Glowing promo poster Mary Jo Dionne and Baby; photo Tanya King

Sometimes comedic inspiration comes from dark places. Mary-Jo Dionne, writer and performer of Glowing: A Reproduction Production – part of the 2013 Vancouver Fringe Festival line-up – experienced her last episode of melanoma during an already-horrific pregnancy, ultimately serving as the subject matter of her debut, one-woman show.

The thirty-minute performance follows a 40-year-old woman, born without a biological clock, who after countless hurdles eventually becomes pregnant – resulting in an experience that is anything but a glowing one. She thinks it can’t get any worse than all-day morning sickness, but she’s wrong. At seven months pregnant, while other women are deciding on paint colours for the nursery, a cancer diagnosis leaves her deciding whether or not she should go through with a potentially life-saving amputation. All told, this poignant one-woman comedic journey aims to debunk the myth that all pregnant women glow.

Glowing: A Reproduction Production is Mary-Jo Dionne’s debut at the Vancouver Fringe Festival.

Glowing: A Reproduction Production

Dates: September 6, 10:30 pm
September 7, 3:55 pm
September 8, 2:45 pm
September 9, 6:45 pm
September 12, 8:25 pm
September 14, 9 pm
Venue: Revue Stage, 1601 Johnston Street (Granville Island), Vancouver
Tickets: $10 weekday/$12 weekend (plus one-time $5 Fringe Festival membership); available online or at the Box Office, 1398 Cartwright Street on Granville Island.
*All advance ticket purchases subject to a $3 surcharge.

Audience members are invited to bring a donation of baby food to each Glowing performance to be donated to local food banks.

Mary-Jo Dionne is an award-winning writer whose work was called “A masterpiece in urban satire that will have you laughing so hard you’ll glow,” by the Globe and Mail. As a comedian, she has performed in Vancouver, Toronto, New York, and LA and was named a finalist for Vancouver’s Funniest New Female Comedian. As a writer, she has interviewed notable greats such as Ellen DeGeneres, Cloris Leachman, and Katherine Heigl. She trained at the London Academy of Media, Film and Television in the UK, as well as at the American Comedy Institute in New York City. A three-time survivor, she is an ardent spokesperson in the realm of melanoma awareness.

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