After a successful run at the Toronto Fringe Festival, Self-ish is coming to Vancouver. The one-woman dramedy written by Kuan Foo stars UBC alumna Diana Bang, who plays a woman in her mid-30s re-examining her life after a recent tragedy.
“It’s just me on stage with a bunch of boxes running around … impersonating different people in the character’s life,” said Bang. “Esther transforms the boxes into different things like a city, [or] into a chair. She uses it to create her world and her environment so I think that … is very fascinating and really cool to watch.”
While it promises to entertain and deliver lots of laughs, Self-ish also makes a statement about the complexity of being human by showcasing a fully fleshed out Asian-Canadian woman, flaws and all — a rare occurrence in the entertainment industry today.
“It is a universal story and I think it’s important because … we need to see women in … all their parts,” explained Dawn Milman, director of Self-ish.
“There [are] so many complexities to us and how we react to things within the context of various stages and places within our life and I think that was an important part of the story … How does this [tragedy] affect her when she’s at work, how does this affect her when she’s at home? ... [I]t’s not just ‘Oh! There’s one solution and it all tidily wraps up in the end.’ There’s more to us than that, more to people than that.”
Self-ish will be shown at the Vancouver Fringe Festival from September 6 to 16.