Fringe 2012: Dirty Butterfly
Photo by Joe Bucci.
Sunday, July 8, 1 p.m.
Monday, July 9, 2:15 p.m.
Tuesday, July 10, 6:45 p.m.
Wednesday, July 11, 4:45 p.m.
Friday, July 13, 1:45 p.m.
Saturday, July 14, 9:45 p.m.
Sunday, July 15, 12:30 p.m.
Theatre Passe Muraille Backspace (16 Ryerson Avenue)
A harrowing examination of how domestic abuse can affect a community, Bound 2 Create’s production of a new play by British playwright Debbie Tucker Green goes right for the gut. Joanna (Lauren Brotman) is a woman who endures daily abuse at the hands of her partner, never seen by us, and presumably rarely seen by her neighbours, Jason (Kaleb Alexander) and Amelia (Cherissa Richards). Jason has become obsessed with listening at the paper thin wall, in a mixture of guilt, attraction, and sympathy; Amelia does her best to ignore it all, in a decaying attempt at self-preservation. The first half of the play ratchets up the tension, as the couple interacts with a Joanna they seem to imagine, at her best and worst; and just when it seems unbearable, it switches to a real life interaction between the two women. The script is pervasive and mesmerizing, and all three actors are affecting, but it’s Richards who stands out as a woman we initially resent for her seeming callousness, and later come to realize is having her life torn apart by her perceived inability to prevent the brutality that’s ruining all their lives.
