Out-of-Towners Showcase: Part Two of Two

The Pumpkin Pie Show

These guys definitely get the medal for being the friendliest out-of-towners: they’re the only ones who approached me, rather than the other way around.

So I was relieved to find that I really enjoyed their preview. They’re a storytelling group, and at first I was sort of annoyed at how theatrical the storyteller’s performance was: then I thought, no. I’m being stupid. That’s just me getting really foolish and dogmatic about some silly concept of what storytelling is supposed to be. What I do know is that his theatricality was totally engaging, very funny and very controlled.

Ophelia

While, this is a piece that might have been brilliant. Or it might have been terrible. Unfortunately, I’ll never know — it was crippled by poor staging decisions that made the preview impossible for me to either see or hear; the performers were on the floor, wrapped in a sheet, and they seemed to be doing — something worth watching: but even standing up and moving around the space, I wasn’t able to follow it. Simple problems, simply fixed — but unfortunately, not leaving me much to comment on about their performance.

Roofies in the Mochaccino

Comedy’s a funny thing, and I was just thinking about exactly what makes things funny for me. One thought is that a lot of it revolves around taking stupid, trivial things, and making them impossibly elaborate. Hell, Monty Python pretty much built their career on that one gag — and it’s the same thing that I love about so much of Dean Hatton‘s work.

So. Fozzie Bear fucking Miss Piggy? Mildly funny, I guess. But taking that concept, and then examining the process in minute detail — building the environment, the landscape of both bodies, the complications that evolve from both interspecies and, er, inter-puppetry intercourse? In the context of beautifully, carefully crafted poetry? That’s fucking funny, and it has to be seen to be believed.

Homecoming

So apparently I have a huge thing for the whole virginal white gown look, because watching an attractive girl, clad in a restrictive bridal gown, executing a sequence of carefully choreographed movements through space, was really breathtaking for me. I’m sure someone could come up with all kinds of analyses for this.

But maybe it is worth examining more closely — because I was into her performance until she began speaking. So. Two possibilities: one, that she really effectively crafted a world with her body and with gesture, and introducing language violated that; or, two, that the whole bridal-dance thing played into some sort of submissive fantasy that fell apart once she opened her mouth and began to speak for herself. I don’t know that the two possibilities are mutually exclusive: in fact, I think that it’s likely that they’re related.

I don’t think this is some sort of fetish that I’m imposing on the performance, I think it’s an inherent part of it: a dancer doesn’t enter the space in something as evocative as a bridal gown (particularly in a show that seems interested in dealing with gender) without that influencing audience perception of what she does.

So. Interesting.

Gone, Gone, Gone

Cute and amusing, but not much more: a couple comes out, binds their hands together with duct tape, and begins a dance that progresses into a desperate need to get away from each other. I found myself wishing for more physical engagement, from a piece that seemed to break down into a series of spins: not something I feel compelled to rush out and see, but it was amusing enough for long enough.

The Thinnest Woman Wins

More body-image angst, which continues to be a tough sell for me. Punctuated with baton-twirling, although I do have to observe that the baton was dropped twice; and the content of what she was saying wasn’t…really something I’m inclined to sit through, for an hour. I’m sure that her show contains much more than this, but I’m afraid I can’t tell what that might be from the preview.

Leaving Normal

Normally I’m not a real big fan of audience interaction, but the performer had a real sweetness and a vulnerability that made me eager to play along with her: an eagerness that, I think, was shared by the two members she pulled to play with her. Part of the strength of this, too, is that she really did play with her participants, rather than simply using them as human props — she was attentive to them, and worked closely with what they had to offer.

Plus, she gives out treats in her show. And I get hungry at Fringe.

Boom

A solo piece by one of the Cody Rivers dudes, which is a pretty hefty recommendation in and of itself. The piece was brief — he played a pair of characters, a teacher and a student, having an absurd conversation about bombs. Entertaining but brief.

Sex, Love & Vomit

A pair of storytelling pieces that really suffered from being placed at the end of the night. Seemed to be offering the first part of their respective stories as teasers, but neither offered quite enough to pique my interest. (It’s possible that the second one may have been cut off by a tech error.) Truthfully, I was struggling to stay alert; they would most likely have fared much differently at the other end of the evening. Unfair, perhaps, but I can only report on the experience I had.

Out-of-Towners Showcase: Part One of Two

Systems: A Literal Interpretation of the Fourth Wall

I can’t say that the text did much for me: it all seemed to be very clever and very quick and very cerebral, deconstructing all kinds of aspects of theatre and blah blah blah. It’s certainly possible that there’s more going on in the full show than was apparent during a brief preview, but the intellectual exercise ultimately feels kind of hollow to me.

Karaoke Knights – A One Man Rock Opera

Tim Mooney is something of a controversial figure locally — there’s camps that absolutely love and camps that absolutely hate his stuff — and I’m definitely part of the former.

That said, I’ll confess that this is a weaker piece he chose to do tonight — one that I suspect is effective within the overall context of the show, but doesn’t communicate much as an excerpt. Regardless, he’s on my “must-see” list, if only because of his work in previous years.

Red Tide

I’m not usually a visual person when it comes to theatre — I’m interested primarily in text, and in performances by actors.

This is a piece, however, that hinges heavily on creating a visual world — and they didn’t really have the tools to do that in the preview. This is a piece that’s almost all style, all aesthetic, all about creating a cool world — and I’m struggling to visualize the performance, good or bad, on the basis of what we saw tonight.

Get It OFF YOUR CHEST!!!

This is one that was very popular with the audience, and well-played by the performer — she waddles out as a cheerful, elderly homeless lady, sharing her homespun insights with the audience.

And yet, the whole exercise feels somewhat manipulative to me — she comes across like a bit of a stock character, and the sudden emotional shifts seem calculated. Well-played, and probably very popular with the right audience — but I have a hard time visualizing spending much more time with this woman.

How Does a Drug Deal Become a Decent 3rd Date?

This pleased me — a solid little comedy scene, featuring a girl being accosted by the classic seedy, sleazy date. Not really much of anything to it beyond that, but superbly played by both of them, and I was laughing pretty much from beginning to end.

Beowulf or Gilgamesh ? You Decide!

Gah, this requires no selling from me: he’s a Fringe hit, and deservedly so. I’m actually kind of fascinated to see which piece ends up becoming more heavily requested (I’m a “Gilgamesh” fan, myself). No matter: I’ve seen both pieces, both are brilliant, and I would happily sit through either again. And at Fringe, that’s not nothing.

Oens

So guy comes out in a weird costume, weird music starts playing, and he moves through the space in a weird way. I can’t say that I have any real idea exactly what was going in the little movement sequence I witnessed, and I seemed to have every reason to hate it — but I loved it. I found it funny and engaging and consistently interesting throughout. Moreover, he demonstrated a physical discipline and control that suggests to me that he’s more than capable of sustaining an hour show: the brief piece I saw was the work of an artist I’m prepared to trust.

FOOL FOR A CLIENT

So, usually I’m happy to use this space to just sort of talk about my impressions, work through them, let people read and draw their own conclusions.

Not so with this one. I want you to see this show. You, reading this. That’s right: go ahead, click on the link above, go to his show page, and schedule one of his performances. Yes, it’s funny. Yes, it’s smart. But beyond that, I think it captures something important: I think that it captures some important truths about humanity, and government, and all those kinds of things that I’m constantly struggling to find a way to communicate to people. When I complain about cheap, stupid, obvious political comedy? This is the antithesis of that.

I could go on and on. But really. Schedule it now. Go.

The Attack of the Big Angry Booty

Les Kurkendaal is something of a beloved figure locally. I’ve never seen any of his shows, and I’ll confess that his previews have never really done much for me: I find his stage character to be somewhat needy in a way that really turns me off. I’ll also throw out that the subject matter of this show — more body-image angst — isn’t really something that excites me.

But I was thoroughly entertained by his performance tonight: he was more relaxed and genuinely playful than I’ve seen him before, and his subject matter — how bar crawls while touring have basically destroyed his physique — well, they were pretty inside jokes, but, hey, I’m inside and I enjoyed them, found myself laughing along — yes, yes, those are all things that I recognize. I don’t know if that recommends it to anybody else, but I certainly had a good time.

The Cody Rivers Show Presents: Stick to Glue

This is another group that I hear about constantly, but whose shows I’ve never managed to catch. Not for any lack of desire — everything I’ve seen has impressed me, and this was no exception.

Trying to describe what they did is next to impossible: it was, well, kind of a nonsense song, kind of a kid’s song, acted out through extremely physical, extremely ludicrous, brilliantly timed gestures. And that was it. A simple gag, elegantly executed: but one that had the full house in stitches from beginning to end.

Ten Artists I haven’t seen before

…but whose work sure sounds interesting. Once again, the Rarig is a well-represented venue: you’ve got Adam Sharp putting on 10.10 Post 9.11: Laughter in the Aftermath and Top Hat Theatre doing Robin Hood The Musical!, both of which have caught my attention in previews. I haven’t seen any of Courtney Roche in Stupid Face, or of Rampleseed in Reincarnation: Another Chance at Failure, but both have fans who just plain won’t shut the fuck up about them to me.

Over at Intermedia Arts, Jared Reise is producing a show called Among the Oats. I worked with him briefly last year, in a role in which he really didn’t get the chance to spread his wings: but he impressed me in the few conversations we had backstage, and I’m curious to see what he’ll produce when he’s given a blank canvas. I have a similar sense of the intellect of Katherine Glover, who’ll be producing her first show No Stranger Than Home in the same venue.

At Mixed Blood, you have puppet show JACK by Eric van Wyk and political comedy Orange by Questionable Company Theatre, two shows that have been ridiculously – and admirably – aggressive in pimping themselves to a new audience.

For those who are into faery tales, Atomic Lotus & Invocatio is doing a Gothic ballet based on “Hansel and Gretel” (and that’s something I’m curious to see, successful or otherwise) call HafenGeist. A more thoughtful storytelling experience can be had from Klatch Productions, doing My War: From Bismarck to Britain and Back, an epistolary performance based on WWII records. And last but not least, newcomer Mother/Destroyer seems to have a notable flair for language in their maiden voyage, Skunkape Sexkult.

Whew! That’s it, until the Festival proper starts — but these last three entries cover most of the shows that have caught my attention. As for everything else — well, I’m looking forward to being surprised.

Fifteen Returning Champions

No less than five can be found at the Rarig Center: Chopping Block and Charlie Bethel (the team that brought you last year’s “Tom Thumb”) is teaming to produce Beowulf or Gilgamesh? You Decide! at which audiences will be able to pick which of Charlie’s hit one-man epics they get to see that evening. He also did some of the initial script work on Sun Tzu’s The Art of War, by No Refunds Theatre Company. Fringe favorite Joe Scrimshaw presents a children’s show called An Inconvenient Squirrel. Four Humors (of “Bards”, “Deviled Eggs” and “Inspector Rex”) brings a traveling medicine show called Mortem Capiendum. And Walking Shadow is putting on Shakespeare’s Land of the Dead, in which the Globe Theatre finds itself under attack by a zombie plague.

Two great movement shows can be found right her in the Minneapolis Theatre Garage: Jon Ferguson has been collaborating with Chain Coffee Productions to create BULL “An American Story of Bullheadedness”, a twisted adaptation of Ionesco. Noah Bremer of Live Action Set has also contributed to Fools for Love by The Hastings High School Drama Club. Live Action Set itself is putting on Deviants, an adaptation of a remarkable show they did earlier this year, at the Soap Factory.

There’s at least two brilliant 90-minute productions taking place at the Bryant-Lake Bowl: out-of-towner Mark Whitney is doing his one-man show FOOL FOR A CLIENT, which easily made my top ten last year, and Vanderpan Enterprises (whose show “Three Days in Hell” made my top five) is doing Paul Bunyan Runs for President.

If it’s movement you’re interested in, there’s an embarrassment of riches scattered throughout the Festival: Sara Stevenson Scrimshaw (whose comic dancing I’ve the pleasure of witnessing in the past) is doing Dance of the Whisky Faerie, while physical theatre ensemble 3 Sticks is just bringing The Gypsy and the General back from Kansas City. Marceau-trained mime Dean Hatton – one of the best-kept secrets in the Twin Cities – is performing a tribute to his (now unfortunately late) teacher, titled Silent Poetry.

Rounding out the list, I’ll throw on two more solo performers: Tim Mooney will be presenting his third one-man show in Minneapolis, this one called Karaoke Knights. And hit stand-up comic Ben Sandell is taking a crack at storytelling in Strawberry Fields Temporarily.

But that’s not all!

Needless Nepotism

I’m one of the founders of the Rockstar Storytellers, so I won’t be talking about that show in this space. However, since the group is composed of hit solo performers — a kind of “Fringe All-Stars,” as it were — many members of the group are also producing shows in the Fringe that I’m looking forward too. I don’t know if the fact that I work with these guys disqualifies me from recommending their work — but the shows I’d like to plug are ones that I’ve had nothing to do with.

ROCKSTAR: Allison Broeren
COMPANY: Mumble Mumble, Ink Productions
SHOW TITLE: I’ll Marry You for Health Insurance and other shocking revelations
LOCATION: Rarig Xperimental

ROCKSTAR: Allegra Lingo
COMPANY: Allegra J. Lingo
SHOW TITLE: Tipping the Bucket
LOCATION: Rarig Arena

ROCKSTARS: Curt Lund and Laura Bidgood
COMPANY: True Enough Theatre
SHOW TITLE: Boys Don’t Make Passes at Girls Who Wear Glasses
LOCATION: Rarig Arena

ROCKSTAR: Mike Fotis
COMPANY: Mike Fotis
SHOW TITLE: An Intimate Evening with Fotis: Part Two
LOCATION: Minneapolis Theatre Garage

And a brief shout-out to another performer I’m working with, who also has his own show in the Festival:

PERFOMER: Michael Shaeffer
COMPANY: Empty S Productions
SHOW TITLE: Roofies in the Mochaccino
LOCATION: Interact Center

Onward to more recommendations!

The Gypsy and the General

Here’s a production that absolutely delivers on the promise of its show description – a “physically daring ensemble-created show” – in spades. It has singing and dancing. It has falls and leaps and rolls. It has a catchy soundtrack and countless object manipulations.

Some of these are very cool, and very tightly-plotted: others feel aimless, emerging from nothing and dissolving into nothing. There were at least a few sequences where I was watching objects moving through space and had no sense what was going on. They’re all unquestionably physically impressive, and it feels a bit churlish to pick apart a performance that’s working so aggressively to entertain you.

Some people are going to call this a masterpiece, and I don’t think that it is: there’s really not much more to it than a kind of generalized ridicule of militarism, a sort of live-action political cartoon. But it has the frenetic, kinetic energy of a cartoon; it turns around and continually surprises you; there are several moments that merited gasps and applause. It’s very possibly the most consistently entertaining hour in the Fringe, and that’s not nothing.

JACK, Orange, and Roofies: Previews from the Rockstar Storytellers Show

JACK by Eric van Wyk

His preview during the Fringe-For-All, I’ll confess, left me cold. This still wasn’t his crowd, and the pacing still felt awkward – but this time around, I was much more impressed with the *visual* inventiveness of the show – the piece he chose to do was largely a rapid-fire catalogue of different puppets, puppets being transformed into other things, packed with lots of visual surprises. I still can’t say that I have a clear sense of exactly what I’ll be watching during the show, but I’m now reasonably certain that it’ll sustain my attention.

Orange by Questionable Company Productions

This was like a Saturday Night Live sketch, but the old, good Saturday Night Live. The premise is a funny one – people in a building are watching the television, and trying to figure out if the hostage situation they’re watching is the building that they’re in – and it’s played in a very deadpan, tongue-in-cheek style.

Roofies in the Mochaccino by Michael Shaeffer

Talking up this guy anymore would be nothing short of nepotism. But you should see his show.

Writer’s Panel

I’m a big fan of panel discussions – but I have to confess that this was a bit of a disappointing experience for me. It was a table with some very cool writers – Matthew Everett, Anton Jones, and Michael Shaeffer – as well as some first-time Fringers who seemed to have intriguing stories to tell.
 
But we never really got into anything that was really interesting to me – the bulk of the questions seemed to be of the “How do you get postcards printed” variety, and I was really craving the opportunity to hear them get their teeth into a subject with some meat in it. I’m not sure what would have helped that to happen – perhaps an aggressive moderator, rather than the open-forum “town-hall” style of the proceedings.
 
In any case, there were also several table readings of upcoming scripts. It was interesting to have such a text-focused approach to developing Fringe shows, stripped of the performance polish that so many seem to live or die on.
 
All Rights Reserved: A Libertarian Rage by Maximum Verbosity
 
Mine, so I’ll leave it to the discretion of others to analyze the strengths and weaknesses of the text.
 
Bronze Bitch and Dog Tag by Matthew Everett
 
I had the pleasure of reading this dialogue, along with the playwright. I’ll confess that his favored genre – romantic comedy – is one that leaves me cold. But his facility for well-constructed dialogue is well in evidence – it’s quick and clever, fun to read and fun to listen to. The subject matter – at least of what I’ve heard – is a bit fluffy for my tastes; but fans of this style will find much to enjoy here.
 
Roofies in the Mochaccino by Michael Shaeffer
 
I’ve sung his praises plenty, and I was as usual impressed with his material – but this time around, I noted his strengths as a vocal performer. As a fan of slam poetry, I’m critical of how shallow so much of it is – with such a limited time period in which to hit, poets will often hit a single level of intensity and maintain it throughout. But sustaining a full-length show is a different animal entirely – and Michael’s able to hit a range of levels within a single piece. (This was an excellent poem to demonstrate that, a vision of heaven populated by jazz legends. It helps that I’m deeply in love with the subject.)
 
Trying Guilt by Culture Mesh Collective
 
I first ran into this dude completely by accident – at his show “Same Difference” last year, which I saw because I stumbled into the wrong theatre while Fringing frantically. It was pretty awesome, an intelligent script about racial identity that shifted easily between prose and slam verse – and I’m a real sucker for those kinds of linguistic acrobatics. He seems to be doing something similar this time around: his preview was a slam piece, performed by one of his cast members, a cute white girl playing a homeless person. The cadence was engaging, but I had some difficulty following the content of what was said – I imagine that finding actors who have that kind of facility with stylized language, as well as the ability to emotionally engage with it, is challenging. Regardless, I’m sold on this show, if only because I so fondly remember the writer’s previous work.
 
Skunkape Sexkult by Mother/Destroyer
 
I think that this guy probably made a mistake, in attempting to read all of the dialogue himself: vocally distinguishing multiple characters is something that even the most skilled actors struggle with, and I got lost in the muddle of characters he was interpreting. Regardless, there were several clever phrases that leapt out at me – “the heaving bosom of academia” is one that I recall off the top of my head. He seems to have an ear for that kind of comedy – if he has a cast that can back it up, and the ability to structure it within a script, he’ll probably have a good show.
 
10.10 Post 9-11: Laughter in the Aftermath by Adam Sharp
 
I’m actually really glad that I got to see these guys again, since my only previous exposure was sort of half-seeing them from the back during the Fringe-For-All, and what I saw there…really didn’t impress me, much. It was fast-paced, but largely seemed to be coasting on a single Bush-bashing joke, which really makes me roll my eyes in annoyance. This President seems to be well on his way to becoming a comic stock character for generations to come, a la Richard Nixon, and at this point that character is about as socially relevant as jokes about mimes and insurance salesmen. But! This piece pleased me much better – a Romeo-and-Juliet style parody of Middle-Eastern tensions, built on over-the-top racial stereotypes. I do with they’d pushed it further – I suggested they stick one of the actors in black-face – but it was a solid joke and solidly played. More like this, please.

Fringe-For-All 2008

Fringe-For-All was a pretty wild time, as usual: a packed house of enthusiastic theatregoers, and a rapid-fire smorgasboard of various categories of lunacy.

I didn’t get to see as much as I’d like this time around, since I was performing as part of two groups, one in the first half and one in the second — I saw several from the back, or in-between, or on my way to something else, but I don’t really think that it’s fair for me to try to provide any kind of reasonable analysis of them.

The six that closed out the first half, though, I feel comfortable dishing out an opinion on.

SHOW TITLE: JACK
COMPANY NAME: Eric Van Wyk
LOCATION: Mixed Blood Theatre
YOUTUBE CLIP: here
EVER SEEN BEFORE? Not to my recollection.

I’m a fan of both puppetry and faery-tales, and Jack the Giant-Killer has a special place near my heart. I have to confess that these three minutes didn’t leave a very strong impression. In his defense, this clearly wasn’t his audience — but I had a hard time visualizing exactly what his audience was. By far the high point were the long, uncomfortable gory death scenes — but I think I needed them to be pushed much further to constitute a worthwhile joke. The fart gags had me rolling my eyes, though the introduction of a living actor into the world of puppets was a cool gimmick — and one that it seems he could get a lot of mileage out of if played well.

I did, however, get to witness him again at another showcase in which I was both fascinated and entertained. So this could easily have been a fluke.

SHOW TITLE: How Does a Drug Deal Become a Decent 3rd Date?
COMPANY NAME: Green with Envy Productions
LOCATION: U of M Rarig Center Thrust
YOUTUBE CLIP: none available
EVER SEEN BEFORE? Not to my recollection.

This was a video clip sent in by a group of out-of-town performers, and I have to admit that it didn’t leave much of an impression, either. (Although there was one amusing gag in which an actress looked directly out into the camera to plug the show.) Previews of this nature are hard, are fucking hard, and this is one that seemed to sidestep the problem entirely by doing a preview about doing a preview for the show. The only problem is, it didn’t really convey any meaningful information to me about what their show was about, and I still don’t know any more than I would from reading their show description. So, kind of a wash.

SHOW TITLE: Robin Hood The Musical!
COMPANY NAME: Top Hat Theatre
LOCATION: U of M Rarig Center Proscenium
YOUTUBE CLIP: here
EVER SEEN BEFORE? Not to my recollection.

Robin Hood is one of the characters that’s been living far too long in my head. I’ve been compiling notes for an adaptation about his life for at least — four years now? That’s four years of picking apart the ballads and the various adaptations, and I have a very clear idea in my head of what my Robin Hood is like — which renders me totally incapable of rendering any kind of fair judgment. This one seems all wrong to me — he’s too sweet, too approachable. My Robin is fucking dangerous.

So it’s significantly to this company’s credit that, in spite of my ingrained prejudice, and in a mere three minutes, they thoroughly charmed me. I’m sure there are plenty of other critics with a much stronger musical background than me who can pick apart the technical aspects of their performance, but that doesn’t really interest me — I was impressed by the totally sincere, unironic, emotional engagement of both the performers. Performing something this unapologetically sweet in a snarky Fringe environment is a pretty goddamn bold move, although I don’t know to what degree the performers were aware of that.

So I’ll probably be sitting in the audience, struggling against a wildly variant interpretation to one that I’m prepared to accept. But I am going to make a big effort to be in the audience.

SHOW TITLE: HafenGeist
COMPANY NAME: Invocatio
LOCATION: Ritz Theater
YOUTUBE CLIP: here
EVER SEEN BEFORE? Not to my recollection.

And speaking of fantastic stories that I have an emotional history with — Hansel und Gretel is one of the first full-length shows I ever adapted and directed. I love the story, and I love its titular characters. The Grimm Brothers are famous for being, well, grim, but this is a story that’s uniquely gritty — in which the fantastic elements are grounded in some dismayingly realistic depictions of poverty.

This is a production that seems, on its surface, prepared to embrace those elements — one that doesn’t portray its heroes as cheerful, fat German kinder, but children in an intimidating world. The three performers had a…range of skill levels, to put it politely; but the underlying concept is an interesting one, and one that they seem prepared to commit to. So sign me up.

SHOW TITLE: The Chasm: Two Prevailing Winds of Gabriela Mistral
COMPANY NAME: Disquietude Theater Company
LOCATION: Ritz Theater
YOUTUBE CLIP: here
EVER SEEN BEFORE? Not to my recollection.

This is another dance group that suffered from a range of movement skills — perhaps more visibly here, since this was a piece that relied upon coordinated ensemble movement, more so than the story-driven movement of HafenGeist.

That’s the analytical approach. The personal approach is to say that I found this compelling stuff — but that’s largely because I find small, slight, powerful women, clothed in diaphanous, classical robes, to be fascinating possibly to the point of being a fetish. (This has caused me public embarrassment in previous years, to a point that I’m actually glad that some of the Fringe archives haven’t gone online yet.)

It may be a churlish reason to be interested in a production. But it’s an aesthetic I just can’t look away from.

(At least in this case, I’m reasonably certain that all the performers are over 18. Shudder.)

SHOW TITLE: The Gypsy and the General
COMPANY NAME: 3 Sticks
LOCATION: Theatre de la Jeune Lune
YOUTUBE CLIP: here
EVER SEEN BEFORE? Yes; I had the pleasure of witnessing their remarkable immigration satire Borderlines, as well as their contribution to Five Fifths of Wizard of Oz. I’m a fan.

I would be very surprised if this doesn’t turn out to be a Fringe hit. Actors rocketed onto the stage and rapidly shifted between a series of inventive object manipulations, to create a series of different environments. I have no idea what was going on, and I don’t care — it was pretty fucking cool.

As a speculative fiction geek, I usually find myself complaining about the dearth of fantasy in the Fringe world — if the few shows I was able to catch are any indication, this is a year that will please me mightily.

Vilification Tennis Fringe Previews

I’m cutting short my writing about the Twin Cities Improv Festival, because I’ve been a baaad blogger — way behind, and Fringe season is upon us. If you still need a fix, I know that Matt Everett has a piece about it coming out for MNArtists.org. Time for me to start catching up, though — I hit up Vilification Tennis on June 28th, and, hey! there were Fringe previews happening.

It was an odd environment for it — 3-5 minutes is a pretty abbreviated period of time in which to do much of anything. And especially with an audience that came to see dirty insult comedy, the leap to more theatrical entertainments is a weird one to make. Also, with the amount of time that’s passed between seeing the previews, and writing about them — one of the biggest tests is how many of them I can actually remember.

I have to confess, the first two haven’t left a terribly vivid impression two weeks later: The Fish, the Fruit and the Pet Coffee Maker and Skunkape Sexkult. Of the former, I have retained an image of a man in a lab coat and a woman, poised for some kind of gynecological examination; and a vague impression of jokes that seemed to hinge on my being shocked by them. Of the latter, an image of a man, deliberately repulsive in both speech and bearing, running with much the same schtick. Both groups seemed to be pulling a page out of the same playbook, perhaps because they were performing as part of a group as famously controversial as Vilification Tennis; but it’s hard to beat them at their own game, and I couldn’t find either particularly memorable.

Which I also feel bad about, because they’re the two groups with which I don’t have some pre-existing relationship. Michael Shaeffer was up next, promoting two shows: All Rights Reserved: A Libertarian Rage and Roofies in the Mochaccino. The former is mine, so I won’t say much about it — but I’m more than happy to promote his. He’s the former slam master of Minneapolis, and I saw his show in the 2005 Fringe — Tantrums, Testicles, and Trojans — no less than three times, repeatedly dragging back people who I thought needed to see it. There’s so much pressure to see as much as possible during the Fringe, seeing anything more than once is about the highest recommendation I can make — and he’s as good as he ever was. I’m not a fan because I’m working with him, I’m working with him because I’m a fan.

The last group is one that needs no assistance from me: Four Humors, promoting Mortem Capiendum in a preview that probably ran too long for an audience that didn’t come to see them, but nevertheless stood out because of its extraordinary performance polish. I’ve long been a fan of Nick Ryan’s writing, but it strikes me that he could easily have ended up becoming one of those artists who other artists like, but nobody ever really goes to see — if it weren’t for his collaboration with directors like Jason Ballweber, who layers the script with a slickness that makes them accessible to a mainstream crowd.

The latter two groups, I recommend wholeheartedly — the first two, I’ve seen too little of to say much of anything in one direction or the other. So here’s hoping I get the chance to catch them again before the Festival hits.