EDMONTON
August 21st
Rob Gee and Steve Larkin are two performance poets from the UK who are doing a show together, during which they use the word 'wanker' on several occasions. It's not common slang in Canada and the person who reviewed their show for the local paper decided to make it the headline without grasping the linguistic nuances. Needless to say, since they put it on their posters their shows have been selling out.
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August 19th
Dressing room. Ten minutes before showtime. Jazz venue. Freeform jazz upholstery
August 18th
Edmonton has the best 'techs' on the Canadian Festival circuit and mine (Jason and Brendan) are so laid back they do all their lighting and sound wizardry from the comfort of a sofa. Being Canadian they think everything is "AAAAAAWSOME!"
August 16th
My venue this year is The Yardbird Suite, an old jazz venue that opened in 1957. Operated entirely by volunteers throughout the year, it's the only facility of its kind in Canada and is used by the Fringe as a festival venue. A perfect venue for stand-up even though they won't open the bar!
August 14th
This is the Edmonton Fringe Festival's 26th year and this year it plays host to more than 140 companies on 25 stages presenting over 1000 performances over 11 days. It all takes place in Strathcona, an old prairie town that got absorbed by Edmonton as it expanded, which has become the theatre district of the city.
SASKATOON
(Pronounced 'saskitooooooooooooooon')
August 10th
Final show in Saskatoon. On to Edmonton.
August 9th
No! This is not the regional heats of the Sinéad O'Connor lookalike competition. This photo was taken on Festival "spoof night". Everyone in the festival has to write and perform a three minute skit of someone else's show drawn at random from a hat. I got one called "Hot Pink Bits". Don't ask!
August 8th
Saskatoon is actually named after a small purple berry that grows in abundance in the Canadian Prairies. They're a bit smaller than blueberries, sweet in taste and ripen round June and July. Once picked they are generously rammed into pastry to create a local delicacy called Saskatoon Berry Pie.
August 6th
I'm staying in a leafy area on the opposite side of the river from downtown Saskatoon close to the University.
What's amazing about it is that no two houses look the same. There's been a property boom here lately and some of the larger ones are selling for over a million Canadian dollars. That's roughly £75 at the current exchange rate.
August 4th
My venue here is a huge School Gymnasium. Luckily my show this year has a routine on the parallel bars and a fifteen minute vaulting horse demonstration. The bit I do at the end with the strained calf muscle and fractured metatarsal is worth the entrance fee alone.
August 3rd
The main publicity tool is the sandwich board and a lot of skill goes into making your publicity eye-catching. Some of them are works of art in themselves and deserve awards. I've erred on the side of minimalism as usual.
August 2nd
Before and during. The festival all takes place in and around the one street called Broadway, which they close to traffic, and fill with buskers, fire-eaters and jugglers. Sometimes word gets out that there are indoor theatre shows as well.
July 30th
Undoubtedly, one of the smallest in Canada, Saskatoon is by far the most picturesque and laid-back of festivals and occurs around the middle of the Canadian tour. It's the one where performers chill out, see each other's shows and compare the number of empty seats they have in their venues. This is due mostly to the bizarre scheduling times. I have a show here at 11.30 am on a Monday! (Yes, that's A.M.!!)
The first permanent settlement of Saskatoon occurred in 1883 when Toronto Methodists, wanting to escape the liquor trade, decided to set up a "dry" community in the rapidly-growing Prairie region. It is only fitting then that this is the place where performers come to bombard their livers into submission by drinking copious amounts of alcohol. Let us all raise our glasses to the Methodists!
WINNIPEG
July 28th
Apparently, it's a Canadian tradition that all champion jockeys look like 1970's porn actors.
July 27th
An evening at the races is one of the best forms of post-gig entertainment and I'm hooked! The track is at Assiniboia Downs and was re-located here after someone thought the old site at Polo Park would look better with a shopping mall on it. You can reserve a table overlooking the track, eat, drink and lose money without being surrounded by morons in suits and top-hats called Nigel.
July 25th
This was a fine bottle of Chilean Merlot. But someone really needs to have a word with their marketing department. It falls way short of what it promises.
July 24th
The Bank of Montreal is situated in the centre of Winnipeg and has been there since 1913. The inside is almost completely decked out in marble which is always 11 degrees colder than the air around it. With temperatures here soaring to 38 degrees centigrade during the afternoon it's worth going in there just to lean against the wall for a while. It is, literally, the coolest place in town.
July 22nd
Perogies are a local delicacy here.They're Eastern European in origin and were probably made popular in the Canadian Prairies by its large Ukrainian population. They are semi-circular dumplings of unleavened dough, usually stuffed with just about anything although more commonly with potatoes and cheese. Warning! Eating more than three of these can render you immobile for at least two days.
July 21st
This is the beer tent where fringe-goers think they're going for a quiet drink only to find that it's merely a way of getting the maximum number of punters into a small space so that performers can hassle, cajole and bombard them with leaflets about their shows. I chose beer mats this year as an advertising option (see July 18th). They're slightly more ecologically sound, practical and thoroughly absorbent.
July 20th
Every surface is a poster opportunity. These are the loos on the festival site. Humans are at their most susceptible to marketing when suffering a full bladder and encountering a foul smell. That's why kebab shops in England are so full on a Saturday night after the pubs close.
July 19th
This may seem like a post-apocalyptic bunker but is in fact The Manitoba Theatre Centre, a community-based, registered charitable not-for-profit arts organization which was Canada’s first English-speaking regional theatre. It has not only become a model for regional theatres throughout North America but is the headquarters for the Winnipeg Fringe Festival, second only to Edmonton in size and now in its 20th year. As you can see, performers go to great lengths to give it a make-over by stamping on it with their huge carbon footprints.
July 18th
Here we go again!