Toronto Fringe Review - Mortem Capiendum

Any Fringe Festival goer who has spent much time lining up at the Toronto Fringe has probably been approached by a large number of people handing out flyers, promoting their Fringe shows, highlighting the various stars they may have gained from this review or that and generally trying to say that if you only see one show at the Fringe, it must be theirs.

Mortem Capiendum fits in to this backdrop quite well as the show revolves around a depression-era snake-oil salesman hawking his wares to the fine people of Ontario County sitting in the audience. As an exercise in style, Mortem succeeds effortlessly. The fast-talking Professor St. Miracle (Matt Spring) is the stand-out both in his performance and for the text of the brilliant sales pitch he delivers. He is joined by a banjo-playing companion (Brant Miller) and a planted stooge (Jason Ballweber), who round out the medicine-show experience nicely. It is in the actual story that begins to be told throughout this style exercise where things get bogged down a bit.

Mortem Capiendum is latin for ‘to capture death’, and the main product that this show is building itself up toward selling is a tonic that can actually keep a person from dying. It is when the spiritual and philosophical implications of such a prospect get explored that the relationships between the characters break down, along with some of the pretense of the medicine-show style. By the end, unfortunately, we are left with a trio of performers treading well-worn territory as they alternate between saying to themselves “what have we done?” and to the audience “come on, buy it!” far more times than was necessary. Although it started off strong with a great deal of potential, even Mortem Capiendum’s titular tonic cannot keep it from falling flat.

Mortem Capiendum online: http://www.fourhumorstheater.com/