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Reviews from The 19th Annual Edmonton Fringe Festival (Summer 2000)
Click the following to download facsimiles of the originals in Adobe PDF format.
“Fringe Fest” Saturday, August 19, 2000
by Richard Helm
If faith flies away, neuroses stream in Tori King’s look at marital infidelity even has a ‘stink ant’
* * * * (four stars)
This soulful little monologue by Los Angeles playwright/actress Tori King takes you crawling across the shattered crystal of infidelity, betrayed trust and heartbreak.
Remarkably, it all turns out to be a wryly amusing, emotionally satisfying journey, leading to one inescapable conclusion: somewhere out there in the wilds of Arizona there’s a philandering, skinny rock guitarist who made a big, big mistake in his life.
King isn’t the first Fringe performer to spin a riff off the suspicious wife routine but it’s clear, early on, that she speaks from bitter experience. This play opens with her recounting the night she snuck into her estranged husband’s apartment in a sadly underhanded bid to place a tap on his telephone.
Two years after she found him sleeping around with some vapid band groupie, Tori is trying to give due consideration to his offer of reconciliation. When faith goes out the window, you see, all sorts of neuroses come streaming into the void.
This is a brave, bittersweet confessional, a rueful portrait of a young woman who comes to realize that she’s becoming just as manic and mistrustful of men as was her poor, unhappy mother. (It was mom who advised her that the more a man weighs, the bigger the liar.)
It’s a one-woman show, but King plays a cast of characters, including her lisping, wayward ex and, not incidentally, a world-weary stink ant. She’s a fresh new talent along Fringe row, well worth the acquaintance.
Tuesday, August 22, 2000
by Steve Tilley
King Weighs In
Rating due Cirque: * * * * (four stars)
There’s no better weapon against despair than humour, and perhaps no situation that cries out for humour more than the sudden implosion of a relationship. If you can’t laugh, you’re just gonna cry.
L.A.-based writer/actress Tori King has done her tour of duty through the delta of despair after the meltdown of her two-year marriage to her rock-band bassist husband. Now, she’s picked herself up, dusted herself off and turned her experience into this heartfelt, funny-sad (but more funny than sad) one-woman memoir.
Tori’s story sort of creeps up on you, as she morphs from an actress on the stage doing an animated monologue to a friend telling you the most mesmerizing and human story you’ve ever heard, full of laughter and heartbreak and, ultimately, triumph. Oh, and stink ants. The stink ant is an important metaphor here.
The story begins and ends in the apartment of her estranged husband, Scott, on the eve of an attempt at reconciliation. Tori has shown up a day early with the intent of sneaking into the place and bugging the phone, possibly catching her ex in the act of further infidelity. You see, if he’s still cheating on her, the peril-fraught decision to attempt to get back together will be out of her hands. And maybe, deep down, she wants it that way.
In between, Tori takes us on a journey through her childhood, her early womanhood, the first meeting with her future husband and the eventual discovery of his affair. She switches deftly between characters, bringing her mother, her lisping husband and the other woman to life instantly and memorably.
The title is a mis-hearing of “the Mormon way,” which Tori’s mom interprets as “the more men weigh,” figuring the bigger the man, the bigger the liar. But while the humour is woman-friendly, this isn’t an hour-long man-bashing session. It’s a newfound pal making the gutsy leap of letting all her foibles and foul-ups hang out, so that we might learn something from it. Or, at the very least, be engaged and entertained.
King’s bittersweet learning experience and the honesty with which she shares it leaves us feeling sorry for only one person: her ex-husband. Dude, you were a fool to let this one go.
Thursday, August 24, 2000
by KW
* * * * (four stars)
Tori King battles deception, infidelity, mother issues, and continuing cycles. King wrote and performed this monologue about a cheating but repentant rock-star husband and her drive to catch him in the act. This piece is well-done, funny and, despite the unusual situations the character gets herself into, rings true. King is buoyant and full of a gleeful mischief, but she can turn on a dime and the true loneliness and pain of her characters’ situation hits hard. A neurotic, fun journey.
Tuesday, August 22, 2000
by Mark Kozab
The Very Best of Cirque du Fringe
* * * * (four stars)
Actress-writer Tori King takes the audience through startling terrain in this semi-autobiographical one-woman play. Pop culture references to Duran Duran and Michael Jackson’s Thriller are little touches King uses to make a real life even more real. Her tales of mistrust and infidelity are embarrassingly intimate, sometimes funny and always deeply moving. Good storytelling and a stellar (and brave) performance, all in one heavyweight of a play.
Articles & Reviews from Phoenix, AZ April, 2001
Tuesday, April 12, 2001
The Ex Files by Robert Pela
A text version of the article will appear here in the future. In the meantime, click here to view it as it appeared in newsprint (189k jpeg image).
Tuesday, April 12, 2001
Chandler High graduate spins comic tale of infidelity by Michael Grady
A text version of the article will appear here in the future. In the meantime, click here to view it as it appeared in newsprint (146k jpeg image). |
