LOST YOU FOR A SECOND
Created and performed by KAREN HINES
Comedy. Not for Children.
FROM THE REVIEWS OF POCHSY IV
“You’d call the show an hallucination if hallucinations were as expertly constructed as Pochsy IV. Or maybe a nightmare if nightmares were as funny.”
— Liz Nicholls, 12th Night
Read the Full Review HERE
“Hines delivers an impressive 75 minutes of seamless dialogue with an inky black charm that is nothing short of riveting.”
— Savanna Parker, Edmonton Journal
Read the Full Review HERE
“No other satirist captures so fearlessly, and with such original panache, the contemporary drift towards a kind of late-capitalist chaos the way Karen Hines does.”
— Liz Nicholls, 12th Night from “2023: The Year in Edmonton Theatre”
PLAYING AT THE IN THE SOIL FESTIVAL
JUNE 15 & 16, 2024
(Scroll down for clips of Pochsy IV!)
The Show:
“I used to work at Mercury Packers,” says Pochsy. “Where I packed mercury…” Now a robot has her job. Or perhaps a child. Child robot…? Part stand-up comedy, part consumeristic night terror, Pochsy IV takes a peek through Pochsy’s thick-lashed eyes as she says goodbye to her industrial past and fantasizes a 5-star future in a market-driven world.
Writer/performer Karen Hines’ lush satires have traveled the globe. Her live shows and short films have won dozens of awards and citations internationally. The prize-winning Pochsy Plays (I, II and III) have been published in multiple printings. But you do not need to read them to get Pochsy IV. Pochsy can’t remember what happened that far back… why should you?
“ I was never very good at History. I dunno, I just find it boring. Repetitive. (she rolls her eyes) It’s like the same things happening over and over and over again …” (Pochsy III: Head Movements of a Long-Haired Girl)
…
Pochsy Productions
“Ingenious acidic comedy.” (The Globe & Mail)
Pochsy Productions was founded in 1992 for the company's first show, Pochsy's Lips, which won a loyal cult following, and went on to play at theatres and festivals across Canada, the U.S.A. and in Germany, earning critical acclaim and a place as:
“One of the gems of Canadian Theatre” (Toronto Star)
Since then, the company has developed and produced many more award-winning performances, films and audio. Under the umbrella of “Keep Frozen,” the Pochsy shows and the short films adapted from them have travelled from Dawson to Boston, Palm Springs to Kuala Lumpur.
Combining such disparate elements as magical realism, satire and horror, Keep Frozen : Pochsy Productions has won a growing audience, numerous production and literary nominations and awards, as well as a reputation for original, hilarious and provocative entertainments.
(By the way, Pochsy is pronounced “Poxy.”)
“Savagely funny.” (NOW Magazine)
Excerpt from Pochsy IV at the 2023 High Performance Rodeo
The Pochsy Plays 1992-2010
“Karen Hines' Pochsy, the crown princess of narcissism, has become one of the little gems of Canadian theatre, an unforgettable character steeped in equal measures of honey and acid.”
— Robert Crew, Toronto Star
“A miracle of bitter hope... Hines has tapped into the confusion and alienation unique to our age and mined a work of gossamer charm and deadly power. Pochsy is part of the light that keeps us laughing as we plunge into the darkness. Beckett … would have fallen for her.”
— Simon Houpt, EYE
“Pochsy is a must-see, a blend of charm and vitriol who traipses blithely over mercury- traced waters. A master of direct address, able to entrance an audience with a simple stare, she skewers middle class aspirations and consumer obsessions with poison-tipped arrows and relentless slings.”
—Christopher Winsor, Theatrum Canada
Hilarious and harrowing...A walking, singing, dancing embodiment of designer nihilism ... Her comedy has the rare ability to make you laugh while feeling queasy.
— Jill Lawless, NOW Magazine
“Hines is an astonishing artist both as a writer and a performer. Her acid meditation on our modern confusion comes via the murky labyrinth of Pochsy’s brain. You will laugh, a lot, and Pochsy will help you be dismayed by your laugh lines.”
— Liz Nicholls, Edmonton Journal
“To be in love with Pochsy, as I am, is an exquisitely perverse addiction. Karen Hines's character, with her breathlessly innocent voice, butterfly lashes, and Cupid's-bow mouth is as gorgeous as the ghost of a silent film star and as rancid as the corpse. She's like a disease you want to get in the hopes that it will purge something bigger.”
— Colin Thomas, The Georgia Straight
“This apocalyptic vision of Clara Bow and Betty Boop ... is the most intriguing female creation to hit the stage in a long time...”
— Valerie Gregory, Edmonton Sun
“Pochsy is a vulnerable, evocative character with the sublime, violent spirit of a cornered animal and the allure of a child. Pochsy violates the audience so sweetly you barely notice... Over the past 15 years, we’ve seen many new talents celebrated like the second coming of Christ only to disappear as soon as the media spotlight dimmed. Hines, though, is the real thing.”
— Denis Armstrong, Classical 96
“Go. Just go.”
— Munich Evening Post
POCHSY IV was commissioned by, and premiered at, One Yellow Rabbit Performance Theatre in the High Performance Rodeo.
Originally:
Written and Performed by Karen Hines
Dramaturgy by Blake Brooker
Directed by Michael Kennard
Set and Lighting Design by Sandi Somers
Sound Design by Chantal Vitalis
Clunic Consultant - John Turner
Additional Sounds by Richard Feren
Costume Consultant - Justin Miller/Pearle Harbour
Social Media and Design - Kate Pallesen
Art - Peter Moller
Photography - Gary Mulcahey
Literary and Musical Acknowledgements:
Blake Brooker, Gia Tolentino, Sandra Balcovske, Marcus Aurelius, Imajyn Cardinal, Michelle Thrush, Sam Harris, Douglas Harding, XXXXX, Maggie Huculak, Greg Morrison, Jaydra Dawn, William MacAskill, Joni Mitchell, John Turner, Roland Griffiths and Michael Kennard.
…
Produced by Keep Frozen with funding by:
The Canada Council for the Arts
The Alberta Foundation for the Arts
One Yellow Rabbit Performance Theatre