his lyrics?
RA: I love Tonight Will Be Fine. I think the chorus speaks to something so profound and so honest about feelings that linger long after one might hope they would. More specifically the line “We swore to each other our love would surely last/You went right on loving, and I went on a fast/Now I am too thin and your love is too vast.” I feel like I’ve been on both ends of that statement – probably everyone has at some point. That feeling of regret, wishing you could feel things that you don’t, or that feelings you have could be matched, when they can’t.
I also think that Famous Blue Raincoat is one of the most beautifully heartbreaking songs I’ve ever heard. I’ve never listened to a song that made me sad so repeatedly.
SM: What do you think Leonard Cohen means to Canadians of your generation? How is it different from how he’s viewed by baby boomers?
?RA: To be honest, I don’t think Leonard Cohen means much to most of our generation, and I hope that changes. I wonder partly if it’s because so much of his music has been so widely covered by other artists, but I know for many people our age that I’ve talked to about this show, the most common response has been that they’re not that familiar with Leonard Cohen — which, prior to the show, was pretty much the case for me as well. I think a lot of people my age think of Cohen as someone that their parents listen to, that they weren’t that into when they were kids.
Hopefully it’s like a lot of music that’s just too mature for younger audiences, and people start to give it a listen now that they’re old enough to understand what the hell he’s talking about. I feel like it’s the kind of music people in their twenties should be listening to all the time. One of my friend’s fathers saw the show and said afterwards that he was tearing up through most of the first act because it brought back so many memories from his twenties. He said you don’t feel those incredible highs and lows forever. I think that’s probably what it means to a lot of people my parents’ age – it’s a reminder of the later years of their youth. His lyrics capture so perfectly what incredible love and incredible loss mean, but at a deeper level that anything you feel at adolescence. The love is vast because you’re old enough to feel like it actually means something real, and the loss is devastating, because it feels like a much deeper investment that’s come up dry.
SM: What instruments can you play? Did you have to learn any for the show?
?RA: Oh the instruments…
I played the cello regularly for about 11 years, but those years were between age 4 and 15… so a bit of it’s in the “riding a bike” camp, in that I learned so young that some of that knowledge will never go way, but I also had been out of practice for so long until about this time last year that my musicianship is definitely still a work in progress in my opinion.
I started playing the ukulele this summer for the fun of it. I played the piano in high school, and actually got to a pretty high level, but have been out of practice so long that it’s really crumbled back into a pretty rudimentary skill
And the bass guitar, which I play in the show – I had never touched until our workshops for the show in early December. Our first day of rehearsal Steve said, “Rachel, how do you feel about playing bass on [First We Take] Manhattan?” I said, “Well, I’m willing to try, but just so we’re all on the same page here, I’ve literally never even tried before.” Steve paused for a second and then said, “Oh yeah. I think you’ll be fine.” I leave that to the audience to judge. The more work I get in theatre, the more I’m starting to feel like half of the battle is deciding what you’re crazy enough to agree to try, and then dealing with the fallout of that agreement.
SM: Have you done much musical theatre before?
?RA: I’ve done a bit. I was one of those kids in high school that was really into musical theatre, and then I sort of drifted away from it when I went to university, and then to theatre school. I’d pretty much stopped thinking of myself as a musical theatre performer. Then in the last year all the shows I’ve wound up doing, while they haven’t all been full musicals, they have been full of music, and have required me to sing.
SM: What was it like growing up immersed in the theatre world? Did you always know you wanted to be an actor, or did you ever have phases of rebelling and wanting to go into business or something bourgeois like that?
RA: I had bouts of thinking that maybe I wanted to be a writer, and for a time even a lawyer – I don’t think they came from a place of rebellion however (and you couldn’t really call becoming a writer bourgeois). Growing up with a Dad who was in theatre taught me from a young age that it was a possibility – that the idea of trying to pursue a career in theatre (while maybe still insane) wasn’t impossible. People did it. Having that knowledge meant that I never went through the phase of thinking “Well, yeah, I want to be an actor, but nobody actually does that… so what am I going to do for real?”
?SM: And I bet a lot of your peers did go through that phase, right?
RA: Yeah – I mean when I think of the people I went to high school with who I did theatre with, I don’t think many of them are doing it any more. And to be fair, for some of them it was never something that they wanted to pursue after high school – but I do wonder how many more young people might consider going into theatre, or music, or any artistic field for that matter, if it dawned on them that it was a viable option.
SM: How do you feel about the current state of the theatre scene in Vancouver?
?RA: That is a tough question to answer. I guess what I would say is that I know for sure that I’ve been incredibly lucky with the opportunities that I’ve had, not only because opportunities are scant (and that’s true of theatre anywhere), but also because the projects I’ve gotten to work on have all been very fulfilling, and very different from each other, and have all involved incredible people. Of course I wish there was more funding – that should go without saying but unfortunately we need to keep saying it, and keep saying it, and then say it some more. And I wish I could figure out what would get the average Vancouverite more interested in seeing plays.
There is so much to do in this city. I get why on a sunny day people want to go to third beach, and I get why on a rainy day people are more interested in going up on a mountain where it’s snowing and riding boards and skis back down the mountain. What I wish for is a way to make people who are interested in those things also interested in sitting down and watching some fantastic storytelling. I would like to figure out a way to build the theatre into the recreational vocabulary of this city … I’m just not sure how.
SM: In Chelsea Hotel you play a muse. Have you ever been a muse? Or had a muse?
RA: (laughs) If I’ve ever been a muse, nobody told me. In terms of having a muse, I’ve definitely wrote some things based on or about people that have come in and out of my life – and I’ve definitely used relationships I’ve had with people as a way to connect with material I’ve worked on as an actor.
SM: Is it strange singing the same songs over and over again? Do you start making up your own versions of the songs?
?RA: It hasn’t seemed strange yet, and I think part of that is that the material is so rich that there are a lot of new things to find every day. I have an unfortunate habit of replacing words with other words completely subconsciously, and have definitely sang the words, “Suppose that he froze when the wind took his NOSE,” instead of, “CLOTHES” a few times in rehearsal, and once while rehearsing Take this Waltz I sang “I’ll bury my soul in a sandwich” rather than “bury my soul in a scrapbook.” But intentionally? No, I’m happy with the material so far
SM: (laughs) Sandwich!
RA: I know, I always think that if those were the lyrics it would mean that she dealt with the break up by eating her feelings.
?SM: It’s a good Freudian slip, something to sing when you are hungry.
?RA: Right?
SM: Right!
Chelsea Hotel
Firehall Arts Centre (280 East Cordova)
Now until March 3rd, 2012
$25 regular, $20 students and seniors Ticket info here
On Monday night, Vancouver’s swaggering funk-rap group Panther and the Supafly will be playing live instrumental versions of hip-hop classics while karaoke hopefuls get live on the mic. If you’ve never been to Fortune Sound Club’s Hip-Hop Karaoke, widely considered to be Vancouver’s best Monday night out, this is an excellent opportunity to check it out. And if you’re already a Hip-Hop Karaoke fan, you shouldn’t miss the chance to see the night go unplugged like Jay-Z and the Roots on MTV. Panther and the Supafly will also be rocking tracks from their debut EP “Nikazi.”
Sad Mag’s exploration of the complex motivations of Hip-Hop Karaoke performers continues here:
Tim Mortensen
Shmuel Marmostein: What got you into Hip-Hop Karaoke?
Tim Mortensen: I was at a Nice ‘n Smooth show here wearing a Gang Starr t-shirt, and they pulled me on stage.It was right after Guru died and they were pouring out orange juice on stage, it was crazy! A friend of mine who knew about HHK saw that and suggested we perform DWYCK, the song Nice n’ Smooth were doing.
SM: What was your favorite song that you performed?
TM: Halftime by Nas, on Halloween. It was one of the hardest songs I’ve ever done. It was fun because I was dressed as b-boy priest in gold chains.
SM: What about by another performer?
TM: A Busta Rhymes song by local MC Kaboom Atomic, he did it perfectly.
SM: That’s hard! How much do you usually practice?
TM: It depends on the song. For some of them I’ve already liked the song for a while, so it’s easier. I usually practice the song 15-20 times. I always rap over the vocal, and then I switch to the instrumental, which is a lot harder! For the Nas one, I did it 30 times or more.
SM: What do you love about performing here?
TM: The good vibe, and the fun I always have at the night itself. It’s a privilege to perform. You do it once or twice and you get addicted. It’s great experience if you want to be a performer because you have the spotlight on you. And I love hip-hop, so I get to do what I love.
Chad Iverson, event organizer and co-founder
Shmuel Marmostein: What made you start the Hip-Hop Karaoke night?
Chad Iverson: Paul [Gibson-Tigh, the other founder and organizer] told me about the HHK night in Toronto, and said we should do it here. It was just a drunken conversation on Third Beach, and I though hhk sounded like the illest idea.
SM: What was your favorite song that you performed?
CI: Earl by Earl Sweatshirt, or the one I just did, Tried by 12 by East Flatbush Project. I love that song and I’ve been wanting to do it forever. It’s an underground classic.
SM: It was awesome, you killed it! What about by someone else?
CI: That’s a really hard question…maybe Kyprios doing Passin’ me by at the one-year anniversary show?
SM: How much do you usually practice before performing?
CI: Way too much. If you take a look at my lastfm site, all my top songs listened to are ones I’ve performed!
SM: What do you love about performing here?
CI: The ego boost. It feels good! It’s a rush being on stage. I’m also paying homage to a genre of music and a culture I love. I never thought I would be running a hip hop night in Vancouver, that’s for sure.
SM: How has putting on this night changed your life?
CI: Well, this night has made Fortune a second home. I do promotion here and I’ve learned a lot about, I don’t want to use the term, the “clubbing scene.” It’s a potential career changer. The changes have all been positive, definitely.
The Best, Man is a surprisingly sweet play, considering it starts with the lines “Fuuuck!” and “Open sesame, bitch!”
Hip Hop Shakespeare Live Music Videos packs loads of fun into its 45 minute running time. It is virtuosic, danceable, provocative, and to those that know either their Shakespeare or their hip-hop, awe-inspiring.
