Date 11July 2005 at 19.00 Venue Arts Club Theatre, Granville Island Stage, Granville Island

The Only Animal Theatre Company and
Roundhouse Community Arts and Recreation Centre

Fred

The show’s essential conceit is that for every choice imagined (or unimagined) there exists a possible alternative dimension, where this choice is realized. So at any moment a thousand new dimensions are constantly being actualized. And for moments when we did or didn’t do something, another self is out there making the other choices. The whole production is engaged with this notion of possibilities.

The first ten minutes, set in the Arts Club Theatre, introduces Fred, shy, introverted, and a stranger to life’s possibilities. Everyday Fred comes to the Granville Island and watches life pass him by. We also learn about quantum mechanics. This is perhaps the weakest part of the show, a kind of upbeat philosophy create a syrupy mixture of new age religion speak. I don’t doubt the sincerity behind the ideas, but they play like Tony Robbins does science.

The audience then leaves for a deck overlooking False Creek. A giant cast of about 130 works different parts passersby, kayakers, unicyclists, waitresses and bar keeps and others interact with Fred and the other Freds. Within moments you are lost to the charms of the air, the locale, and the performances.

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The first magical moment begins as the audience watches Fred alone, sitting on the boardwalk, eating his sandwich, all the while his soundtrack instrument (the banjo) plays a soft melody. One by one all the other Fred begin to emerge. The rest of the play is about how from this one stable point a number of wildly different narrative paths are possible, and how they all existed for one moment in the original Fred.

Fred again

These other Freds begin to interact with the world in all kinds of lively and comical ways: the Fred who chooses to get drunk, the Fred who chooses to help out a roller skater and finds romance, the Fred who discovers a beat and begins to dance. They are juxtaposed against the original Fred who seems paralyzed and irresponsive. This juxtaposition realizes the play’s theme: an exploration of potential and kinetic energy unfurled by very physical and acrobatic performances. Walking, away from the performance, the Fred in you is simultaneously re-energized and exhausted.

The concept would become tiresome were it not for the show’s dazzling musical score, playful, cleaver, archaic, and brilliant. Each Fred is associated with a different instrument, a helpful device when Freds run, jump, and gallivant in five different directions. And the visual image of a musician following the various Freds around creates many of the most beautifully comic and surreal moments.

This is not to suggest that the music functions merely as an identification tag. It also creates appropriate rhythms, melodies, and harmonies that unfurl at a leisurely pace and give the show much of its energy. Particularly beautiful is the finale when a complete chorus appears and joins the instruments while the staging area is filled with Freds. All potential is momentarily let loose on the world as the stage lives in reds and blues. Go see it, all you Freds of the world.

© 2005 Kulpreet Sasan

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