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Lord of the Fringe
Thanks to Hobbitangel for the info!
Lord of the Fringe at the Toronto Fringe Festival
To my deep regret, I missed Charlie Ross’ The One Man Star Wars Trilogy at a previous Toronto Fringe Festival. I wasn’t about to make the same mistake now that Ross has decided to tackle J.R.R. Tolkien in The One Man Lord of the Rings.
It is simply brilliant, one of the most enjoyable shows I can remember in 25 long years of Fringe-going. If you have any strings, pull them. Do whatever you can, but see this show.
Ross has several things going for him. He is a good mimic; he can nail, say, the Gollum voice or the Gandalf voice with consummate ease, or wrinkle his face and pull back his hair to conjure up King Theoden before your very eyes. But it’s also his physicality and tumbling skills. Remember that moment when the skeleton falls down the mine at Moria? Aided by director T J Dawe, Ross recreates that memborable effect.
What’s also impressive is that he’s in complete control of a huge amount of data. He may have three long volumes and 40+ characters to cram into the space of 60 minutes, but he is still relaxed enough to poke fun at the material, or to ad lib a quick aside to the audience.
You’ll need to know the movies, and it doesn’t hurt to have a read the books as well. Ross works exceptionally hard, and he expects his audience to work too. Tickets won’t be easy to come by. Friday’s opening night was completely sold out.
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