Joe and Mister in Wonderful Joe, Ronnie Burkett Theatre of Marionette. Photo by Ian Jackson, Epic Photography

By Liz Nicholls, 12thnight.ca

Your biggest problem this weekend in this theatre town is … choice. That, and the moment of truth for procrastinators. And the possibilities are high-contrast, to put it mildly, from companies of every size, aesthetic, and budgetary heft.

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What’s happening onstage? Productions at Theatre Network, Northern Light Theatre, the Citadel, Theatre Yes, Edmonton Fringe Theatre, the Mayfield, Rapid Fire Theatre, and more.

It’s your last chance to see a beautiful story about an old man and his dog by a great Canadian artist (and played by cast of marionettes); a strange original prairie-goth horror story about growing up as an outsider; a breath-sucking provocation of a story about the link between life and art; a play about an American hero up against time and cultural history.

Kahlil Ashanti, creator and star of Basic Training. Photo supplied.

And opening tonight, two shows:

One, the Edmonton Fringe Theatre season finale, is a hit solo memoir of survival through comedy. Basic Training, by and starring comedian/ actor/ playwright/ ex-soldier Kahlil Ashanti. It’s a story of violent childhood abuse transcended by a gift for entertainment. And it runs at the Backstage Theatre through April 27. Check out the 12thnight preview interview with Ashanti here. Tickets: fringetheatre.ca.

The other is a crazily inventive Rapid Fire hit, Improvised Dungeons & Dragons, led by Mark Meer as the Dungeon Master, leading a cast of the company’s top improvisers. It runs at RFT’s Exchange Theatre through May 4. Tickets: rapidfiretheatre.com.

You’ve been waiting for the weekend to venture forth, right? And now it’s your last chance to catch …

Wonderful Joe, Ronnie Burkett Theatre of Marionettes at Theatre Network. Photo by Ian Jackson, Epic Photograpy

•Ronnie Burkett’s wonderful, wonder-filled Wonderful Joe, premiering at Theatre Network. The characters come to vivid life as puppets and marionettes in the story of an old man and his old dog, in a last grand adventure in the world — Joe’s life-filled multi-cultural urban ‘hood on the wrong side of the tracks. Exquisitely designed, as always from the Ronnie Burkett Theatre of Marionettes, it’s a beauty of a piece, generous, funny, imaginative. Have a peek at the 12thnight preview interview with Burkett here, and the review here. It runs through Sunday. Tickets: theatrenetwork.ca.

Candy & The Beast, starring Jayce McKenzie and Jake Tkaczyk Northern Light Theatre. Photo by Brianne Jang, BB Collective Photography

•Candy & The Beast, a new mystery thriller/ coming-of-age tale by Trevor Schmidt premiering at Northern Light Theatre. It takes us to a prairie small town where a serial killer, species uncertain, has been on the rampage. And we meet a couple of misfit kids (Jayce McKenzie and Jake Tkaczyk), who set about solving the mystery and finding themselves a place in their dark, eerie, exclusionary world. It runs through Saturday in a Schmidt production at the Studio Theatre in the Fringe Theatre Arts Barns. Tickets: northernlighttheatre.com. Have you read the 12thnight preview interview with McKenzie? The 12thnight review is here.

Brandon Mcpherson, Dayna Lea Hoffmann, Ruth Alexander in The Pillowman, Theatre Yes. Photo by Mat Simpson

•Martin McDonagh’s dark comedy The Pillowman, a queasily brilliant provocation that comes at you in a series of interlocking stories, each springloaded with horror, and questions about the relationship between life and art. In a police state, the writer protagonist is being interrogated for the uncanny similarity between a series of child murders in the town and her grisly fables. The Theatre Yes production directed by Max Rubin takes us to a venue we haven’t been before, the basement of the Pendennis Building downtown, lined with plastic for the occasion. Check out 12thnight interview with director Rubin, and the review. The Pillowman runs through Sunday. Tickets: theatreyes.com.

•The Mountaintop, at the Citadel through Sunday. By the American writer Katori Hall, the play imagines the last night on earth of a hero: an encounter between Martin Luther King and a mysterious housekeeper, as the great man arrives back in his Memphis motel room after delivering his “mountaintop” speech. The two-hander has the same director (Patricia Darbasie) and cast (Ray Strachan and Patricia Cerra, both experienced in the roles and both excellent) as Shadow Theatre’s 2022 production. Tickets: 780-425-1820, citadeltheatre.com. Read the 12thnight review. (The Citadel production of The Three Musketeers directed by Daryl Cloran starts previews Saturday, and opens next week).

cast of Grease, Mayfield Dinner Theatre. Photo by Marc J. Chalifoux

Continuing:

•at the Mayfield, Kate Ryan’s vivid high-energy revival of the nostalgia magnet Grease, in which a cast of 18 is set in motion by Julio Fuentes’ sexy and inventive choreography. It runs through June 16. Tickets: mayfieldtheatre.ca. Check out the 12thnight review.