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CBC RADIO, EDMONTON, Eva Marie Clarke
#1 Pick of the Fringe
I have never had such a strong emotional response to a character on stage before. What made it so wonderful is the exquisite simplicity of the presentation, the fragile vulnerability of Izzy the clown, the sheer humour of a clown in a fluffy wedding dress. Izzy is very non-confrontational, although she does expect her audience to pay attention and sit up straight. It is all done gently and delicately.
It's a very simple scenario: Izzy is waiting in the park to meet a man she met on the internet. She's armed with a picnic basket because as she says men never know what they want to do when presented with choices. Although she says she's not a planner, she's in her $25,000 wedding dress. She's prepared for any eventuality, but as she waits for the man who is obviously never going to show up, her cheerfulness begins to ebb and she opens up to the audience. She talks about everything from corporeal mime classes to kisses to the trials of meeting Mr. Right. She's desperately lonely and you are never sure when and if the cheerful persona will crack and reveal all the desperation inside.
The audience is presented with one person's search for acceptance and it is aked to share that journey. Calcutt's clown is the product of the Canadian method of the art form. The idea is that the clown is about persona rather than tricks and the clown is developed through mask work; facing yourself from six directions at once and laughing at your splendid ridiculousness. This show is going to become one of those we'll probably talk about ten years from now.
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