✭✭✭✩✩

by Daniela Vena,

directed by Daniela Vena and Jesslyn Miller

Theatre in the Raw Productions, Toronto Fringe Festival, Factory Studio Theatre, Toronto

July 2-12, 2009

Inside the repetitious verbiage of A Tranny Tale, there is a cute, very funny hour-long story trying to get out.  In it the conformist 1950s married suburban housewife Cindy (Jennifer Pogue) realizes that not only is she in love with her married neighbour Betty (Lauren McGill) but she is a man trapped in a woman’s body.  The show is under-rehearsed, the superbly ultra-feminine McGill needs to project and Kwame Kyei-Boateng as Cindy’s sequinned fairy “dragmother” needs more confidence on stage.  Pogue, however, gives a wonderful performance full of innocence and the awkward joy of discovering her true nature.

©Christopher Hoile

Note: A version of this review appeared in Eye Weekly 2009-07-03.

Photo: Lauren McGill and Jennifer Pogue. ©Alex Nirta.