Fringe Fort Myers announces 2020 line-up of performances
The Alliance for the Arts, in partnership with the Broadway Palm Dinner Theatre, will present the first ever Fringe Fort Myers Festival April 22 – 26, 2020 featuring 48 genre-defying performances on four different stages. Festival tickets go on sale January 2020.
Fringe Fort Myers is the newest Fringe theater festival in the United States and maintains long-standing Fringe traditions of being 100 percent uncensored, 100 percent unjuried and 100 percent inclusive. Even better, 100 percent of ticket sales go directly to the artists.
Out of 32 entries, 16 artists were selected at random, with 6 local performers, 6 state performers and 4 national and international performers winning berths.
Fringe Fort Myers kicks off on April 22, 2020 with the fun and frenetic Teaser Show. The teaser show is a great opportunity for audiences to learn what the shows in the festival are about. Each performance group gets 3 minutes to sell their show to the audience, and how they do it is up to them.
Over the next 4 days, Fort Myers will play host to 48 performances on 4 different stages at the Alliance for the Arts and Broadway Palm Dinner Theatre. After the final curtain, Fringe Fort Myers will host its first Fringe awards ceremony celebrating the artists that make Fringe an incredible experience.
Florida Rep Education will also offer Kids Fringe, which will operate a family-friendly festival within Fringe Fort Myers.
And here’s the 2020 line up:
- Choose Your Own Variety Show by George Gilbert (Fort Myers, Florida) – Welcome to the world’s only variety show where the audience and fate combine to write the show on spot! Spin the wheel of destiny, and watch as magic and circus jump out of the wheel and come to life before your very eyes! Each act has a story and every show is different, but one thing is for sure: there will be danger, there will be magic, and there will be non-stop thrills and excitement!
- Sketch Comedy by Comedy Asylum (Fort Myers, Florida) – Sketch comedy with adult themes, improvisation and naughty puppets. Their specialty is corrupting childhood icons like The Hundred Acre Hood and The Wizard of Oz. They also have topical humor like My Fair Hooker, Dope Hospice, and the Good ‘Ol Boy Scouts.
- Welcome to My Soul by Derek Lively (Bonita Springs, Florida) – Set in an underground nightclub, a performance artist (who wishes he could be a stand-up comic) takes us through a series of characters who he has met through his travels as well as members of his family. The performance artist has a cathartic experience because this show is unlike any other that he has performed.
- Eat The Apple by Alyce Bochette (Fort Myers, Florida) – What was your definition of a life well lived? A small company of experienced dance performers will capture the audience through thought-provoking movement and sound inviting all on a journey of self discovery. When push comes to shove, for what will you be remembered?
- Earthshine by Kat Epple (Fort Myers, Florida) – Live music in collaboration with dance, projection art, lasers, and/or spoken word to explore the healing, beauty, fragility, and future of the Earth and performed by Emmy Award Winning artist, Kat Epple.
- How We Show Up, Singing About the Dark Times by James Brock (Fort Myers, Florida) – A fragmented original play, with a mix of spoken word, music, song, and movement. The play celebrates the power and agency of being visible, with the attendant responsibilities of showing up, being present, against all of that which tries to render those on the margins silent and invisible. (“It’s It’s likely that the content may not be suitable for children–mostly because it would bore them to death. I am pretty sure, though, that moderately educated house pets will love it,” touts Brock.)
- Old Fart by Tim Bourgard (Canada) – Hilarious, touching and fun. Old Tom is the Old Fart. He takes you through the joys and challenges of living long, laughing hard and loving deeply. He’ll make you laugh, bring a tear to your eye and put a song to your heart. Bet you’ll sing along when he strums on his ukulele.
- Nazis and Me by David Lawson (Astoria, New York) – Nazis and Me is a one-man show about Lawson’s run-ins with hate set in a time where hateful Americans feel a strong sense of comfort: Right now.
- Deep In Bear Country by Philip Gonzales (Minneapolis, Minnesota) – Phil Gonzales presents his ridiculously close analysis of Stan and Jan Berenstain’s Berenstain Bears children’s books. He has investigated, picked apart, theorized and speculated about Bear Country, its denizens, its history and its meaning. Was any of this called for? No. Is it fair to do this to a rather innocuous series of children’s books? Maybe? Has it changed Phil’s outlook on life, art, family, community and legacy? Definitely.
- Sexpert: Madame K! by Krista Komondor (New York, New York) – A wildly interactive solo comedy show that probes everything from excessive male masturbation to enhancing women’s pleasure. Madame Komondor’s completely unscientific sex rant skewers traditional values while exposing the effects of pornography on love and the female orgasm. Madame strips away the fourth wall to teach, answer audience questions, and invite members to the stage to explore examples of consent, cat calling, and most importantly, how to properly lick and suck a mango.
- Pardon My French! by Tangi Colombel (Palm Beach, Florida) – Pardon My French! is an unorthodox French Cabaret Show, in English. A one-of-a-kind performance with classic Parisian songs, Gallic humor and just the right amount of jokes that will make you blush.… it’s unusual, different, exotic!
- Mom In Transition by Elyssa Rosen (Delray Beach, Florida) – When a baby boomer mom finds out her millennial son is now her daughter, she tries everything short of mind control to stop this from happening to her normal life. Accepting her daughter is fraught with pronoun errors and confusion until mom sees the light in the H&M dressing room. This journey takes the audience through a mother’s neuroses filled with guilt, repentance and most of all humor and love.
- The Light Bringer by Laila Lee (Tampa, Florida) – Freedom, but at what cost? A Palestinian immigrant and her family find more freedom in the US than expected. A true-life one-woman show, Laila brings to light her experiences growing up Muslim in the South, and how she discovers her own place in the world and what sacrifices she must make.
- Anna and the Sea by Shawnmarie Stanton (Bradenton, Florida) – With Sea Turtle as her companion, actor, singer, songwriter, and solo performer Shawnmarie Stanton embodies over a dozen characters on this lighthearted journey through evolutionary biology. Musical mystery and vertebrate history – a winning combination!
- Being Mark Twain by Alan Kitty (Nokomis, Florida) – Being Mark Twain addresses the question “What would it be like to be Mark Twain in the 21st Century? To learn the answer, Kitty transforms himself onstage while relating his 21st century experiences in a style reminiscent of Twain’s humor, satire and irony.
- Drunk Magic by Colin Smith (Orlando, Florida) – Drunk Magic is a comedy magic show where the each time an audience volunteer is brought up, everyone on stage takes a shot of tequila. From straight jackets to cutting audience volunteers in half the show is as insane as it sounds.
Sponsorship opportunities are available at ArtInLee.org/Fringe or by contacting Jessica Wisdom at Jessica@ArtInLee.org.
For more information, call 239-939-2787 or visit ArtInLee.org/Fringe.
December 16, 2019.