Ha Ha Da Vinci, Phina Pipia. Photo supplied.

Ha Ha Da Vinci (Stage 14, Café Bicyclette Stage)

By Liz Nicholls, 12thnight.ca

In its way this quietly captivating show created by and starring Phina Pipia is a bit like an exotic sorbet. You can’t quite identify the flavour, but it melts in your mouth, and you find yourself wanting more.

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Kooky things happen in Ha Ha Da Vinci, uncaused, but they don’t feel kooky. They feel weirdly natural. A woman with a tuba is transported to renaissance Italy in Leonardo da Vinci’s failed time machine, and gets a message from the past. In fact she talks to the great man himself via a red radio in the bell of her tuba. Going back in time is no problem, apparently; it’s going forward into the future that’s the big challenge (a thought that recurs).

Phina Pipia in Ha Ha Da Vinci, Edmonton Fringe 2024. Photo supplied

Bits and pieces of The Mona Lisa magically reassemble themselves into the whole painting. Every step the woman takes on a rug brings forth a different note, and music happens. She’s moved to dance; she plays something from Carmen on the tuba; she picks up a guitar and sings a song. She unfolds a magic square, with amazing results. Da Vinci’s Vitruvian Man drawing, hanging at the back of the stage, near an easel and paints, suddenly reveals a red heart. The man has a new, moveable face; it’s our heroine and she sings an opera aria. A sign appears: “look to the moon.” And the moon appears. “Some things are just bound to happen,” she tells us.

You should never go to any Fringe festival expecting to hear a virtuoso tuba solo (or you will, needless to say, be bound for disappointment a lot of the time). It feels special when it happens. Suddenly a lovely renaissance lantern hangs from the woman’s  tuba. You not know what will happen next.

This is a whimsical kind of enchantment, a strange free-floating assortment of music, imagery, dance, illusions. You might be dreaming, which would explain a lot, and it feels fine. I loved it.

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