September 3–10, 1998

cover story

Fringe Binge

Sidebars:

Can the Fringe Festival keep growing and growing and still stay on the edge? What to look for in this year's bigger, wilder Fringe.

by David Warner

		National Stature: Nick Stuccio (left) and Conrad Bender inside the National Products Supply Co., being used for the first time this year as a venue for Fringe events photo: Sandor Welsh

What's Fringe? M

It's the overworked technician who turns a restaurant supply house into prime theater space.

It's the choreographer who discovers a week before opening that all his equipment has been stolen.

It's a critic telling a theater director at an out-of-the way venue, "People are never going to find this place."

And the Philadelphia Fringe, according to some, isn't Fringe at all.

But however you define it, Philadelphia's Fringe Festival (Sept. 9-19), the second annual Old City smorgasbord of "entertainment on the edge," shows no signs of suffering from a sophomore slump.

Growing pains, maybe.

Consider the numbers:

The Fringe has grown from five days to 11 in its second year, with 200 acts doing more than 500 shows of theater, dance, performance art, music, poetry—twice as many as 1997. That includes more than double the number of "headliners"—artists who were sought out by the festival—as well as an increase in the number of artists chosen through application and in the number of "self-producers" (artists who set up their own venues, fringing the Fringe).

Fringe shows will be staged everywhere in Old City from the Arden to the cavernous interior of the National Products Supply Company to streets, alleyways and parking lots. The festival has a visual arts component this year, too, with painters, sculptors and conceptual artists enlivening such mundane objects as pay phones and billboards. There's also Fringe action as far away as the Annenberg Center and St. Stephen's Alley, so it seems only a matter of time before the festival takes over the entire city.

But not without a struggle. One recent evening in the Fringe staff's tiny office, Producing Director Nick Stuccio talked on the phone to the director of publicity, Diane Eacret, confirming the above numbers.

"That's insane," he said, smiling ruefully. "We're insane." At Eacret's prompting he added, "And the crux of the insanity is we have the same size staff."

Christine Barbush (who replaced Carrie Stavrakos as managing director), Deborah Block (program director) and Conrad Bender (technical director) make up the rest of the staff—same size as when City Paper labeled them the Fringetastic Five last year. A box office manager, Greg Gephart, has been added, which suggests that one of 1997's most intractable problems—ticketing—will be less confusing this year. But the fact is, a festival that's twice as big is twice as much work.

		Left Hanging: Thieves stole the hammocks Erick Schoeffer was going to use for Strung (above). If you can help, contact The Fringe at 413-9006

The toughest burden may be Bender's. Last year he was responsible for technical matters in 60 Fringe-produced shows; this year he's helming 100. (He's had to take time off from his new job on the Convention Center tech staff to be able to do the Fringe.) The biggest demands come from the headliners, whose shows often pose extraordinary technical challenges. Amsterdam's Griftheater, for instance, needs 10 projectors; Bender has to procure them. Producionnes Imperdibles, the Spanish troupe, was still waiting to hear if the Fringe had tracked down six motorized winches—the performers don't want to have to explain to customs why their baggage includes six motors. (And then there's the matter of visas, still not quite ironed out a week before the company was due to arrive.)

Naturally, expenses have grown, too. Last year's Fringe cost a mere $110,000, and even brought in a small profit, thanks in part to the $40,000 worth of tickets sold. This year's budget is close to $300,000, which includes $30,000 for the 11 headliners; they're each paid a flat fee, while artists chosen through the application process are compensated according to box office proceeds, of which they receive 70 percent. Both groups receive full technical support from the Fringe.

The festival, which received its official non-profit tax designation only last December, has already raised two thirds of that $300,000. They've brought in new corporate sponsors like Fox Philadelphia (joining returnees like City Paper and the Philadelphia Weekly) and scored an impressive uptick in foundation funding: Independence Foundation bumped up support from $15,000 to a three-year grant of $150,000; William Penn went from $30,000 to $85,000.

And, for the first time, the Fringe won a grant ($5,850) from the Philadelphia Cultural Fund, the city's funding mechanism for arts organizations.

Stuccio hopes to sell at least $60,000 and maybe as much as $90,000 in tickets. The trick is to lure audiences into the shows they've never heard of, like headliner Da Da Kamera (starring the reputedly dazzling Scottish actor/playwright Daniel MacIvor), as well as the performances by local favorites—like Brat Productions' 24-hour Bald Soprano marathon. Unknowns, whether hometowners or out-of-towners, would do well to take a promotional clue or two from Brat's Madi DiStefano, who managed to get a New York Times plug last month for Soprano's premiere at the NYC Fringe, and who was profiled herself in last Sunday's Philadelphia Inquirer Magazine.

For the self-producers, the Fringe offers great exposure and great risk; you don't have to pay part of your ticket proceeds to the Fringe, but you do have to take on your own rental and equipment costs. Dancer/choreographer Eric Schoefer, who helped devise the original idea for the Philly Fringe, scored one of the hits of last year's festival with Icarus, which he self-produced with SCRAP Performance Group. This year he is hoping to repeat that success with Strung, despite a major setback: someone made off with the rope-climbing harnesses and hammocks he's using in the choreography.

That's definitely not the kind of adventure Fringe participants are looking for. But adventure remains the key for audiences—stumbling into a show you have absolutely no expectations about and discovering it's wonderful, or at least wonderfully weird. The Philly Fringe removes some of the chanciness by doing bookings and adjudications, but with so much to see (plus the presence of the self-produced acts, who haven't gone through any weeding-out process) the Philly Fringe is pretty much a joyous crapshoot—a great big grab bag.

		Home Trip: Monica Favand returns with L.A. company TRIP Dance Theatre

However, there are other Fringe festivals in the land who think that Philly's Fringe doesn't even deserve to use the name—that by using a panel of jurors to select acts, Philly's festival is committing Fringe heresy. The judging process, they claim, violates the spirit of the original festival in Edinburgh, Scotland—where a tribe of artists shut out of the city's big International Arts Festival in 1947 held their own festival on the "fringe" of the big event, allowing anyone in who could find a space to perform. Never mind that the Edinburgh Fringe grew to become the largest arts festival in the world and now is very much about quality control. It's that original burst of DIY fervor that the Seattle Fringe wants to preserve; the first Fringe Festival in the United States when it was founded in 1991, it operates on a first come, first served basis, producing just about everyone who applies. According to Kibby Munson, acting executive director of the Seattle Fringe, U.S. festivals may someday do what the Canadians have done—join together in a formal association and trademark the word Fringe. And if a U.S. organization were to be formed, Munson says it's quite likely members would force Philly (and New York, which also adjudicates) to relinquish the name Fringe.

"She really said that?" said Stuccio when informed of Munson's prediction. But he's heard rumblings of discontent from the Fringe purists before. Even if there were some kind of purge, Philly's festival seems poised to continue, no matter what it calls itself. For the city's various performing arts communities, the Fringe has become a fact of life, the elephant in the living room you ignore at your peril.

For instance, just about every contemporary dancer and dance company in the city is performing during the Fringe; the Fringe is virtually the fall dance season. And the festival's not just for struggling newcomers. Among the Fringe theater offerings are shows starring veteran actors like Hazel Bowers and Ceal Phelan (in Pianosa Group's Talking Heads) and Philadelphia favorites like Pearce Bunting and Maggie Siff (in the Big House production of Samuel Beckett's Endgame, directed by Mark Lord; see this week's Noises Off column for an inside-the trashcan view on this production).

From some perspectives, the growth of the Fringe can be something of a headache: theater and dance organizations must plan schedules and casting around the festival, and the press grumbles that there's just too much to cover (and why can't the Fringe be scheduled at a time of year other than the fall, when so many of the city's leading theaters are opening shows?).

Indeed, the sheer number of attractions can be daunting; on Saturday night Sept. 19 between 8 and 9, for instance, there are more than 20 to choose from, ranging from Dancers of the PA Ballet to A Huey P. Newton Story. (Check the official Fringe schedule inserted in this week's City Paper for complete info on curtain times, venue addresses, ticket policies.)

To help you navigate, City Paper will review selected shows in coming weeks, and at the end of the fest CP critics will summarize what they liked best and least. But for now, here's a guide to the kinds of entertainment in the offing, the trends, the buzz, and a few glimpses at the individuals making it all happen. Because finally what makes this festival thrilling—and what makes it still as Fringey as ever—is that it's driven, not by RPACs or Avenues or other grand plans, but by the artists' need to create and the audience's need to see them in the act of creation.

		Old City Road Rage: Daniel Abse and Pearce Bunting in Parking

Change of Venues

Though there's not a big increase in the number of performance venues this year, the new additions to the list have stirred anticipation—none more so than the National Products Company Showroom at 113-131 N. Second St. With its orange tile facade, streamlined chrome logo and vast interior space, the showroom has begged for some kind of dramatic use ever since National went bust in 1996. Linda Levin, daughter of company founder Harry Caplen, owns the showroom as well as other big chunks of Old City property, and gave the Fringe a sweet rental deal last season on a warehouse that was used for dance performances. But the showroom wasn't made available till this year.

Inside, the office wing looks almost untouched, with product catalogues, Outstanding Dealer plaques and the glass-walled executive chamber (complete with motorized drapes) still intact. The public won't get to see the inner sanctum, however; performances will take place in a space behind the main showroom, a supermarket-size expanse which will serve as the lobby. With its cantaloupe-and-gold paint scheme, faux bronze light fixtures and Customer Service Booth, the interior strikes an oddly period tone somewhere between Art Deco and '70s High Tack. "It's like Darrin Stephens worked here," says Stuccio, which makes it the perfect ambience for Madi DiStefano's "Nick at Nite on acid" vision for Bald Soprano.

The other show being done here, Griftheater's Cinema Blanc, is not quite as obvious a fit—even though the performance area is a high-ceilinged 35x60 feet, it's the smallest space the Dutch company's ever worked in. But the environment should prove eerily correct for Griftheater's intimate cinematic style, in which actors tell stories through the manipulation of screens, projectors and their own bodies.

Another important new Fringe venue is Arden's Haas mainstage (referred to as the Fox Philadelphia stage during the Fringe), further connecting one of the city's most successful mainstream theaters with the scruffier festival that surrounds it. (The Fringe box office is located in Arden-owned space adjacent to the theater lobby.) Big Mess Theatre's Greg Giovanni, who established a relationship with the Arden when he appeared in their recent production of A Midsummer Night's Dream, will stage his latest, The Ixiondae, on the Fox stage—no doubt the glossiest environs a Big Mess extravaganza has ever enjoyed.

And still the Fringiest of all, perhaps, is Smoke, photographer Jim Graham's chocolate factory turned photo studio/performance funhouse. Located just north of the Ben Franklin Bridge at 233 N. Bread St. (accessible only from New Street between Second and Third), it served as memorable backdrop to Icarus and DJ Spooky last season, and will (God willing) be home to Schoefer's Strung. But the interior's quite a bit changed from last year; construction's in progress for a network of offices and studios, and two productions—Endgame and the New Paradise Laboratories' intriguing riff on James Bondism, Gold Russian Finger Love—will be housed in the previously unvisited (perhaps you'll see why) basement. (Also note the adjacent Unbound Dance Studios in the former Slossberg Auction House at 232 N. Second St.; yet another Linda Levin-owned property, it's been transformed into a spiffy new dance space thanks to Conrad Bender and company.)

Two other venues, while not new as performance spaces, have taken on a new identity, and that identity's markedly queer. Lamp designer Warren Muller, maskmaker Michael Biello and Biello's musical theater partner Dan Martin have teamed to self-produce a series of gay and lesbian performers in Muller & Biello's Third Street atelier (used last year for the Fringe), which they're calling Q Street. And the Christ Church Neighborhood House venue has been renamed the Legacy Stage, thanks to the sponsorship of the Delaware Valley Legacy Fund, which raises money for gay and lesbian organizations through donation and bequest. Expect most of the artists at the Legacy Stage to have something of interest to say to gay and lesbian audiences, but don't assume the performers themselves are queer; gay male hearts stopped en masse recently when it was learned that very popular nude saxophonist Dan Froot, returning for another engagement with partner Dan Dorfman, is, alas, straight (albeit unconcerned about appearing otherwise).

Among self-producing venues, none has a more eclectic mix than Break Even Productions' eclectic lineup at Jake & Oliver's (see a.d. amorosi's sidebar). And one more promising new addition to the festival: a nightly late-show cabaret at Helena's restaurant at Front and Chestnut, hosted by recently married Melanie Stewart Dance Theatre stars Nina Kareis and Pete Livingstone, a Danish chanteuse and Scottish composer/performer. Edinburgh's Fringe Club is a headquarters for after-theater revelry, artist networking and surprise stage appearances by Fringe stars; let's hope Helena's will generate the same sort of creative ferment.

The Great Outdoors

The most exciting action in this year's Fringe may take place en plein air. There seems to be a marked increase in shows that take audiences on a journey through the back alleyways of Old City—the Brick Playhouse's murder and mayhem tour, Dead End; Cut & Paste Performance Group's The Beaten Path (billed as "a voyeur's view of life on the streets"); Theatre O's BAU.NDARI,Z, featuring nine brides from Greek tragedies screaming through "the streets of the city."

Then there are the big outdoor shows like Theatre SKAM's Zastrozzi. The SKAM team scored a hit in last year's Fringe with a two-man show inside a parked car by the Quarry Street Cafe. This year the Canadian troupe has graduated from car to parking lot, staging George F. Walker's popular melodrama on a lot and loading dock opposite Elfreth's Alley with a highly physical 11-member cast.

Also be on the lookout for some of Philly's best actors to pop up where you least expect them: Barbara Pinto and Jane Moore on a park bench at Fifth and Arch in a play called The Oldest Profession; Frank X and Harry Philibosian in Theatre Exile's Frankenharry Plays, a series of short outdoor sequels to last year's hilarious Death and Taxes; and Pearce Bunting, John Lumia, Joe Canuso and Daniel Abse in Rat Bastard Productions' Parking. Offering proof that the parked-car genre is not dead, this one involves a fierce argument over a parking space that may seem all too familiar to anyone who's ever tried to snare a spot in Old City on a Friday night.

And look for the aptly named Madmen in the lot next to Lucy's Hat Shop on Market Street; that's where they'll be doing their original adaptation of Melville's Bartleby the Scrivener.

A Multitude In One

Lawton Lawton Bunting Bunting & Lawton: no, it's not a law firm, but this kind of versatility ought to be illegal (ba-dump bump). Versatile actors Tony Lawton and Pearce Bunting are outdoing themselves in this year's Fringe: Bunting, besides doing Endgame and Parking, is also in The Ixiondae. Lawton's in four shows (Bald Soprano, Pinter's Briefs, The Great Divorce and One for the Road), as well as emceeing a new Fringe feature, the Sly Cry Scream Contest.

Then there are the performers who play multiple roles all in one evening: Da Da Kamera's MacIvor; Mark Pinkosh in Starving Artists Theatre Co.'s Road Movie, a critical hit in last year's Fringe; Sharon Hayes' The Lesbian, in which she plays seven characters gleaned from visits across the U.S. to more than 700 lesbians; and "delusional diva" R. Sky Palkowitz's "collage of humanity." Then there's Argentinian, Amsterdam-based Kris Niklison, who searches through piles of clothing, trying on identities (and genders) as she goes, in M/F. Who needs a theater company when your imagination contains a cast of thousands?

Very Kinky Girls (And Boys)

It wouldn't be Fringe without a guy who shoves nails up his nose, now would it? See him if you dare in Sideshow Bennie's Carnival of Wonders at the Quarry Street Cafe. And for thrills of a more sensual nature (although, hey, I'm not saying nails up your nose isn't sensual), try Mistress Ecstasy's Erotic Circus, performed by Marjorie Conn, and Cordax: The Fine Art of Fantasy, presented by Fetishes Boutique at the Khyber "in the spirit of ritual sexual provocation."

Dance Dance Dance

Why does the fall dance season seem a little meagre? Maybe because everybody's shooting their wad in the Fringe. Check out the lineup of locals: Melanie Stewart Dance Theatre, Headlong Dance Theatre, SCRAP, Anne-Marie Mulgrew, Grace Mi-He Lee and Mohan Sikka, Trapezius, Tap Team Two, Paul Struck and Paule Turner (as the two Di's, Princess and Ross), Nichole Canuso, Nicole Cousineau, Roko Kawai and David Forlano, Sheila Zagar, Paula Diehl, Myra Bazell, Josie Smith, Leah Stein (she'll be choreographing Chant in a parking lot on New Street). Plus there's the fascinating Merce Cunningham-esque collaboration between choreographer Kevin O'Day and dancers of the PA Ballet; the interaction of local and out-of-town talent in The Field Exchange; divine diva Richard Move in his homage to Martha Graham; the investigations of traditional dance forms like Appalachian clogging, capoeira, Indian dance, flamenco and the tarantella; intriguing visitors like Snappy Dance Theater and Ponto Facto; and the welcome returns of local heroines Asimina Chremos, Monica Favand (with TRIP Dance Theatre), and Heidi Weiss and Jennifer Mann.

Land O' Lorca

Two companies take inspiration from the life of Spanish poet/playwright Federico Garcia Lorca. The Pig Iron Theatre Company has already introduced audiences to each of the short plays in its Lorca Cycle ; during the Fringe, they'll present all three in succession for the first time. Producionnes Imperdibles' Lorca play, Un Poeta en Nueva York, is marked by stunning special effects. At least that's what Joe Canuso, his wife Trish Kelly and Pearce Bunting (yeah, him again) reported back to Nick Stuccio after they saw Imperdibles perform in Seville, Spain, and their enthusiasm helped bring the company to the United States. Now if Kelly can only find those winches…

Enough Said

Finally, a selection from my favorite Fringe press releases, in the artists' own words:

"The spirit of Sheetrock, Warrior Princess is roused and begins The Sacrifice of the Fatted Male Virgin…" (Edgar Allen & the Poettes at the Fringe Cabaret)

"30 shapely minutes of silence punctuated by an odd assortment of fluids…" (Mark Booth at the Legacy Stage)

"Gratuitous wordplay and a psychotic hand puppet…" (Clark & Powell at LockJaw Gallery)

"Attempts to capture the overdecorated, deliciously sticky but precise presentation of certain Middle European desserts" (Philip Grosser at Unbound Dance House)

"A short kabuki-esque piece featuring a 15-pound dead fish…" (Michelle Lynn at Q Street)

Depending on your mood, these descriptions may drive you screaming in an opposite direction or running giddily to the box office.

Either way, that's Fringe.