Jane Stoody, Crow's Nest Fort Qu'Appelle
The Extras has a feel of both spontaneity and uncertainty. At its most literal level it works with events of local/historical importance, like worker's struggles, referencing global and geopolitical themes along the way. But it is in its deliberate exercise of semiotic s that the Extras is so playful and well carried-off. In the performance, language has its syntax altered becoming objectified and exposed as the clumsy tool it can be, while simultaneously presenting itself as both creative act and imaginative leap, a tool that points to rather than is something, retaining its own mystery. And how delicate it is for all concerned, this act of making meaning. The Extras works with themes like the inherent shortfall of literalism as an interpretive view, the chaos of these times, the boisterousness of our desire for social change, and the patience with life that is demanded of us. We are treated to both the richness of multi-media performance, and the delight of being overwhelmed by it. And we are moved when threads of cultural significance intersect, as when the red curtain used as a backdrop in one sequence calls up both the Ukrainian childhood of one of the performance's creators, and the weightiness of the Chinese regime whose presence was all over the media as hosts of the Summer Olympics. Life is sublime. Everything is in everything. The Extras said it all.

coming soon