Victor & Priscilla, Victorian-era gender-bending clowns, bring comedy to Leslieville at the new Toronto Fringe VideoCabaret venue this July!

   #1 Toronto Fringe Clown Comedy proudly presents the new play #1 Clown Comedy With Victor & Priscilla at the Toronto Fringe Festival July 2-13, 2025. The show follows the further adventures of a 19th century vaudevillian clown family first seen in crowd-pleasing earlier shows at Alumnae Theatre (Victorian Closet Drama) and Theatre Gargantua (Victor & Priscilla Go To The Circus).

   Zany, cross-dressing clown siblings Victor & Priscilla (returning Julie Vanderlip & Eric Amaral) are thinking of quitting show biz to become fancy upper-class toffs of the Ton. Can their fantabulosa drama mama Sophy (returning Dora-nominated Michelle Gram) and their clever Bunbury cousins (Parker-Elizabeth Rodenburg, playing three roles) win them back into the family theatrical troupe?

   The hour long PG-13 Canadian comedy entertains with song, dance, witty wordplay, slapstick, drag and puppets while touching on the deeper themes of LGBTQ+ history, identity, outsider communities, and gender roles.

   The show was written by a trio of award-winning female playwrights overeducated at the University of Toronto. The writing team reunites after their 2018 Toronto Fringe collaboration, the sold out Leslieville site-specific food themed show set in a kitchen, Kitchen Sink Drama, called “a theatrical feast” by Mooney On Theatre.

   Aaliya Alibhai’s writing was called "touching, funny and tender” by Life With More Cowbell; multi-award-winning Natalie Kaye (Mood Swings) has writing described as “beautiful” and “poetic” by Mooney On Theatre; and her multi-award-winning sister Nina Kaye (Death Meets Harlequin, Unspoken) was named “one of our city’s best emergent playwrights” by Mooney On Theatre.

   Directed by award-winning Kyra Keith, lauded for her “mind-expanding imaginative energy” by Sesaya Arts, the play pairs physical comedy with a clever script. The silly comedy of manners, staged in the round, is set in a playfully historically inaccurate Victorian-era and features the Polari language, a nearly forgotten theatrical slang also used as a Queer secret code in a time when homosexuality was outlawed.

   With lengthy past programming featuring cross-dressing historical and comedic clown shows, VideoCabaret provides the perfect location to host the production at the newest Toronto Fringe Satellite Venue, VideoCabaret’s Deanne Taylor Theatre, 10 Busy St. Toronto ON M4M 1N8 in Leslieville, near Logan Ave and Queen St East

Show Dates and Times      July 2-13, 2025  Tickets on sale online from June 4, 2025

Adult regular price $15 plus fees, some discounts available, July 8 is a PWYC date

Wednesday July 2 at 6:15pm    

Friday July 4 at 6:30pm      

Saturday July 5 at 12:30pm 

Tuesday July 8 at 4:00pm         

Thursday July 10 at 9:30pm     

Friday July 11 at 7:45pm 

Sunday July 13 at 2:45pm     

Team

Producer: Aaliya Alibhai, artistic director of #1 Toronto Fringe Clown Comedy

Writers: Aaliya Alibhai, award-winning playwright sisters Natalie Kaye & Nina Kaye

Director, Movement Coach: Award-winning Kyra Keith                

Cast: Michelle Gram, Julie Vanderlip & Parker-Elizabeth Rodenburg, Eric Amaral

Puppet Design, Puppeteer: Dora-nominated Michelle Gram

Publicity Assistants: Tania D’Amico & Gary Kaye

Publicist, Costumer: Nina Kaye 

Dance Choreography: Jonathan Benedicto, Natalie Kaye