Connor Thompson (face covered), Allison Price, Kevin Whalen, Ashley Botting and Etan Muskat in Rebel Without A Cosmos.Racheal McCaig
The snappy and relevant new revue down at the Second City Theatre has to do with galling self-centredness. You know, Russia and the fellow who stops his car in a bike lane to pop in for his pumpkin latte – the centre of the world is them, says Second City.
Among the many spot-on sketches in Rebel Without a Cosmos, one had to do with an intervention for the type of socially indecent people we all know and abhor: the person with no concept of personal space, the racially insensitive boor, the "too-much-information" guy, the loud talker and the one who asks outrageously indelicate questions. They operate in their own little universe, obliviously.
But don't we all? In This Is Water: Some Thoughts, Delivered on a Significant Occasion, about Living a Compassionate Life, a David Foster Wallace essay inspired by a commencement address he had delivered, Wallace posited that self-centeredness is natural, basic and hardwired into our beings at birth. "Other people's thoughts and feelings have to be communicated to you," he wrote, "but your own are so immediate, urgent, real."
He was urging empathy. Second City urges that we look at the big picture, the cosmos.
But then, it's hard to take it all in when the world has it out specifically for you. Promising newcomer Kevin Whalen worked himself up into a wonderful Lewis Black-like froth while dealing with an Apple Store "genius." The problem was product obsolescence: A man is 47 years old, which makes him 94 in terms of smartphone years.
Of course, the production is set in Toronto, a city routinely accused of seeing itself as the place around which Canada revolves. Second City suggests we instead look at Ontario's Owen Sound for direction (and a new chief of police: "fight crime with kindness.") Up there lives Oily Pete, a savant and oracle disguised as the village idiot. The character is cleverly conceived and wonderfully executed by Connor Thompson, something of the centre of the cast. We don't have the answers to the questions of our own lives. Maybe we're looking in the wrong places for bearing.
For pure laughs, highlights were Sarah Hillier as a raccoon – she knows the rodents are as adorable as they are infuriating – and Whalen as a short-legged space villain. And speaking of the centre of the universe, the ubiquitous astronaut Chris Hadfield was the object of desire for the lounge-singing Ashley Botting. "Take me on a starry mustache ride," she crooned suggestively, before adding that she wouldn't be requiring a heat shield.
Hot stuff.
The final sketch was a revisit to the class for the socially challenged. They were being taught perspective, and seemed to be making progress as they gazed at the night sky. The show ended and the crowd applauded. Second City had given us something to laugh about and something to think about too.
But when the lights came up I noticed that the oaf sitting next to me wasn't wearing shoes or even socks. Barefooted, on opening night, can you imagine? There is no hope for human kind, not with this rebel without a clue still around.
Rebel Without a Cosmos runs indefinitely at Toronto's Second City Theatre (416-343-0011)
Brad Wheeler