The joy and trouble for audiences is that we have to figure out how to navigate so much creativity. The festival opens tonight with an All-You-Can-Artist buffet, at the Dairy Center, where presenters will show off snippets of their work to the crowd. But what if you miss opening night? What's a festival-goer to do? See also: Davey B. Gravey's Little Movies on a Little Screen
For starters, browse the program online. But if you still need more direction, Westword checked in with the Fringe Fest director David Ortolano to learn the five events he's most excited about. In no particular order (after all, Fringe Fest snubs creative hierarchies), here they are:
5) Band of Toughs: I Miss My MTV "This award-winning, local theater company is an ensemble-based, do-it-yourself, mash-up theater. They have built a theater venue behind Trident in an empty warehouse. They made this very rough, rock-and-roll space into a theater," says Ortolano. Their performance I Miss My MTV explores the collision of images and sound in 1980s pop culture, moshing and the universal power of music. 4) Shirley Kirchmann "Experienced Fringe touring artist Shirley Kirchmann is bringing herself all the way from South Africa," says Ortolano. The artist will be presenting Deranged Dating, her story of finding herself single after seventeen years of serial monogamy and trying to figure out how to survive family pity, bizarre dates and a nightmare matchmaker. The absurdist performance mixes stand-up comedy with solo skits. Read on for more of the Fringe Fest director's picks.
