Fringe Review: The Lady in the Fountain
- Septimus & Carmunist
- Aug 22, 2025
- 2 min read
Updated: Aug 31, 2025
Dates: Aug 21 – Aug 28, 2025
Location: Baumann Centre (Fringe Venue 3)
Artist / Company: Hannah Ockenden & Jim Leard (Vancouver, BC)
Duration: 50 mins
Rating: Ages 14+
Genre: Storytelling
The Lady in the Fountain opens with the performer explaining how the concept came about: a prop camera with the initials R.D. sparked the invention of Ramona Dale, a young woman traveling the world with her lens. We then follow Ramona through an imagined adventure in 1920s Italy, where romance and political unrest collide. The piece mixes travelogue, intrigue, and moments of danger while exploring how stories can take shape from the smallest of objects.
Highlights
The protagonist lands herself in real danger.
Hannah’s Italian accent was confident and consistent.
The final lighting cue was great.
Workshop Notes
The origin story—how the show was conceived—felt unnecessary. It blurred the line between performer and character, especially since the transition amounted to putting on a scarf. It didn't feel like she stepped into a fully realized character, which made it hard to believe in the protagonist as a distinct person.
Ramona lacks a clear inner conflict, fatal flaw, or misbelief. We get adventure and danger, but beyond that there wasn't much in the way of nuance or depth. She’s poised and privileged, but we didn't come away with a sense of her beyond that. Similarly, the other characters felt like stock stereotypes.
Ramona doesn't have a super compelling narrative goal. She's on a quest to explore the world and take photographs for her godmother. She does get swept up into some conflict, but it's solved fairly easily when she calls in a mafioso cousin to help her friend.
Rating
★ ★ ★
The Victoria Fringe Festival, presented by Intrepid Theatre since 1986, has become a cornerstone of the city’s arts scene, known for its unjuried, anything-goes approach to performance. For Carmunist and Septimus, Fringe is the highlight of the year. We’ve been involved as volunteers for more than a decade, and more recently, we’ve opened our home to performers as billets. Reviewing Fringe shows is something we’ve talked about for some time, and now we’re putting our experience as fiction editors and theatre stans to work, offering our thoughts and workshop notes for as many performances as we can attend.
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