Montrealers Nic and Sabrina end their run on The Amazing Race Canada

The Montreal presence on CTV’s The Amazing Race Canada is over after   Nic La Monaca from Anjou and  Lachine’s Sabrina Mercuri became the fifth team eliminated.  

The Montreal-based couple were in “jeopardy” early in the leg, struggling at the crime scene Detour, before their race took a turn for the worse when Nic was last to complete the CPR Road Block. In the end, Nic and Sabrina were the last team to reach the Pit Stop at Bell Park in Sudbury where they were greeted by host Jon Montgomery and eliminated from the race. 

“I’m not disappointed…you always think of me before you think of you, and I love you for that,” said Sabrina about her relationship with Nic.

“The bond that we have is never going to be broken,” added a heartfelt Nic, a graduate of the English Montreal School Board's Lester B. Pearson High School Sports Études Program.

Despite a 10 year age difference – Nick is 22 and Sabrina 32 – this looks like one rock solid couple. If anything can test a relationship it is this type of experience.

I spoke to Nic and Sabrina today. They joined me by telephone from Toronto where they are doing the media rounds. “Testing our relationship was certainly not the reason to do the show,” said Nic. “We know our boundaries. If anything this validated our love for each other.”

Because the show will still be airing for several weeks, there is a lot the couple did not want to say. “Life will kind of get back to normal,” said Sabrina. “While we cannot talk too much, this experience was very stressful and difficult. Nobody can ever imagine. You cannot understand by just watching the show for one hour.”

Having interview Montreal physicians Brett and Holly, first year contestants, I know all of the intimate details of what the contestants go through. For starters they cannot tell anyone in their family where they are nor communicate with them during the shoot.  When they check into hotels, the phones, TVs and radios are disconnected. No newspapers are permitted. Just some magazines. A guard stands outside the room and they do not mingle with their competitors when filming is not taking place.

Nic and Sabrina.

Nic is now busy coaching youth soccer for Les Étoiles de L’Est in Laval. He also returns to class full-time in September at Concordia, where he is studying political science. Sabrina works in human resources for an engineering company.

During the show Nic actually had one challenge that involved soccer. Competitors had to get the ball in the net while blindfolded. He was unable to complete the task and the couple actually took a two hour penalty to skip the experience. That choice almost got them eliminated two weeks earlier. “That was a tough one,” said Nic. “The thing is that challenge ended up not being about skill, but rather communications.”

One of the interesting developments of course when you are on a show seen by millions of Canadians each week is the recognition factor. “We do get recognized,” said Sabrina. “It is quite flattering.”

The most recent  episode will encore this Saturday, August 15 at 8 p.m. ET/PT and Sunday, August 16 at 5 p.m. ET/PT on CTV and CTV GO – and is also now available on demand at CTV GO. All-new episodes of THE AMAZING RACE CANADA air Wednesdays at 9 p.m. ET/PT on CTV and CTV GO. Episodes 1–5 are also now streaming on CraveTV™, with new episodes available a week after the broadcast premiere. Previous seasons are also now streaming on CraveTV.

On the next episode (Wednesday, August 19 at 9 p.m. ET/PT on CTV and CTV GO), teams race to Canada’s heartland, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, where the Road Block has some teams bouncing ahead of the pack, and others falling behind. Tensions drive Brian and Cynthia to the edge, and at the Detour, some teams are spinning in circles, while others jump through hoops to stay in the race.

KlezKanada 2015 to conclude August 23 with Theodore Bikel tribute

Another edition of KlezKanada will take place August 17 to 23 at Camp B'nai Brith in Ste. Agathe and Dr. Hy Goldman,  who founded the event with his wife Sandy, could not be more proud. 

Each summer KlezKanada’s Laurentian Retreat draws people from around the world to Camp B’nai Brith. On the shores of a calm lake, nestled amongst the beautiful Laurentian mountains, participants celebrate the tradition, innovation, and continuity of Jewish/Yiddish culture. Intergenerational, interdisciplinary, and international, KlezKanada’s Laurentian Retreat has grown into one of the leading Jewish cultural events in the world. KlezKanada features an all-star faculty, world-class concerts, and a KlezKabaret that  keeps participants singing and dancing late into the night. There are also films and classes on Jewish history, culture, Yiddish language, and literature, workshops for instrumentalists, singers, dancers, and visual artists of all levels, creative programs for the whole family, and so much more!

Dr. Hy Goldman

This year KlezKanada will conclude  with its  Der Groyser Kontsert - A Tribute to Theodore Bikel on Sunday evening, August 23 (7:30 p.m.) at Oscar Peterson Concert Hall in NDG. The evening  will showcase four generations of the most highly acclaimed musicians on the international Jewish music scene – all paying homage to the career of masterful performer, singer, actor, raconteur and author Theodore Bikel, in support of the KlezKanada Youth Scholarship Fund.

Born in May of 1924, the legendary Bikel led a unique career spanning over seven decades. An Academy Award nominee and Emmy Award winner, he was perhaps best known as Tevye in Fiddler on the Roof, a role he performed on stage over 2,000 times. As a folksinger and storyteller he recorded over 30 albums and  captivated audiences on virtually every continent. A true Renaissance Man, he viewed his work and life in terms of survival, saying, “You must explore your roots in the past in order to pinpoint your place in the present or to be entitled to a future.”  

 

Theodore Bikel

“Bikel was scheduled to appear and perform at the concert and when I spoke to him in Los Angeles about a month ago he was looking forward to it,  but he was gravely ill and it was 50/50 whether he would be able to appear  in Montreal,” Dr. Goldman explained. “Well, he died a week later to our sorrow. Incidently he was a member of KlezKanada’s Board and had already performed in 2007 and 2011.”

Born and raised in Montreal, Dr. Goldman moved to New York in 1946. Drafted into the U.S. Army, he was sent to Japan and South Korea before receiving his discharge 18 months later. The GI Bill of Rights enabled him to attend university, and it was there, at the University of Illinois at Chicago, that Goldman began his flirtation with music. He organized musical events, but also a pep rally that starred Jerry Lewis and Dean Martin.

“I used to be a pretty good singer, but I realized that singing was not what I wanted to do. I decided to become a doctor,” Goldman recalled.

Yet the music bug never left him. In the 1980s, when Goldman was involved with Montreal’s Akiva School, arranging concerts and other fund-raisers, he brought in Boston’s Klezmer Conservatory Band. The group played a type of music with which most of the public was still relatively unfamiliar. He initiated his summer klezmer festival eight years ago.

Dr. Goldman is an Associate Professor of Paediatrics and Biology at McGill University and an Emergency Room pediatrician at the Montreal Children’s Hospital. KlezKanada, though, is a 12 month obsession leading up to the actual evengt,

“KlezKanada makes Jewish music and the arts accessible to everyone,” says Dr. Goldman. “It gives people a chance to learn about Jewish history and their roots in a contemporary way, and discover who they are.” The curriculum includes world-class concerts, workshops for instrumentalists, singers, dancers and visual artists of all levels, films, literature, language and culture, and children’s and teen programs. When you come to KlezKanada you have a supermarket of activities to choose from.”

Klezmer’s roots date back hundreds of years in Eastern Europe. Itinerant musicians would travel from shtetl to shtetl playing events, Goldman said. There are Romanian, Turkish, Greek and Russian elements in klezmer, but the essential part comes from synagogue music.

 “Music is a very important part of the human condition,” Dr. Goldman says. “Ongoing research shows music’s role in the brain. I think music can heal in a way that’s difficult to determine. It provides an atmosphere where that individual is relaxed and less preoccupied with his or her ailments.

Socalled

The extraordinary line up for August 23, coming together for that one-night-only, includes Grammy award-winning klezmer supergroup The Klezmatics; Montreal's own Yiddish hip-hop sensation Josh Dolgin (aka Socalled); New York's finest post-war klezmer tribute band The Tarras Band; the golden-voiced Shura Lipovsky from The Netherlands;pioneers of the post-Soviet klezmer renaissance, Efim Chorney and Suzanne Ghergus of Moldova; and – pulling it all together as MC – Yiddish author and bon vivant Michael Wex.

Tickets are $50 for the orchestra and balcony  and $36  and available at Oscar Peterson Hall Box Office or through Admission.com at 1-855-790-1245. For more information go to www.klezcanada.com.

  

X-Men to film at McGill; Caitlyn Jenner Montreal bound?

Hollywood North is back! Those of us who travel to the United States are clearly not pleased with our sinking Canadian dollar, now at about 75 cents compared to the American buck, but it is bringing lots of movie shoots and stars here.

X-Men: Apocalypse, part of the iconic series of movies, is back filming in Montreal. Sources tell me that shooting will take place in  the prestigious arts building on the McGill campus  beginning next Tuesday with McGill standing for the Pentagon. 

Quantico, expected to be a big hit show on ABC this fall, is filming in Sherbrooke.  It centers on a group of young FBI recruits, all with specific reasons for joining, who battle their way through training at the Quantico base in Virginia. As the show intercuts between their hidden pasts and their present training, it also flashes forward to the near future, where one of the recruits will turn out to be a sleeper terrorist responsible for the most devastating terrorist attack on U.S. soil since 9/11. 

Cara Delevingne

Spotted in Montreal recently was top model Cara Delevingne, now starring in the movie Paper Towns. She was here to watch her significant other Annie Clark from the group St. Vincent perform at Osheaga.  Delevinge  is currently filming the movie  Suicide Squad in Toronto. Co-stars  Margot Robbie, Jay Hernandez and Joel Kinnaman joined her at Osheaga, Delevingne  was also seen at the boutique Vintage Frames in the Sud Ouest, owned by Corey Shapiro, where she bought some shades

Kanye West was in Montreal this week for a business meeting related to his clothing line. He was seen signing autographs in Westmount.

Bruce/Caitlyn

We also hear word that Caitlyn Jenner, who as Bruce won the Olympic decathalon here in 1976,  will be here next week on the occasion of Fierté Montréal (Gay Pride Festival). The world`s most prominent transgender personality will reportedly stay here for a week and be part of her daughter Kylie`s 18th birthday bash at Beachclub in Pointe-Calumet on August 16.

Chai Lifeline: Montreal riders bring home $300,000 for kids with cancer and other life-threatening illnesses

Camp Simcha, an overnight summer camp in Glen Spey, New York, is designed to meet the medical and social needs of children and teens with cancer and other serious illnesses. Via its annual two-day Bike4Chai fundraiser  participants travel 180 miles through mountain ranges and scenic roads to the actual camp in Glen Spey, N.Y. and obtain pledges. Following the sixth edition last week, some $5 million has been raised for this flagship program of Chai Lifeline, a national organization that services families of children with cancer and other life-threatening illnesses.

Stu Guttman, the executive director of Donald Berman Chai Lifeline in Montreal, reports that 10 local cyclists aged 25 to 55, raised more than $300,000. They are: Avi Ickkovits, Warren Roll, Shuly Vorhand, Morty Stern, Michael Fischer, Allan Rosen, Eli Bernholtz, Andrew Friedman, Leon Steinberg, Arie Reingott. Ickovits, Roll, Stern and Reingott actually made their way from Montreal to the starting point in Connecticut by bike.

 Avi  Iczkovits (second from left) with George Hincapie and Christian Vande Velde,
two participants who have competed in  the Tour de France.

This is the largest most profitable per-rider charity cycling event in the country, if not the world. About 430 children attend the four two-week summer sessions at Camp Simcha each year, offered at no cost to the families. It’s a medically supervised environment and has the ability to be a supportive hospital, but a kid can experience it like a camp.”

The idea for the ride was conceived by Chai Lifeline volunteer Dovid Egert, who raised $10,000 in sponsorships for biking 135 miles from his Lakewood, NJ home to Camp Simcha in 2009. His ride enabled seriously ill children to attend Camp Simcha that summer. The next year, the lone rider was joined by 39 others, kicking off the Bike4Chai annual event.

Every year, experienced and novice bicyclists from around the world pedal their way through three states — New Jersey, Pennsylvania and New York — to raise funds for the camp.  

Roll was the newest addition to the Montreal team. In the span of two months he was able to not only raise over $100,000 himself, but train to participate.  Readers might remember Warren and more specifically, his daughter Jayden, from her battle with cancer and the search for a stem cell donor.  “Thankfully, Jayden is doing well and is in remission,” says Guttman. “Warren undertook this race as a way to give back to our organization.” Iczkovits raised $111,000 and the others between $2,800 and $12,000.

Back to Camp for Terry "Aislin" Mosher as Kanawana gets set to honour master cartoonist

Terry “Aislin” Mosher, the main editorial cartoonist for the Montreal Gazette, has received many well deserved honours in his lifetime. On Saturday August 8 he will go back to Camp Kanawana in the Laurentians for the first time in more than 60 years. There he will accept the 2015 YMCA Kanawana “Pip” Award. 

Terry Mosher

Mosher will be the eighth person to receive the award, established to recognize the contributions of distinguished Kanawana alumni.  He was a camper there in 1952 and 1953.

“Obviously I’m very pleased about all this, particularly given that my five grandchildren will be there for the presentation, all of whom have either attended, do presently attend or will attend Camp Kanawana,” Mosher share with me. “Kanawana was very important to me given that I remember the layout of the camp surprisingly well – and I haven’t been back since 1954! I am told that it has hardly changed. So, I am anxious to tour the camp next Saturday with organizer Andrew Caddell.”

Previous recipients of the award included Richard “Itche” Kerr, a Montréal volunteer working with the physically challenged; Richard Patten, former Ontario MPP and cabinet minister; Stuart McLean, broadcaster and author; Bruce Netherwood, YMCA leader and author; John Cleghorn, former CEO of the Royal Bank; ; the late Sam Lazarus, NGO volunteer, along with the Lazarus family, which raised hundreds of thousands of dollars for Kanawana in Sam’s memory; and Jeniene Philips Birks, a former broadcaster and community volunteer with the Oral School for the Deaf.  

James and Pip on Parliament Hill.

The “Pip” Award is given annually to a former camper, counsellor or supervisor at Camp YMCA Kanawana who best exemplifies the values of selflessness and contribution to the community. The award is a memorial to Philip “Pip” Caddell (1913‐2004), Second World War officer, executive and Montreal community volunteer, and his grandson, James Caddell (1973‐2005),  UN Peacekeeper, McGill graduate, NGO Worker and federal public servant. Both attended YMCA Kanawana – “Pip” as a camper in 1928 and James as a camper and counsellor in the 1980s and 1990s. The “Pip” Award Committee is composed of Kanawana alumni who were friends and family of “Pip” and James. 

“In his professional life, Terry Mosher has always taken seriously the journalist’s credo to ‘comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable,’” said award sponsor Andrew Caddell,  who grew up on Benny Farm in NDG and in Montreal West. “The purpose of this award is to recognize people who have taken the values they learned at Kanawana and applied them to the larger world. Terry Mosher has been a caring community volunteer who has dedicated himself to the disadvantaged. The ‘Pip’ Award Committee felt Terry Mosher’s volunteer work and professional accomplishments made him a very deserving recipient.”

Caddell calls  Mosher a great role model within the community as a director of the Old Brewery Mission as well as his remarkable career as one of Canada’s most respected cartoonists. He is an Officer of the Order of Canada and received an honorary Doctor of Letters from McGill University, two National Newspaper Awards and five individual prizes from the International Salon of Caricature. He was inducted into the Canadian News Hall of Fame and the Canadian Cartoonist's Hall of Fame.  “I am delighted to have reached the point in my life where I can give back in my own way,” Mosher says. “However, the most satisfying way to do so, I have discovered, is anonymously. So, enough said."

Mosher lived in a lot of places growing up.  “As a youth, I attended fourteen different schools in Toronto, Montreal and Quebec City,” he says. “From the time I was seven until I was fourteen, we lived in Montreal in the upper part of a coach house  -a converted garage, really-  in an alleyway between Lincoln Avenue and Saint Luc (what is now called de Maisonneuve) between Fort and Chomedey. Being several blocks from the old Forum, those were the happiest years of my young urban life. John Little, the painter, was our downstairs neighbour, and I have included a sketch he did of our funky little building at the time.That’s me directing the neighbourhood hockey game below from the upstairs right-hand window. My parents, Jack and Norma (in respective windows) always tried to get me out of the city for a period of time during summers and sent me to a series of camps, Kanawana being my favourite. I attended Victoria School, King's School and Westmount Junior High during that period. I moved back to Montreal from Quebec City when I was twenty-two, and, despite periods of time abroad, I have been here ever since.”

Pip  was one  the leaders on the committee that built the Montreal West Arena and pool. “Like many of the greatest generation, my father did not seek the limelight for the things he did,” Andrew says. “ His grandson, James was very much that sort of person, and he wanted to have an award at camp that recognized those attributes of his grandfather.  So, not long before he died, we agreed the ‘Pip’ award should recognize people who are exceptional, but who make their contributions in the spirit of Non Nobis Solum.   When James died, it made sense to make the award in both their memories.”

James was a former Canadian Forces peacekeeper with a taste for adventure who did a tour of duty in Bosnia and performed tsunami-relief work in India. Ten years ago he was overcome by altitude sickness in Bolivia and died. He was only 32. His tremendous life story is told beautifully in this article. 

YMCA Kanawana has been contributing to the well‐being and success of hundreds of youth ages 7 to 20 for over 120 years. Children are invited to take part in a safe and unique outdoor experience while learning about the environment and sustainable development.   Established in 1894, YMCA Kanawana was the first summer residential camp in Quebec. It is accredited by the Association des camp du Québec and is a founding member of the Association. For more information, visit ymcakanawana.com.

Rabbi Chaim Steinmetz leaving Baily Shul for prestigious post in New York City

Rabbi Chaim Steinmetz, who has served for 19 years as spiritual leader of Tifereth Beth David Jerusalem Congregation on Baily Road, will be leaving Montreal towards the end of the fall for a prestigious position in New York City.

As a friend, congregant and huge admirer of Rabbi Steinmetz, I write this story with a heavy heart. He is one in a million, one of the nicest and most compassionate individuals you will ever meet. During his nearly two decades here, he has made his mark not only at TBDJ but in the community at large. He assumed many leadership posts in the community and was never afraid to speak up on controversial issues. Articulate as they come, his sermons were always “must listen to” experiences. He came here with his wife Lisa Schwartz from New York. Together they raised their four children and adopted Montreal as their home. It was unthinkable that he would ever leave. Like many others, I joined TBDJ specifically because of Rabbi Steinmetz.

Rabbi Steinmetz

In everyone’s life there comes a challenge you cannot pass up. That is what happened to Rabbi Steinmetz when was offered the position of senior Rabbi of Kehilath Jeshurun, a distinguished and historic synagogue on Manhattan's Upper East Side. He will be succeeding one of the great leaders of the North American rabbinate, Rabbi Haskel Lookstein. “This appointment is both a great privilege and a great responsibility, and offers me the possibility of beginning a meaningful new chapter in my career,” he wrote to congregants.

Rabbi Steinmetz joined TBDJ in September 1996. Prior to that, he served congregations in Mount Vernon, New York, and Jersey City, New Jersey.He received his ordination from Yeshiva University, where he was a fellow of the elite Gruss Kollel Elyon. He has a M.A. in Jewish Philosophy from the Bernard Revel Graduate School, and a M.A. in Education from Adelphi University. He has completed Leadership Education and Development (L.E.A.D.) and Meorot Rabbinic fellowships. His articles have appeared in the Canadian Jewish News, The Gazette, The Suburban, the  Toronto Star and La Presse, as well as the The Jerusalem Post and the Forward and many other publications.. He also has an online blog of articles “The Happiness Warrior,” which is frequently updated.

Rabbi Steinmetz is the Past President of the Montreal Board of Rabbis, Past President of the Rabbinical Council of Canada, and past Vice President of the Quebec Region of the Canadian Jewish Congress, a has been a member of the executive of Quebec Israel Committee (QIC) and Hillel-Jewish Students Center of Montreal. 

“TBDJ has been an exceptional home for Lisa, myself and our family, and it has been a wonderful place to be a Rabbi,” he said.  “Deciding to leave was difficult, not just on a personal level, but on a professional level, because our synagogue is now so strong and dynamic. We have an exceptional president and lay leadership team, dedicated staff, and the nicest members in all of Canada. To leave all this was difficult; and to leave a comfortable home is risky, and we know it. But as someone once said ‘in the end, what we regret most are the chances we never took.’ For us, it was time to take on the challenge of a new shlichut, a new mission.”

 TBDJ president Judah Aspler said the very difficult task of finding a successor for Rabbi Steinmetz has already begun. “ Rabbi Steinmetz will be with us through the holidays, and we’ll soon share more detail regarding the exact date of transition and various ‘farewell activities’ that will be scheduled,” he said. “With regards to the future of TBDJ, it is bright. We are in a great position to maintain our growth, and will do our utmost not to miss a beat in terms of programming, services, and the strengthening of our institution and community. This includes the immediate initiation of a search process for our next Rabbi. We have already begun the formation of a search committee, along with defining the goals and parameters of our search.  

Neil Patrick Harris adds true star power to Just For Laughs galas

I caught the first of four Just For Laughs galas Monday night at the Place des Arts, hosted by superstar Neil Patrick Harris. He was essentially the ringmaster for what was called Circus Awesomeaus. Once again the folks at JFL came up with a pretty novel way to close out another successful celebration of comedy.

The star of the show, NPH.

Harris has hosted 10 televised awards shows over the past few years. Only a few months ago he was front and centre in Hollywood at the Academy Awards. Fast forward to Montreal, a city where he has shot a number of movies, and he did not disappoint as the common thread for a variety show which included a singing clown, a sword swallower, a magician/illusionist, an acrobat, a “little person” stand up comic and a female comic who would be better suited for the Nasty Show.

Local comic Ryan Willner opened things up with a great cross promotion for sponsor Air Canada.  Two spectators, Phillip and Carolina, were upgraded from their balcony seats to front row centre. They each got $250 AC gift cards and a chance to go back stage after the show. Following a short highlight reel of previous gala shows, Puddles the Clown made his way into the Salle Wilfrid-Pelletier, walked down a few rows and introduced Neil Patrick Harris.  This was one of those “feel good” moments as the capacity crowd of some 3,000 rose to their feet and gave him a loud and lengthy standing ovation. Since this was being taped for airing on a future CBC broadcast,  it made for a great TV moment.

“Montreal is my favorite city in all of Canada,” he said, “and I’ve been to Edmonton.”

Harris spoke about how exciting this past year has been for him. “I played a flamboyant transgender punk rocker in Hedwig and the Angry Inch on Broadway, then I did something rash and I hosted the Oscars…then I got married,” he said.

Harris made several jokes related  to his sexual orientation, first praising Canada for marking the 10th anniversary since legislation was adopted legalizing same sex marriage. The United States only followed suit recently.  “America’s future is looking more like Canada’s past,” he said.

A funny bit had Harris promising to read the minds  of some audience members. Two pretty women came on stage with a large case. Inside were sealed envelopes.  His first question was to a man near the front, asking if they had ever met before. The man said “no.” Harris then showcased a small board with the word “no,” on it. He then asked a woman in the crowd who her favorite actor ever was. Her response was Red Skelton. Harris promptly displayed the photo of a baby. “Red Skelton at nine months old,” he quipped.

This might not have been up there with his performances at the Tonys or the Oscars, but I got the feeling that just about everyone in the room was so excited to see him live and in person he could just as well have sat there playing solitaire. 

Sammy J and Randy were the first acts to perform. Sammy (Sam McMillan) is an Australian musical comedian and writer who embraces a variety of media in his comedy, including the use of video and self-composed music. Randy is a purple puppet voiced by  Heath McIvor. They were quite funny.

Harris then brought someone out in a wheelchair, outfitted in a straightjacket. It was sword swallower and self confessed professional weird person Brett Loudermilk, who made everyone feel just a little bit uncomfortable.

Next came the true hit of the night – little person Brad Williams,  whom I would go back and see solo any day of the week.  A California native, he started doing stand-up at age 19 and has been touring ever since. He has appeared on numerous TV shows including Legit, Deadbeat, Dave Attell’s Comedy Underground, Sam and Cat, Live at Gotham, the Tonight Show, Jimmy Kimmel Live, Mind Of Mencia, and Pitboss. The late Robin Williams called him “Prozac with a head.” Brad’s ability to make humorous observations on disability, relationships, sex, and race are winning over audiences and proving that anyone can overcome their shortcomings. He joked about walking into a children’s hospital. A young kid ran up to him and said, “don’t worry, they will fix you.” One of his funniest lines was about the looks he gets at the grocery store when he buys Lucky Charms cereal (known  for their leprechauns).

Magician/illusionist Ed Alonzo got some giggles with his bit – swallowing a balloon, followed by some funny sound effects and then having it come out of his rear end. According to what I read on the web, Harris referred to Alonzo as his “best friend” during a 2008 interview on the Craig Ferguson Show. Harris asked for volunteers, as he was told by Alonzo to saw a woman in half. One lady obliged. When the deed was done, her upper torso was transported off stage to which Harris asked “What am I supposed to do with the bottom half of a woman?”   

Someone introduced only as Beardyman came on stage. He created some impressive sound effects with his mouth, from music to a baby talking. Harris then came forward with a fish bowl. Inside people made up the titles for some songs such as “My second boyfriend left me,” to “How did my daughter get lice again?” The bearded man turned these words into pretty good songs.

Acrobat Hugo Desmarais was not only impressive in his aerial cage, but when he seemed to have finished his act he signalled to Harris to come forward and together they flew through the air- a pretty impressive, but risky move for the very successful and wealthy Harris. One bad move and his career would have been mush. Referring to the handsome Desmarais, Harris shouted out, “I love my husband David! I love my husband David!”

What would a circus be like without a juggler. Nicolas Fontaine fulfilled that role

I am not sure anyone in the audience was ready for profanity laced Bridget Everett, a singer, comedian, actor and writer who performs regularly in New York City.   A plus size woman wearing an outfit which showed a lot of her anatomy, she went into the audience and actually convinced some men and women to repeat some very racy language.  Check her out in the new Amy Schumer movie Trainwreck

As the show drew to a close, Harris finally consented to give Puddles  The Clown the stage. Puddles belted out a pretty good rendition of the theme song from Titanic. As he concluded, a makeshift boat with the name “Titanic” written on the side containing Harris and  the evening’s performers appeared on stage. No question about it. This ended things off on a high.

The Titanic finale.

There are still some tickets left for the Tuesday, July 28 shows. Go to www.hahaha.com to do so.