Before Parliament

Hello world,
I know it's been a while since I've posted anything but here I am.

This week I'll be visiting parliament to observe the proceedings and hopefully question period.

I've been on a tour of parliament before, but I have never seen the proceedings. What I have heard, read and seen about it lead me to believe that some days are quite a spectacle. With a chamber of commons designed to separate the majority to the opposition by the length of two swords, they were anticipating conflict. However most of the time it tends to be proticall.

Politicians are a peculiar breed. They act high and mighty, above all us common folk but then we see videos like the ones released in January. In which prime minster Justin Trudeau was caught on camera assisting someone through the crowd and accidentally nudging a member of the house along the way. This was blown way out of proportion in my opinion but I digress. It made the politicians appear like children on the school yard that couldn't get along. All of these play into the preconceived notions of how politicians behave and what people expect to see.        

I'll let you know how it goes,
Elyse

The Crashing Red Bull Disaster

Hello everyone,
I know this post was a long time coming so let's get into it.

Before
Before going to the Red Bull Crashed Ice event I was super excited. I had a friend competing and had seen some super cool footage online. The event had so much hype surrounding it; the city, the players, the university and my classmates were all very excited to share in this event. It was promising to be exciting and quite a party.

After

This hype was what made the results so crushing. I arrived an hour(ish) early which evidently was not enough but I could still see. Honestly it was a bit anticlimactic, the racers were fast but no one around me was cheering. I was in a open spot but yet a friend of mine had trouble finding me.  The worst part had to be the cold. This will be an exaggeration but I swear it felt like negative 30 degrees. on top of all this the shear amount of people around me brought on one of the most painful panic attacks I had ever experienced, it felt like a heart attack I was in tears and almost screaming from the pain. So overall it was not a very enjoyable night.

Sorry this took so long to put up but there you have it, one of the worst events of my life, exceeded only by palio but that's a story for another time.

Have a great day,
Elyse

Avenue Q: After

Hello people of the internet!

Avenue Q was every thing I hoped for. Well presented, staged, acted and puppetted ( I think that'a a verb). The choreography was beautifully cheesy and the vocals were strong.

There were a few instances that took away from the overall production, each actor had multiple parts and occasionally both puppets had to interact , then the puppeteer was required to  voice two puppets fighting and in my opinion it took your attention away from the story and made you focus on the actor behind the characters.  

Was it "real"? Was it "authentic"? Not at all, you had felt puppets as both people and monsters engaging in a story together. There is not a moment that you feel like this actually happened. However, you still related to the themes of love and lose presented.

As puppets they could get away with saying things that were not necessarily accepted for humans to say. Like everyone's a little bit racist. This show was designed to push barriers with comedy that can only be accomplished when non humans were stating things. It allows us to think that maybe some of this is us without directly calling people out.

Thanks for reading, more updates coming soon,
Elyse  

Avenue Q, pre show

Hello everyone I hope your reading week was  as enjoyable and as (un)productive as mine! So far this reading week I have seen 4 shows, 2 Mirvish productions and 2 one act plays at my local high school so why not cap off the week at a highly inappropriate comedy with my family.

Unlike all the shows attended earlier this week, I know all the music and plot of Avenue Q. I have seen the Broadway version  (online not in person unfortunately) more  then once and know the entire show backwards and forwards.  In fact the only one in my family who has never seen this R rated version of sesame street is my younger bother, and I'm curious as to his reaction.

My mother is a puppeteer and for her sake I hope this small theatre's production does a decent job with their felt counterparts.

As you can already tell I have a lot of hope resting on this show even before I've set foot in the theatre.

Have a great day and all let you know how it went soon,
Elyse

A grand day of Theatre : After

Welcome back everyone.

Wow this was quite the day, full of usual pieces and really good food.  

The first show we saw was The Bodyguard. It was a fun show with great music however the plot was rushed and there was zero character development. For instance in the span of the same speech she went from I hate him to I love him. Yes I know this is a romantic comedy trope that occurs often but in this version it was faster then normal and with even less reason. the stalker was over exaggerated and quite frankly I felt that the subtle moments the scariest.  The second act was far better then the first as the music was used less to advance the plot and more to represent that the main character was a musician. 

The second piece was The Audience, which was a collection of scenes from the Queen's private meetings with her prime ministers over the years.  This show was packed with wit and humor demonstrating the true strength of the women behind the crown and how she unwavering supported the prime ministers while contradicting them behind closed doors. She changed the way things are done so that she ruled as a sovereign in a new fashion. 

The day was long and wonderful even if the shows weren't quite in my wheel house. The meaning of theater as a whole to me anyway is to share in a story, and that's exactly what we did.

Thanks

Elyse