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Culture Stage

SummerWorks review: This Is The August

THIS IS THE AUGUST by Hillary Rexe. Theatre Centre Incubator. Aug 7 at 8 pm, Aug 9 at 9:15 pm, Aug 11 at 6:45 pm, Aug 13 at 5:30 pm, Aug 14 at noon. See listing. Rating: NNN


This strong debut from writer Hillary Rexe follows a complicated and emotional lesbian love triangle between a rising YouTube star (Lauren Beatty), her middle-aged university professor (Kim Huffman) and a transgender artist (Heath V. Salazar), and explores inter-generational friction between second and third wave feminism through the lens of social media.

Bringing YouTube to the stage isn’t easy, but director Megan Piercey Monafu has Beatty perform her recurring sex-positive vlogs live in a way that nicely highlights the medium’s manifold strengths and limitations. The messy romantic situation takes intriguing turns, highlighting a crucial paradigmatic divide emerging among feminists around the declining importance of static “womanhood.”

But at times the characters’ ongoing debates feel less natural and a tad overly-didactic.

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