Into the Swing of Things
Reviewed by Tamara Kamermans
The vibe of Into the Swing of Things for me is deja vu. Anyone who’s worked in food service will know the characters intimately…..possibly even been one of the characters. I had to check the promo material because I was pretty sure this was a depiction of my summer job at what will remain an unnamed tennis club in Hamilton. Turns out it was a golf course in one of those food service parallel universes.
Eric Jeddry cleverly shifts his masks and personas in this one man kitchen staff/ audience participation/interview. He’s a great mimic and I’m certain his characters are popped straight out of his life experience.
We meet the seasoned chef of the club. He’s spicy in more ways than one, never completely satisfied, always slightly yelling and full of the type of advice that no one remembers on their first day anyway. He prefaces character number two as a type of employee nemesis and Jeddry skillfully trades masks and voila the young punk dishwasher/wanna be rapper appears before our eyes. Does he rap? Of course he
does. He writes in his head while he washes dishes and much like his chef arch rival metes out a lot of advice and information that no one particularly asked for.
We laugh at these two stereotypes, but somewhere deep down in Jeddry’s script is a pit of sadness, especially for those who’ve met and worked with these characters in real life: the man who’s been there forever and the man who thinks he’s just there for now but may find he’s stuck there forever.
It’s a real portrait of life experience.
Age Suitability: Parental Guidance (ages 13+)
Warnings: Audience Participation, Coarse Language
Venue: Backroom @ Ringside
Special Performances: Relaxed Performance
Genre: Theatre—Comedy, Sketch Comedy/Improv, Storytelling/Solo Show
Actor
Eric Jeddry
