CNE 2010: PART ONE

As summer begins to slowly wane, the days are growing shorter and if I face south towards Lake Ontario, I can feel a coolness on the breeze and smell cotton candy and deep fried butter

Yes, it's once again time for the Canadian National Exhibition.

This will be the first of two posts detailing our trip to this year's fair. Collette and I always go at least twice, once to just experience the midway and the Food Building and some of the free attractions (see the video below) and another day to see the Air Show. That post is yet to come

This one deals with our first visits to the Ex this year. We've already gone twice. We went Tuesday, the first time we've visited the fair during the week. It was a bit strange. Usually on the midway and in some of the buildings, you can barely move. It was rather nice to be able to stroll or browse without having what feels like (and probably is) hundreds of people competing for your personal space.

We enjoyed a couple of stunt shows: Two men on 80 ft high sway poles and the same two guys on motorcycles inside The Globe of Death. We also went to see the Super Dogs, a favorite of ours. We enjoy watching all the dogs play and compete but the border collies seem to hold a special fascination for us .. I wonder why that is? Again, see the enclosed video for high lights of these events.

It was a scorching hot today, but free of humidity so not unpleasant. There is a fire station on the Ex grounds (except for this two weeks when everything is closed off, these are just streets after all) and the house has this lovely antique feel to it. And the firefighters went old school, bringing out a couple of hoses and squirting the kids in order to cool them off, something that probably rarely happens in the rest of Toronto. And yes, we went child like and walked through the spray, it was entirely welcome.

We knew we could not stay Tuesday. But we noticed that there was to be a nighttime show on Princess Blvd that looked interesting: MANA: Cirque Fantastique. The Ex has hosted many many memorable night time shows but we just couldn't linger Tuesday to watch this one.

But ... (there's always a but isn't there) if you come after 5 pm the admission is only 5 bucks.

So Thursday night we returned to the Ex. First stop: The Food Building. Of course. Yes, the big attraction at the Ex this year, food wise, is the deep fried butter. And no, I did not go for it. Just the thought of it makes me queasy. But hey, we have one more visit to go, so you never know.

After gorging ourselves and wandering the midway a bit, it was time to go watch this show. I had no expectations of what we were going to see. It turns out that it was quite eclectic, and quite entertaining

The show used the frame of a fantasy world, where some kind of king, (the musical director who created a lot of the sound himself) demanded favours from his minions

This setup allowed for a variety of performers to come on stage and do their thing. And variety is the proper term. We got to see a little bit of everything, from illusions to fire eating ...

.. to a BMX biker ..

... to a woman who did remarkable things with a huge wooden hoop

And a young man who did remarkable things with an enormous metal square frame

And another young woman, who showed off her aerial skills on the Russian beam (is it truly Russian? Nowadays it seems that if you want to add a certain cachet to something, you put the word Russian in front of it)

And of course, every show needs a spectacular ending and this one did not disappoint

So all in all another successful sojourn to our beloved Ex. This show was great but it was icing on the cake. We're happy to just wander around, absorbing the sights and sounds, sort of soaking it in. It's a harbinger of the end of summer, is the Ex, and that's a bit sad but still, we look forward to it every year. As we are looking forward to the Air Show this year.

CNE 2010 from Victor Kellar on Vimeo.

FANEXPO 2010: WHICH WORLD IS YOURS?

We all have a shared reality. But it is shared. Not necessarily exclusive. We each have our own reality, our own perspective through which we experience the reality that we all share. But, often, there are others who share that personal point of view. And we discover each other, it's a cause for celebration and an opportunity for pure unbridled geekish glee.

Yes ladies and gentlemen, it was time once again for Fanexpo in Toronto

This is an ex that is becoming a victim of its own success. It once again took place at the Toronto Convention Centre but they moved it to the biggest hall in the complex and that still wasn't enough. Saturday, they oversold the advance tickets then opened the doors to same day sales and it was temporarily shut down by the fire marshal for code violations. I went Sunday, it was not shut down but it was clear that this event has achieved a popularity beyond the ability of the organizer's. The line up for tickets stretched from the side of the building out onto Front Street. Once inside, it was almost two hours before I got up to the ticket window

Once inside the show was almost worth the wait, there were a few organizational snafu's here and there but there were tons of vendors, lots to buy and of course, lots and lots of people celebrating their shared realities, their shared worlds, in costume

It is an interesting phenomenon. All these people, most of them very young, so heavily invested in their little subcultures. I'm sure they will have a few friends who share these interests, who are equally ardent fans of the video game or the anime or the sci fi show or the horror movie but at the con, there could be hundreds if not thousands of similar fans. Strangers who discover an instant kinship.
Fanexpo features several points of interest: Comics, sci fi, horror, anime, gaming so it appeals to many many groups, some of whom may rarely rub shoulders together. It's a good thing everyone was in good spirits, with some of these characters, you wouldn't want a fight to break out.

Looking at these pictures one has to think: Did the two bat girls encounter each other? What happens then: Do they band together and kick Supergirl's ass for being a snotty blond? Or did they go at each other, in the ultimate cat fight, I mean, bat fight. That's such a perfect comic book nerd conversation, the kind of discussions that seemed to just flow out of the walls.

And of course, let's not think about what happens when different Supergirils collide

Somebody may have to borrow a force field from Sue Richards

There was more at the Expo to watch than just costumed characters of course. The event attracted a lot of celebrities as well, from a wide range of genres.

Director David Cronenburg showed up, and although with movies like A History of Violence and Eastern Promises he has moved beyond horror, he is still a rock star in that field

There were also your requisite geeky fan faves from Adam West ...

.. to Oscar winner Ernest Borgnine. I'm not sure what specific sci fi projects he's been involved with but he was in The Wild Bunch, that's good enough for me. And he is quite loud, quite vocal, and swears like a trucker.

An actor with genuine sci fi chops is Summer Glau. She was a star of the very short lived but very good TV series Firefly and its even better spin off movie, Serenity. She was also the extremely cool teenaged female terminator in another very good short lived series The Sarah Conner Chronicles.
But there was one attending actor with impeccable sci fi credentials. The one actor who I may have considered paying for the privilege of having him sign a photo. The man I consider today's greatest living actor. No, not Pee Wee Herman, the one and only Mr William Shatner
Yes, I considered paying for Bill's autograph till I realized he was charging 80 bucks. And bucks mean dollars. I may still be in shock. Bill, I love ya, I really do but you have 3 different TV series this year ... dude, you should be paying us.

Ok, to get over my William Shatner sticker shock, let's look at some more pretty costumed girls ..

OK, feel better? I know I do. And for my female readers, I don't want you all to feel left out ...
Well, he is a guy .. I think. Think back to the top of this post and the joke I made about Pride Week. Anyway, moving on ...

A sci fi/anime sub culture that made a big showing at this year's con was Steampunk. This is a sub genre that probably began with a novel called The Difference Engine by William Gibson and Bruce Sterling. It presents an alternate universe where culture stopped during the Victorian era but technology continued. There is a healthy Steampunk world out there covering anime, web TV series, comics and of course, fashion

The con provided for a few instances of serendipity. Like this young lady dressed as a vintage TV series Cat Woman ...
... only a few yards away from Julie Newmar, one of the actual vintage TV series Cat Women

who in turn was a few yards away from a vintage TV series Batmobile

It's one of the cool things about Fanexpo, how it features passions that can be shared but such a wide variety of people. Fans come in all ages

And this being Toronto, fans represent all races. But it's interesting that so many Japanese Canadian girls, born and raised here, totally identify with the female characters from manga and anime created in Japan
But that's what it is all about. Connecting. Connecting with some art form that moves you. Connecting with its creators or portrayers. Connecting with others who share the same passion.
Judging by the massive crowds, the long line ups, the giddy enthusiasim, I'd say that connection is more than ephemeral. These may be fantasy worlds. But for one weekend at least, the worlds were very very real
For this event I did not have Collette to create her usual beautiful pics so I struggled on my own with her Nikon. But of course I had the palmcorder in my pocket. So here's a very brief video to give you another perspective on the day

Toronto Fanexpo from Collette Scale on Vimeo.

BUSKERFEST 2010

Jugglers and tumblers and unicycles, oh my! This past weekend the St. Lawrence Market district of Toronto was taken over by face painted, colourfully dressed, flamboyant characters .. no, Pride Week has already happened this year. This was, of course, Buskerfest.

This year we went down to the festival not really knowing what to expect. It's a fun way to experience it. Wandering around the area that has been closed off to traffic, the acts spread out along many blocks, basically following the crowed and listening for applause or music or the patter of the performers. Sometimes that means you butt up against a ring of people so thick you have no chance of seeing over their heads and you pray for a "flying" act so you can get a glimpse of the performers as they soar up over the heads of the onlookers.

The first act we came upon was a charity case. Apparently these lovely birds had been abandoned in their cage. A sign stated "Please feed the birds" If you did, they danced and did some acrobatics on a swing and climbed up to perform on the top of their cage

Besides tumbler and caged birds Buskerfest would not be Buskerfest without jugglers. I am, pretty much, over jugglers. Seriously, with a few exceptions all the juggling acts tend to blur together. Almost all street jugglers use, or try to use, comedy to bolster their act. Some are good, but comedy is not a skill set shared by all. What often happens is you get this guy below, a pretty good juggler but a pretty lame comedian. His act consisted of 10 minutes of lame patter to get to 40 seconds of decent juggling

But for all the "been there seen that" jugglers at the fest you always find something fresh and original. Like this group of tumblers from the States. We got to their show a little late and I had a difficult time filming over the crowd (you will see one shot on the video below) but Collette is a good and insistent photographer so got a couple of shots

Now, the St Lawrence Market district in Toronto is an old neighbourhood, the market building itself goes back to around 1901. But the market doesn't seem the only thing held over from the ancient times, apparently dragons inhabited downtown Toronto back in the day and Buskerfest seems to have brought them back to life

Of course what these creatures were, are stilt walkers in remarkable articulated costumes complete with sound effects. They moved about gracefully with so many independent body parts I wondered how many hands the operators must have had.
Although you could say I'm all "tumbled out" the one thing I always like to see at Buskerfest are the ribbon gymnasts. And this year did not disappoint. There was lovely, traditional, elegant ribbon work as demonstrated by this young girl from the Circus School ...

.. or we saw a different take on the art, as performed by the remarkable clown Lulu. Her act involves "discovering" the ribbon rig and deciding to try her hand at it. In perfect clown fashion, Lulu grabs the ribbons and, clumsy creature that she is, tries to be as graceful and elegant as the other girls but of course it is beyond her limited skill set ... The real trick of course is that Lulu is a very skilled aerial artist and knows exactly what she's doing up there. As you'll see in the video, she is like the female Buster Keaton of the ribbons, playing this inept character with a ton of skill and dexterity that is not at first apparent.

It seems that every year at Buskerfest we come across one act that really stands out. Last year it was Dream State Circus a remarkable act from Australia featuring acrobatics, fire dancing and a graceful sexiness. This year it was couple from Japan, Gheeky and Daiki

Cheeky & Daiki seem as far away from Dream State Circus as you could get. The Australian couple are graceful and sensual. The Japanese couple are frantic and clumsy .. on the surface. Cheeky is much like Lulu: A gifted clown who hides her considerable physical skills under a zany surface of playful cheekiness. Yes, she is well named.

Cheeky was absolutely hilarious, playing off of Daiki's worried and embarrassed character. They are very much a Japanese Ricki and Lucy. Daiki, a skilled unicycle rider was trying to put on a trick show, whereas Cheeky was a mess, easily distracted and incredibly flirty. As you'll see on the video, she has a certain fondness for camera men.

As I mentioned, this was basically a unicycle stunt act and both performers were extremely skilled. But both are more than stunt people they are indeed performers. And I acknowledge the skill and art of the straight man, so Daiki is more than a guy who can do some amazing stuff on one wheel.

The couple had a lot of familiar elements in their show: Audience interaction, build ups to stunts, back and forth banter, but Cheeky is flat out hilarious, the show was lifted above the norm. I don't think I'd have been too entranced by a straight out unicycle stunt show but this pair of clowns were able to elevate it to a higher level of entertainment.

So all in all another successful Buskerfest. Collette and I were remembering our first fest, quite a few years ago. It was held at Nathan Phillip's square and I think there were a handful of performers over two days. It has grown. In Toronto that means thousands and thousands of people squeezed into limited space, most of them displaying extremely poor social skills but still .. A hot sunny Saturday, performers who work their asses off cuz if you don't like, you don't pay and a cold beer on a patio ...

What else would you want. Enjoy the video

Toronto Buskerfest 2010 from Collette Scale on Vimeo.