Now that my run in Ottawa is more than halfway done, a look at a couple more reviews for THE HATTER:
Allison Vanek at Apartment613 didn’t love everything about the show, but they did enjoy quite a bit of it:
“Inevitably, solo shows live or die on the abilities of their performers, and The Hatter is no exception. In that department, writer and performer Andrew Wade doesn’t disappoint.“
Wade embodies the character of the Mad Hatter perfectly. He’s high-energy, even with a pretty low-energy audience, he never breaks character, and his impressions of the Caterpillar and the Cheshire Cat from Alice in Wonderland are fantastic. He’s also really wonderful at improvisation.
The themes are dark, powerful, and frighteningly mundane.
And Josh Chenoweth at Production Ottawa loved the show, but didn’t care for the venue. Widely varying venues is always a danger of Fringe.
Despite suffering from an overly large venue, Wade’s heartfelt performance shines through.
Andrew Wade’s The Hatter takes the titular character… and humanizes him right before the audience’s eyes.
From the start, the appreciation Wade has for the character and the source material is very apparent… You honestly feel for him as his sanity begins reconstructing itself.
It’s a fun journey and Wade’s charm is undeniable.
I look forward to seeing what Toronto and Saskatoon have to say!
Cheers,
Andrew Wade,
The Hatter
Andrew Wade 
Thanks for the quick response, and yay for friends and dollar stores!
Alas, this does mean that I should avoid seeing the show: I’m badly allergic to chamomile, even from smelling it within about a metre from me, so there would be a lot of hassle in order to ensure it wouldn’t be a problem. There are too many kinds of tea that have it as an ingredient.
Good luck with the show! I should check if I have any bagged tea that I won’t use and donate them, if I’m in the area and you need some.
That would be lovely! I am delighted to accept any donations. 🙂
I’m sorry this means you’ll miss out on the show. I know at least one variety on the table will be chamomile, so you were prudent to check ahead of time. Hopefully I will be able to bring a different show into town next year for you to enjoy 🙂
For those of us considering attending your show (in Toronto), the main question I have is: what kind of tea are you serving? I assume standard orange pekoe — it could get expensive otherwise — but the couple of comments about the tea being good makes me wonder.
I have a large (though admittedly dwindling) collection of tea-bags which audience members can choose from. Most of them have been donated by friends and fellow performers from their own stocks (of tea they bought but don’t think they’ll drink any time soon), some have come from cheaper sources such as grocery and dollar stores.
For simplicity’s sake (as I can’t tour with an entire set of china), each audience member gets their own tea-bag. Hasn’t been an issue thus far, but if I get really popular, perhaps I’ll need to switch strategies.