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In Eight to the Bar, it's New Year's Eve 1978-79, and four disparate strangers are stranded in a bus stop. Wade Lynch's character is a suicidal loser who needs to be convinced that life is worth living. His character's despondency is easy to explain: "Would you want to survive with that much polyester on your person?" Wade asks incredulously.
"With the '70s," he says, "the instinct is to be over-the-top, but the truth is funny enough."
"The freakiest thing is that I graduated high school in '78-79. The other members of the cast are saying, 'Oh, it's so neat. It's so retro.' I'm thinking, it's not neat! It's the story of my life!"
As a comedic actor, part of Wade's challenge in Eight to the Bar is playing a character less broadly drawn than some he,s played previously. "The hardest thing for me is to sit still. My butt is so sore. I'm used to more kinetic energy-sell, sell, sell!" Deep into rehearsals for Eight to the Bar, Wade still occasionally asks himself, "When do I get to be funny? Where's my big bow-tie?"
"Also, I'm a show-tune singer. I've never sung a pretty song. And it's hard learning how to sing like a real pop singer -not a cocktail lounge singer, not 'four beers and a karaoke…"
Later in the Festival season, he will play a brain-eating ogre in Arianna.
("He eats brains to get smarter-which could be useful.") And though he's not playing in Anne this year, he has high hopes: "I aspire to be a really mean Mrs. Lynde one day."
Wade is particularly overjoyed to be part of the Festival Season this year, since he has settled down on PEI. "Just like a grown-up!" he says, "This is my eighth season here-so it was a long courtship before I committed. The Charlottetown Festival is the best place in the world."
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