More standout shows
at the Fringe Festival

Tall Mark, Existential Lingerie, Seeing Red and Scions

By Irwin Rapoport

June 11, 2026

This year’s edition of the Montreal Fringe Festival is presenting a variety of plays, ranging from outright comedies to musicals, and addressing family, aging, and the foibles and tribulations that make us all too human, from June 1 to 21.

Performances are taking place at numerous venues and times, ensuring that Fringe aficionados can see plays featuring talented actors and directors from across the globe and here at home.

With so many productions, allow me to suggest a few more shows that you might find appealing.

Tall Mark’s EAT IT ANYWAY

Following a successful run at three Canadian Fringe festivals, Tall Mark’s EAT IT ANYWAY is now being performed at the Montreal Fringe Festival.

“It’s a five-instrument autobiographical romp featuring playful musical performances and stark vulnerability – a story of acceptance, self-discovery, and a fearless tasting of life’s strangest dishes,” says Tall Mark, who writes, directs, and performs in this solo production. “Through a whimsical bard-jester lens, the sixty-minute journey of ‘absurdorealism’ explores alternative lifestyle alongside the reality of navigating a physically decaying body. It is a show of emotional complexity, meaningful insight, and slick wit.”

It’s a five-instrument autobiographical romp featuring playful musical performances and stark vulnerability – a story of acceptance, self-discovery, and a fearless tasting of life’s strangest dishes.

– Tall Mark

One can see the play at Théâtre Sainte-Catherine, 264 Ste. Catherine E. on June 11, 13, 16, 17, 19, and 20.

montrealfringe.tall-mark

Tall Mark discusses the play in the Q&A below:

Tall Mark EAT IT ANYWAY – Image: Andrew Finlay

WM: This production is autobiographical. How do you feel about sharing moments of your life on stage?

Tall Mark: Somewhere around a decade ago, a switch flipped in me; I stopped wanting to tell other people’s stories and started wanting to tell my own. I stopped acting and began writing about the oddities I saw in the world – a skill of authentic vulnerability that did not come naturally. As the years go by, I get better at pulling stories from my zany, adventurous-betwixt-a-touch-of-chaos life, and crafting them for the stage. It’s not only bringing wit and gusto, it’s also processing uncomfortable experiences with humour, holding an audience in that space, and whispering, “it’s okay to laugh about this.”

WM: You wrote the ten songs that are performed in the show. How would you describe the creative process?

Tall Mark: Each piece in the show is a snapshot into a moment of my life where I took a step back and pointed, “What the heck is this?!” – everything from gourmet hot dogs to wildlife encounters to corporate slavery to pharmaceuticals. Writing the show meant distilling years of experiences into ten songs, then discovering how these seemingly unrelated experiences could flow through one another as a complete story that is both deeply personal and gives the audience some food for thought. Directing myself is a process which involves recording every minute performance and watching it back with scrutiny.

Existential Lingerie

‘Montreal’s award-winning singer, comedian, and storyteller returns with this hilarious, absurd, sultry new musical comedy about an existential crash-out sparked by ill-fitting underwear and Lou’s ultimate quest for… fulfillment?’

– Binge Fringe

The play is being presented at the Petit Campus, 57 Prince-Arthur E, on June 11, 13, 14, 16, 18, and 19.

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Lou Laurence discusses the play in the Q&A below:

Existential Lingerie

WM: How did music bring you to comedy?

Laurence: Singing has always been the sort of magnetic centre of all that I do. I LOVE to sing. I grew up in a house of storytelling, I love to be the quickest to a punchline, and I love playing with words. Over the years, as I jumped on any stage that would have me, the singing started to draw in all these other orbiting elements. I was always writing jokes into my love songs and introducing my songs with funny stories. Once I understood what I was doing, I started to learn and really play with my universe. Then I started applying to comedy gigs and festivals and learned so much more from my growing community. Existential Lingerie is a new challenge for me because I’m pushing myself more into the theatre side of things this time. It is scripted, musical, hilarious, and also follows a cohesive plot. A one-woman musical that flits between existential crisis and RomCom.

WM: You’re a familiar face at the Montreal Fringe Festival. What keeps you coming back, and how does it compare to the Sketch comedy festivals you also showcase at?

Laurence: I love Montreal Fringe because, as an artist, I can bring whatever it is that I am working on, no matter how unplaceable or strange. Fringe audiences are some of the best in that they’re so game for anything – they’ll run from a historical drama, to a clown show, to a silly-sultry songstress trying to seduce them at Petit Campus (for example). And for patrons, it is the best of Montreal: running up and down summer streets, alternating between shows and food, running into some of our best characters along the way, and seeing performances that range from our finest pros to the strangest thing you never imagined. I’ve done 6 other Fringe Festivals in Canada and Europe, and the best of what they have in common is the opportunity to discover. When you’re coming to the Fringe, you must promise yourself to see someone/something you have never heard of before. It is a rite of passage.

Sketch Comedy Festivals are, I think, close cousins of the Fringe Festival because sketch comedians get weird, and it is such a delight. The main difference is that at sketch comedy festivals, I’m typically showcasing a 20 to 30-minute set on a shared bill with one or two other acts. For audiences, this means you discover a lot more shorter performances per ticket. As a performer, both Fringe and sketch festivals are some of my favourite things to do because they’re basically just summer camp for big goofballs. I have friends I’ve met touring around, and we’ll meet up in another city, see each other’s newest work, hang around venues and parks, and enjoy how lucky we are to do a thing that gives us a roving gang of hilarious buddies. Both Fringe and sketch festivals are these amazing places where you can see people doing things they absolutely LOVE to do.

WM: Describe Existential Lingerie in three words, two colours, and one musical note?
Laurence: Witty, romantic, soulful. Velvet-red & night-sky-blue (hyphens are not cheating)*

Seeing Red

One year into their relationship, everything should be falling into place for Liam and Frankie. Instead, they are forced to confront what lies beneath their relationship: the dangerous urge to possess what we love.

An insecure man can be a dangerous thing. As famously put by Margaret Atwood: ‘Men are afraid that women will laugh at them. Women are afraid that men will kill them.’

– Misha Nye, playwright and director

The show can be seen at Conservatoire de musique et d’art dramatique de Montréal, Studio Multimédia du Conservatoire, 4750 Henri-Julien, Montréal, on June 12, 14, 16, 18, 19 and 20.

montrealfringe.seeing-red

Misha Nye discusses the play in the Q&A below:

Seeing Red

WM: Are there more similarities or differences between Pyrite Theatre’s proffered production in this year’s Fringe compared to last year’s prize-winning piece?
Nye: It’s a very different show! Seeing Red is a play about love, with all its ecstatic highs and terrifying lows. Audience members will relate on a much more personal and intimate level, unlike last year’s show, which was more of a snapshot into a foreign world. What’s more, whereas the last show found the personal in the political, Seeing Red touches on themes such as male violence in order to find the political in the personal.

WM: Your previous production in 2025 was staged in a St Laurent Boulevard cafe. Are you excited about staging a show at the Conservatoire Studio this year?
Nye: We can’t wait! It was a fun challenge adapting to the intimate venue of last year, but the Conservatoire will really let us take the show to the next level. As we construct the world of these two characters, Studio Multimedia will allow our talented production designer Elisabeth Nyveen to shine. Also, some amazing other shows are playing at Conservatoire, so at Pyrite Theatre we’re very excited to be part of this micro-community within the festival.

WM: What do you hope Fringe Festival goers get out of seeing Seeing Red?
Nye: I hope that people will reflect on the possessiveness in their own relationships. Hopefully, audiences will relate to Liam and Frankie’s flaws, laugh along with them, and then be alarmed by how many they share. I want to see laughter turn to a grimace. And with the wickedly dark humour and the spellbinding chemistry between the two leads, I’m sure Seeing Red will deliver this in bucketloads.

Scions

Scions

Brothers and sisters divided by past choices. Two fled, two remain. All want to change their future for the better, but motives are confused, and feelings are hurt. When the four siblings reunite, the question lingers: What are they willing to risk to get what they want?

The show can be seen at Conservatoire de musique et d’art dramatique de Montréal, Studio Jean-Valcourt du Conservatoire, 4750 Henri-Julien, Montréal, on June 12, 14, 15, 19, 20 and 21.

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Noah Labranche, leading creator of Scions, discusses the play in the Q&A below:

WM: What’s something about fighting with weapons on stage that people often get wrong?
Labranche: That faster equals more realistic. Yes, characters who are skilled fighters will often be faster, but what looks on stage like speed is often actually a greater ability to chain together a series of attacks and parries with flow. As an actor, understanding the logic behind each attack and filling each one with an emotional intention is so much more important to telling an interesting story through fighting than simply going fast.

WM: What’s your favourite line of text you and the team have created – no context necessary?
Labranche: It’s technically two lines, but…

“VIOLET: Violence is necessary in order to change the system.
PENELOPE: Then how are you any different from the people you ran from?”

montrealfringe.ca

Feature image: Andrew Finlay
Other images: courtesy of the Montreal Fringe Festival, unless indicated otherwise

* Editor’s note: No musical note provided

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Irwin Rapoport is a freelance journalist and community advocate from Westmount with bachelor’s degrees in History and Political Science from Concordia University. He writes extensively on local politics, education, and environmental issues, and promotes informed public discourse and democracy through his writing and activism.