Plenty of Dish

Monday night, I stopped off at The Garrison for 416 Dating Stories where both amateurs and professionals can recount their battles. Given that defunct newspaper Eye Weekly had 2 features about dating, Dating Diaries and Blind Date, the average person obviously want to know about other people's juicy details. So the room was full with couples and singles, excited about what could happen.

The show started slow though. The emcee wanted to get some details for the next outing: the best start time, how did people hear about the event, if they want to sign up to present at the next show, should it be a singles mixer as well, and so on. But this book-keeping right off the bat felt too dull as an opening to what should be a fun night. Things improved with Dave Merheje. Being a stand-up comic, he peppered his anecdote with quips and one-liners. His holiday-themed story involved trying to get his crush to like Christmas while living in sweltering L.A. (so technically it wasn't a Toronto dating story.) Next up was spoken word poet Dwayne Morgan with a poem about the idealized man, gleaned from the pages of women magazines. It was amusing but felt like a retread of the Old Spice "I'm On a Horse" ads. Comic Rhiannon Archer was unavailable due to surgery, so her replacement Kimberley gave us some e-mail snippets from a smitten Latin fling.

After the break, local film-maker Anthony took to the stage. He garnered the most laughs and cheers for his 30-minute story. It began with the break-up of an 8-year relationship that started at the tender age of 16. It ended with him singing to a girl in front of her workplace while store-bought fireworks were being fired by his best friend. Anthony even gave the audience a rendition of that self-penned song, including the rap break. Finally, the emcee closed off the evening with her own horror story involving a weird make-out attempt while watching the dystopian film The Road. She compared this rather tone-deaf encounter to Seinfeld's "making out at Schindler's List" episode.

This series could be a hit, as most people were having a good time. But it is definitely dependent on the story-teller. So finding someone who can find the balance between humour, empathy, and give just enough details but not into TMI territory may be a challenge.