Giving ‘the history lesson millennials didn’t ask for’
Three special shows are scheduled to kick off the always busy month of November, but in a flash they’ll be gone.
The Loose Moose will host alumni Rebecca Northan and Derek Flores for three performances of a new comedy show, Class of ’88, while Fire Exit Theatre will present actor, writer, musician and storyteller Ins Choi for one night at the Lantern Church. Also, alumni and friends of StoryBook Theatre will be featured in Miscast, the company’s annual fall fundraiser.
Northan and Flores describe Class of ’88 as a nerdy class reunion celebrating that fateful year when they both joined the Loose Moose.
By time-warping Gen X-ers back to ’80s music, hair and improv that they knew and barely tolerated, Northan and Flores promise an evening of hilarity and heartbreak. Among other things, they are calling it “the history lesson millennials didn’t actually ask for.”
Northan and Flores recall they joined the Loose Moose within six months of each other in 1988 and, in addition to playing on countless Theatresports teams together, they starred in a host of Moose children’s shows like The Ugly Duckling and Cinderella.
They attended the University of Calgary together and ended up in the same acting class. Northan completed her degree, but Flores dropped out and headed for Australia to create a theatre group he called The Three Canadians. Fate brought them both to Toronto at the same time, years later, where they ended up performing opposite each other at Second City.
Northan moved back to Calgary while Flores headed off to New Zealand, but the stars aligned again and they ended up at an improv festival in Dubai recently. Northan invited Flores to be part of Zorro: Family Code, her holiday show for Alberta Theatre Projects.
They figured since they are back where it all began they’d create a special reunion show for the Loose Moose.
Class of ’88 will play at 10:30 p.m. on Nov. 3, 9 and 10 at the Loose Moose Theatre in the Crossroads Market at 1235 26 Ave. S.E. Tickets are $20 and are available at loosemoose.com or by phone at 403-265-5682.
INS CHOI HAS A STORY OR TWO TO TELL
Best known as the creator of both the stage and television versions of Kim’s Convenience, Korean-Canadian writer Ins Choi is also an acclaimed actor, musician and storyteller.
Fresh off winning best comedy series at the Canadian Screen Awards, Choi’s Kim’s Convenience, which airs on CBC, was renewed for a third season. The first two seasons are now available on Netflix and they feature former Calgary actor Paul Sun-Hyung Lee and Loose Moose alumnus Andrew Phung. Choi will be the guest of Fire Exit Theatre on Nov. 1 at 7:30 p.m. at the Lantern Church in Inglewood with his new concert show Songs, Stories and Spoken Words.
In an interview last year, Choi revealed he was “writing the sixth season of Kim’s Convenience and working on a new concert show in which I will share personal stories and original songs that touch on 1980s sitcoms as well as discuss the shape of my eyes and my weird name.” Choi’s Korean heritage, his family and Christianity are sources of great pride as is seen in his plays, Kim’s Convenience and Subway Stations of the Cross, and in his concert shows.
Val Lieske, artistic director of Fire Exit Theatre, met Choi 16 years ago when she was creating Fire Exit. “I was developing my first season for Fire Exit and Ins was touring one of his concert shows and we became fast friends.”
Tickets for Songs, Stories and Spoken Words are $25 and are available at fireexit.ca.
NEVER SAY YOU CAN’T TO MUSICAL THEATRE PERFORMERS
Last year for its fall fundraiser, StoryBook Theatre created a show called Miscast, which featured artists performing songs they ’d never been called upon to do in a show.
The women’s chorus performed Hello!, the opening number from the Trey Parker/Matt Stone musical The Book of Mormon, which usually features 16 men, while the men’s chorus performed as the Kit Kat girls in Willkommen, the opening number from Cabaret.
This gender-twisting continued throughout the evening and will do so again on Nov. 7 at 7:30 p.m. when StoryBook presents the second edition of Miscast.
StoryBook’s artistic director JP Thibodeau says the new show will feature 50 cast members, including a live band and will be hosted once again by Steven Morton.
Some of the performers include Jessica Eckstadt, who is currently starring in Lunchbox Theatre’s Brave Girl, and Tenaj Williams, who just played Hamlet in The Shakespeare Company and Hit & Myth Productions Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead at Alberta Theatre Projects.
They’ll be joined by Jessica Jones, who has been cast as Delores in StoryBook’s spring musical Sister Act, as well as Hannah Kerbes, Katelyn Morishita, Tara Laberge, Tannis Laatsch and Tory Doctor.
Tickets are $45 each and can be reserved at story book theatre. org but the evening is almost sold out. The show will be held in the Beddington Arts Centre at 375 Bermuda Drive N.W.
All proceeds from this fundraiser go toward StoryBook’s discounted programming program, which last year provided $10,000 to allow 2,000 children in need, and their families, to attend StoryBook shows.
“StoryBook never says no to a child, which is why we need these fundraisers,” says Thibodeau.