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Broken River continues to be a clever mixed bag of goodies for audiences that’ve braved the cold every Sunday for the past three weeks.

Even though what I’m about to recap is the next-to-last show before the finale on November 30, you don’t have to have seen everything up till now.

The story’s designed so that you can come out to any show with fresh eyes, an especially open mind, and just let the actors have their way with anything you can imagine in front of you.

Sheriff Ed Stubbs (Vance Gillis)

Local Sheriff Ed is sadly off the force, guzzling beers, and recovering at home from a heart attack. Agent Carver tries to snap him out of it by telling him there’s now a definitive cause of death in the murder of Bruce Angstrom – pummeling by rocks, courtesy of a slingshot. Without missing a beat, Ed blurts out that he’s glad Bruce is dead, and after some prodding from Carver, he admits that he lost $10,000 in a penis enlargement pill scam, all because of Bruce.

Special Agent Denise Carver (Lar Vi)

Agent Carver, worried about Ed’s revelation, finds herself running into wayward Boyd’s arms. Before the two get romantic, she unloads on Boyd the story of her brother, who was killed by a gang of thugs, but the case was never solved. Now she’s determined to bring Angstrom’s killer to justice. Boyd drops a bomb of his own when he tells her that Ed is the proud owner of a slingshot, affectionately named “Tammy.”

Gail (Kyla Margaret)

Gail is livid that she can’t make her property tax payments without alimony from her ex-husband Ed, so she orders him to find another job. He manages to scrape up a little work at local bar,The Jug, but it’s not long before Gail crashes in and brings everything to a halt. She screams that she went to the spot where Bruce (her illegitimate son) was killed and she found Ed’s belt buckle there, with blood on it. Eventually, Agent Carver has no choice but to arrest the former Sheriff Ed.

Boyd Duffy (James McGee)

Boyd hears about his ex-brother-in-law’s arrest from Agent Carver, and he feels terrible about it. As it happens, Boyd’s shady hands are in possession of a little black book that belongs to Mayor Wheeler. What do you know? Inside that very book, there’s a receipt for another slingshot, not Tammy. “Ed’s not guilty!” Boyd takes off, half-cocked, to free Ed from jail. Unfortunately, he crosses paths with Mayor Wheeler, who, let’s just say, is an excellent (sling) shot.

Crystal (Ariel De Roo)

Before Ed is hauled off to jail, Crystal takes pity on him and decides to put him to work at The Jug.
She’s actually hoping that Ed will take over the bar when she’s away on maternity leave. Well, Gail blows that plan to hell, because once she reveals that she found Ed’s bloody belt buckle, it’s clear to Crystal that Ed was horribly involved in her baby daddy’s murder. (Sorry, Boyd, you’re not the father after all.)

Mayor Barb Wheeler (Kyla Margaret)

Mayor Wheeler’s the big kahuna, and she’s got everyone wrapped around her little finger, including Boyd. She made Boyd hold on to her black book for safe keeping, since it also has evidence of her rigging the mayoral elections. Her other ace in the hole is manipulating Agent Carver into getting the book back in exchange for keeping silent about the Boyd-Carver hookup. Wheeler is definitely dirty, and thank God there’s another witness – Gail, who swears she saw Wheeler by the riverbank the night Bruce died. The final kicker: Boyd, after being “shot” by Wheeler, confesses he stole Ed’s uniform, complete with belt buckle, the night Bruce died!

Broken River’s last installment happens on Sunday November 30 at Montreal Improv (3697 Boulevard Saint-Laurent) at 8:30 pm. Tickets: $8 (available at the door). For more information, click HERE