Great Day for Up
Electric Company Theatre
Vancouver, Canada
Playwright: Jonathon Young
 
How to describe this show? Imagine a dream where you’re constantly grasping for something just out of your reach. Words…memories…scraps.
 
Great Day for Up was originally written and performed by Jonathon Young in 1996 as his graduating solo show at Studio 58.  As he says in his printed ‘Afterword’, this version is 85% the original thing. “Where was I and when was I in ’96? Where and when am I now in ’16?’ He returns to the script 20 years later.
 
The 30 minute solo performance presents a climber (Young) who seems to be reaching, climbing, constantly interacting with every tangible thing around him, confused and yet also waiting……not for Godot, but for “Will.”
 
Will to live?
Will Shakespeare?
Wil Wheaton?
 
I feel like an entire thesis could be written on possible interpretations. However to over-analyse may be missing the point.
 
As per Mr. Young, “I hope on some level you regard this short thing as a blob. And if you choose to chew on it with your mouth or slap at it, or blurt stuff at it, that’s really just perfectly great.”
 
Review by Helen Martin.
 
There’s only one remaining performance during the Fringe, on Monday 12th September at 6.45pm, at Waterfront Theatre.