When telling the story of the Holocaust, one effective way to overcome our sheer inability to comprehend the scope and scale of such atrocities is to zoom in on one or two stories: share one particular experience, in all its brutal specificity, and we have at least a small way into the event—the small details illuminate the larger whole.

One theatre company from the Netherlands, Hotel Modern, takes a related approach in KAMP (CAMP). The production depicts a typical day at the Auschwitz concentration camp, but instead of zooming in into a closeup, it shrinks everything down, literally, into miniature. It’s the accumulation of thousands of small details that has the impact in this case.

Eleanor McMahon thinks it’s time to change the conversation around cycling in Ontario.

McMahon is the founder of the Share the Road Cycling Coalition, who will be hosting the fifth annual Ontario Bike Summit this week in Toronto. She says that we need to stop talking about things like bike lanes and other bicycle infrastructure as a zero sum game between cars and bikes.

“We do polling, and our polling tells us that 89 per cent of Ontarians are both drivers and cyclists,” she says. “The notion that it’s cars versus bikes is overblown, and it’s really not working anymore. Deciding to change the conversation means going out of our way to poke holes in that idea and say from the get go ‘We don’t buy into that philosophy, and just because you say it, doesn’t make it true.’ ”

Even with the success of acts like Lonely Island and Flight of the Conchords, people still tend to view musical comedy with some suspicion, and not without reason. Those high-profile success stories aside, at the club level, musical comedy is too often the province of people who aren’t quite good enough to make it as musicians, but not quite funny enough to make it as comedians.

Two local comics, Robert Keller and Rush Zilla, are out to change that perception with their show, Off Key Comedy, which features a wide variety of acts whose only commonality is that they combine music and comedy in one form or another. The third edition of the monthly show will take place on May 23, at Comedy Bar.

Toronto-honed comedic wit Levi MacDougall and his TV boss Demetri Martin play two shows at the Queen Elizabeth Theatre tonight. Detail of a photo by Robyn Von Swank.

COMEDY: Comedian Levi MacDougall plied his craft in the backrooms and stages of Toronto for nearly a decade before Demetri Martin found a clip of his set online, loved it, and offered the lanky comic a writing gig on his TV show. Now, Martin is touring Canada, and MacDougall is opening for him; tonight’s early show sold out, resulting in a recently added late night set by the two absurdist life observers. Queen Elizabeth Theatre (190 Princes’ Boulevard), shows at 7:30 p.m. and 10 p.m., $39.50.

COMEDY: Comedy Bar’s third annual Festival of New Formats wrapped up last weekend and when the dust settled, a few shows were clear standouts. Tonight, two of those shows—Personals and Can I Get a Relationship?—will get encore presentations after Friday night (and festival) favourite Catch 23 Improv. Comedy Bar (945 Bloor Street West), $8 for 8 p.m. show; $5 for 10 p.m. and 11 p.m. shows, or FREE for attendees of 8 p.m. show.

MUSIC: The Wrecking Ball (not the activist theatre one) brings together local music writers with a penchant for chronicling our city’s rock, punk, and metal scenes, and bands from said scene. Tonight’s readers are Liz Worth, Liisa Ladouceur, and Natalie Zina Walschots; the rockers are Battlesoul, Corpusse, and Into Exile. The Garrison (1197 Dundas Street West), doors at 8 p.m., $10.

MUSIC: Halifax’s Rich Aucoin, whose prodigious live performances we’ve covered in detail, has been making waves on the ‘net by finally releasing his video for “IT“, featuring classic film recreations (his recent Nosferatu mash-up for “Living to Die” went up just this week.) Aucoin returns to the Drake for an official Toronto album release tonight, with guests Sandman Viper Command. Drake Hotel Underground (1150 Queen Street West), 10 p.m., $10.

MUSIC: Maylee Todd, Matt McLaren, Jay Anderson, and other musical devotees of classic soul music are collaborating on an intimate late night jam at the Holy Oak tonight, joined by guests Emilie Mover, Thom Gill, and more. Come to A Soul · Winter Party, they say. “Don’t fight it. Feel it.” Holy Oak (1241 Bloor Street West), 10 p.m., PWYC.

THEATRE: We went to all 10 productions showcased in the Next Stage Theatre Festival, so you don’t have to. The fest is having a record-breaking year, and the performances are good enough to stand up to the attention. Here are the best shows of Next Stage 2012, on until January 15.

Urban Planner is Torontoist‘s guide to what’s on in Toronto, published every weekday morning, and in a weekend edition Friday afternoons. If you have an event you’d like considered, email all of its details—as well as images, if you’ve got any—to events@torontoist.com.