The Unhinged Pleasures of the Shrek Musical

There's some fashion in here, I promise

Though I have lived in Toronto for 13+ years, something I’ve never done is go see live theatre. There’s a wealth of venues located in beautiful, ancient brick buildings I trudge by on a regular basis, but I have somehow managed to exist on a completely separate plane from them. But when I got the job as arts and culture editor at Toronto Life, I started getting invites to view a a great number of theatre productions, and against my natural inclinations decided to accept. I saw The Comeuppance—which was sort of a millennial version of The Big Chill—at Soulpepper on opening night, and more recently indulged in Shrek: The Musical at Young People’s Theatre, near St. Lawrence Market.

Despite “not being a theatre person,” and finding most actors socially unbearable, I’ve discovered the act of witnessing thespians practicing their craft onstage to be surprisingly enjoyable. I went with one of my closest friends, who I’ve swapped many Shrek memes with over the years, and from the minute a green-painted guy entered the stage, I was positively howling laughter—both from the undeniable “bit” of being two 35-year-old women at a children’s play, as well as pure enjoyment of the jokes themselves. Shrek (2001) is widely considered to be a “cinematic masterpiece” and an “unironically perfect movie” and the musical was a great reminder of why. The actor playing Donkey did a phenomenal, pitch-perfect impression of Eddie Murphy (someone get Broadway on the line STAT) and the Three Little Pigs wore tabi boots spray painted pink.

If you would like to experience the sublime before December 30th, I highly recommend Shrek: The Musical. Even if you’re not a “musical person” (or a child), I promise that the sight of several very talented adults in silly costumes belting out “let your freak flag fly” trumps any sort of cringe element of the experience.

Here’s a few other things I’ve been enjoying as of late:

• The news of Teen Vogue’s long-time-coming closure was unimaginably depressing, but on the flip side I did appreciate a lot of the stories that came out memorializing the magazine. I particularly enjoyed Randi Bergman’s Capsule 98 story featuring interviews with a number of Teen Vogue employees who worked there during the magazines early 2000s heyday.

• Speaking of early 2000s magazines, the kids have discovered body shape analysis again? Yikes!

• Yes.

• I fall in love with every high-neck cardigan I see.

• Is this woman okay?

• Un gros bébé puma

• I attended a lovely dinner party hosted by my friend Nora and was gobsmacked by her table setting centrepiece, featuring a silver platter, lemons and a cruciferous vegetable. Truly excellent table-spo.

• Wore a really great outfit. (On that note, should I start writing posts annotating my outfits à la Laura Reilly? I already do this a lot of this on Instagram but there isn’t a ton of overlap between my Substack audience and Instagram followers. Leave me a comment!)

• Really felt this in my soul.

• Silent scream.

• I already own a surfeit of bloomers but these ones by La Villa Clementine are possibly the coolest ones yet?

• I want to dress like this every day.

• Frankly, more fire hydrants should be painted to look like Dalmatians.

• Presented without commentary.