Best Picture is an hour long play, paying tribute to 87 Oscar winners. The winning movies date back from 1927’s winner Wings to 2015’s winning movie Birdman. The performers, consisting of Jon Paterson, Kurt Fitzpatrick and Tara Travis, run around the small stage at Lolita’s Lounge in the blazing heat. On opening night it was 30 degrees outside.
It is quite the quest. But Best Picture‘s jokes don’t land well, most of the time. It doesn’t help this reviewer that I’m not familiar with a lot of the movies on the list, but even the Titanic joke and the American Beauty jokes, the movies I know well, weren’t very funny. The audience was pretty quiet during the show, the occasional laugh ringing out every now and then. It’s a hard show to perform, and sometimes the ensemble would be bang on. Like how in Titanic, they didn’t share the wooden plank. But that’s didn’t get a laugh.
Best Picture is a good effort. It’s a good idea. But most of the time the audience is lost and if they aren’t, even if they are familiar with the movie being lampooned, it isn’t enough to laugh out loud.
Best Picture by RibbitRepublic is part of the Calgary Fringe Festival. More information can be found online.