BLOOD WILD by Paul Van Dyck (Rabbit in a Hat). At Factory Studio. January 10 at 6 pm, January 11 at 7 pm, January 13 at 9 pm, January 14 at 5:45 pm, January 16 at 7:30 pm, January 17 at 6:15 pm. $15. 416-966-1062, fringetoronto.com. Rating: NNN
If you like your western tales seasoned with a touch of Reservoir Dogs, there’s lots to admire in Blood Wild, Paul Van Dyck’s take on the classic frontier holdup in a work that’s part parody, part serious.
Set in a saloon the morning after a big heist by the Jackson gang, the play opens with one of the robbers, Willie (Alex Weiner), thinking about the fancy clothes and lanolin that he’ll buy, while the simple, garrulous bartender, Slim (Van Dyck), fantasizes in a more down-home fashion about the pigs he’d buy…if he were part of the gang.
Seems, though, that Jackson’s disappeared, along with the loot and Cassandra (Julia Borsellino), the woman with whom he spent the night. Willie and the stony-faced Mitchell (Eric Davis), another gang member, are understandably not happy campers, nor are Cassandra’s sister, Iris (Patricia Summersett), who runs the bar, and crooked Sheriff Peach (David Baby), who’s due for a cut of the money.
The writing sets up the characters well, and Van Dyck has seeded the narrative with little bits of information that have a payoff at the end.
But the shared direction by the playwright and Sara Rodriguez doesn’t maintain the story’s necessary tension the drama is there sporadically, but the stakes must constantly be high, and we don’t always feel that.
Sadly, the hour-long show doesn’t build toward the production’s well-executed last five minutes, even with good performances by Davis and Summersett.
