My overall impression
http://wemakemovies.org/?p=9607
A Message From a Dying Soldier by Brian Allman is a compelling piece influenced by a letter written from Tomas Young on the 10th anniversary of the Iraq war.
Brian Allman is known around town as being an improviser. He has been active with Comedy Sports for years and even though he has an MFA form UCLA I still think of him as being the funny guy. So I was very much looking forward to seeing a one-man show about a war victim and what he would do with it.
I was delightfully impressed. As you enter Brian is in character and greeting the audience and engaging with them. When the show begins he breaks the themes of the letter up into different scenes and characters. Each character having a compelling story and opinion about war and the United States. Some make you laugh like Charlie Chartzenchartz. Even though you may be laughing they are not coming from a light-hearted place. Most characters shock you with facts that really make you think about the country we live in.
It is definitely a one sided piece about war. Which it has to be if one is basing it off the letter that Tomas Young wrote. Brian is very passionate on the subject and it shows through the creation of this one-man show. Fringe is the premiere of Message From a Dying Soldier. I was very impressed with the show and think it is a worthwhile show to see this Fringe. You can see that Brian is much more then a great improviser, he is a passionate artist with a great entertaining show to prove it.
Message From a Dying Soldier runs at Comedy Sports (733 Seward Street) for one more performance on June 30th at 6:00 pm. / Tickets are $10 http://hff13.org/1393
Review by Jennie Sheffield
