Star-Phoenix from Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada • 15

X' I Fringe solo performer keeps busy with alter-egos ate and premiere new work before taking it out on tour. The Saskatoon performance of Honeymoon (winner of Best in Fest at the 2007 Winnipeg Fringe Festival) will be her first time in the city as a performer. Shes been in ensemble casts including a two-person play 52 Card Pickup in Winnipeg this year but this show is all about Wilcox. The tight-knit Canadian Fringe circuit community is a big part of what makes the experience fun for Wilcox, who the night before the interview participated in a two-hour cabaret thrown together by a group of performers at the Winnipeg fringe. Theres just so much support between us all, she said.

Everyone announces each others shows and you get to work on potential new material and get very inspired by other shows. On this tour, Im on the road for three months and Ill probably see at least 60 shows, if not 100. Saskatoon, she said, is the perfect place to get to know the other performers even better because it is a more intimate Fringe than the ones in Winnipeg and Edmonton that book-end it. (Note that there were a couple of errors in the Fringe program regarding Wilcoxs show times. Please refer to the green schedule on pages 12 and 13 of the program for correct times.) smckaysp.canwest.com ize.

I merge maybe three different aspects of people I know into one character, she said. Theres something about this style of theatre, especially because its just me in one very neutral costume and a bench, that does suggest that all of these characters that Im playing are all parts of myself. Some people pick up on that, some people dont. Wilcox said performance isnt interesting for her unless theres an component that isnt easy or comfortable. That said, Wilcox is a comfortable performer who has acting in her blood.

She actually toured the Saskatoon Fringe 10 years ago as a stage manager for her aunt. That experience sold her on Fringe theatre. At the time, I was living in England and when I first came to Canada, it just blew my mind. The audiences were so warm. I think in both Canada and America theres more emotional receptivity from audiences theyre just more open to new and experimental work, she said.

Not that theyre not in England, but theres definitely a little bit of a strange interaction between audiences and actors in England from what Suggest these that Im are all myself people that, some dont By Stephanie McKay of The StarPhoenix Gemma Wilcox isnt suffering from multiple personality disorder, but you will find her performing 20 characters in just over an hour at this years Saskatoon Fringe Theatre Festival. The 20th edition starts Thursday on Broadway. The one-woman cast of The Honeymoon is Officially Over features women, men and children, but also a handful of inanimate objects such as fire and a saxophone. With all those voices inhabiting her brain, you might think Wilcox would get them confused. But after 10 years of multi-character theatre, the actor knows how to pull it off.

This particular piece I toured for the past five years, so its really in my bones at this point. But I still love performing it and find it a wonderful challenge to keep it fresh. Occasionally I might have an issue if I havent had much sleep the night before, she said with a laugh. But I know these characters so, so well. Its kind of like a dance.

The Britain-bred, Colorado-based performer tells the tale of love and letting go in the show. Even though she has never experienced being a peacock, cat or hamster, the work comes from a very personal place. My work is definitely semi-autobiographical. I do bring in a lot of qualities of people in my life and myself and then kind of fictional Ive experienced. Audiences dont like to see people doing too well.

Theres a much cooler response and theyre way, way more critical and reserved. Even if they do enjoy it, theres just not as much freedom in expressing that. It was partly that audience warmth that prompted Wilcoxs move several years ago to Austin, Texas, where she spent two years as a cast member of the Austin Shakespeare Jf Festival Company. Before that all of long, a fortuitous gut feeling led to another move. Austin was like an oasis in the middle of Texas.

Its a really great arts town. I was married at the time, Im not anymore, but we used to visit friends in Boulder, Colo. Its such a beautiful place. Theres a lot of artists there, but there wasnt anything at the time that was obvious why I wanted to move there. I just had this intuition that there was more creatjve things happening in Boulder, in line with what I was interested in, she said.

When I moved there suddenly that year, there was this Fringe festival that began. Its in its fifth year this year. Wilcox said Boulder is a great place to cre- characters playing parts of Some pick up on people Gemma Wilcox Kim Coates honoured SYO director named by half-lifetime award By Cam Fuller SP Arts Life Editor SP Staff Richard Carnegie has been named the new music director of the Saskatoon Youth Orchestra. He replaces Wayne Toews, who held the position for 25 years. Carnegie is principal bassist for the Saskatoon Symphony Orchestra and its chamber players.

Richard has so many ideas for the new direction for the orchestra, SYO chair Barb Kowaliuk said in a release. This is a really exciting time for the SYO. Aside from his key role with the SSO, Carnegie plays jazz with the Mark DeJong Trio and has a one-man show called Conversations With My Double Bass. Carnegie is also a sessional lecturer in double bass at the University of Saskatchewan department of music and served as double bass instructor for the SYO from 2006 to 2008. Carnegie studied in New York at the Manhattan School of Music and in Toronto at the Glenn Gould School.

Carnegie says he is excited to get to work in the fall, when the SYO will begin rehearsals on its first program: Wagners Prelude to Act III of Lohengrin, Elgars Pomp and Circumstance Marches and a complete performance of Beethovens Fifth Symphony. There are also plans for a competition for Saskatchewan composers under the age of 25, with the winner having their work performed by the youth orchestra. The SYO was established in 1958 by Murray Adaskin as the Saskatoon Junior Symphony. The current organization dates from 1983 when Toews and assistant director George Charpentier worked with a committee of parents to develop an independent incorporated organization. a full house on Saturday, with Coates and about 40 friends and associates in attendance, including buddy Eric Bana (Star Trek, Black Hawk Down).

King of Sorrow picked up six nominations at the festival, including best picture, best actor for Coates and best actress for Lara Daans. What happens between us is very powerful and uplifting and super sad at the end. Really really powerful stuff, said Coates. Its not a perfect movie by any means but its dark enough and rivetting enough that I really was happy my friends could see this little film. Coates gets a kick out of the half-life designation and says hes just planning on enjoying the night.

Theyre going to show three or four minutes of clips from my movies I have no idea what theyre showing. Ron Perlman from Sons of Anarchy, my good buddy, is going to introduce me and cut me down. Ill toss him a $20 bill when hes done. I dont know what Im going to say yet but I wont be long, I promised them. Sons of Anarchy is the biker gang series Coates is currently starring in on FX.

This week, hes shooting the ninth of 13 episodes for the upcoming season, which starts in September. Coates has appeared in more than 40 feature films including Black Hawk Down, Pearl Harbour, Open Range and The Last Boy Scout. Hes worked with Kevin Costner, John Travolta, Bruce Willis and Robert Duval. On TV hes had recurring roles on CSI Miami and Prison Break. cfallersp.canwest.com Its a different kind of spotlight for Kim Coates.

The Hollywood actor originally from Saskatoon will be honoured at a black tie affair on Thursday at the awards ceremony for the Action on Film Festival in Pasadena, Calif. At 51, hes not old enough for the lifetime achievement award, so festival founder Del Weston created a new category: the Half Lifetime Achievement Award. Its going to be a big night and its a lovely honour, Coates said Monday. He doesnt see himself as a typical movie star, so hes comfortable in the company of Michael Madsen and David Car-radine, character actors which the festival has honoured in the past for lifetime achievement. Ive always just plodded along.

Im a working actor and Ive been nominated for a couple of awards up in Canada, but to get this one just for the body of my work is a real honour and Im just proud to be able to go. Its going to be a fun night. As it happens, a film Coates made in 2006, but which was never widely distributed, enjoyed its L.A. debut on Saturday at the film festival. King of Sorrow, directed by Damian Lee, has Coates playing a drug-addicted cop turned serial killer.

The film played before The SYO consists of three programs. In addition to the orchestra itself, the organization includes a string orchestra for young players called the Saskatoon Strings, directed by Bernadette Wilson, and a double bass program. Members of all three groups study privately and audition for membership. The SYO attracts elementary, high school and university students from a broad area around Saskatoon. Its repertoire consists of professional-calibre music in a broad range of styles.

Admission auditions for the 2009-10 season are being held Aug. 24-26. Interested musicians are invited to call Betty Ann Arscott, administrative assistant, at 955-6336 to book an audition time or to e-mail the orchestra at SYOsasktcl.net..