Sunday, July 26, 2020

Fringe 2020 - Virtual Fringe - Nightly Fringe 2 - Friday, July 31

Just one slot on Friday, 7/31

7:30pm - FringeMiss (an artist-led fundraiser telethon for the Minnesota Fringe Festival)

Described as "a live fundraising event to help raise funds for our beloved Minnesota Fringe. The event will feature amazing hosts, short acts from past Minnesota Fringe artists, and an online auction. Our goal is to reach $10,000 to help save the Minnesota Fringe."

The group name is Adventurous Artists, a banner under which a whole host of really first-rate Fringers are banding together for a good cause in this two hour slot from 7:30 to 9:30pm.

Live hosts: Allison Witham, Duck Washington, and Shanon Custer  (honestly, these three people have created and performed so many fantastic Fringe shows - and theater outside the Fringe year round as well, I'd be willing to watch only those three riffing for two hours, but then there's the roster of acts as well...)

Blackout Improv
(They were tops on my pre-Fringe top 10 list in 2017 and delivered a hell of show, just like they always do.  Some of the best improvisors in the Twin Cities, which is a couple of cities full of great improvisers.)

Domino D'Lorian, Michael McKitt, and Ian McCarthy (aka, The Stoopidity Collective)
(If you didn't see these guys in last year's Fringe with their award-winning show Stoopidity, you really missed something amazing.  At the time I tweeted about the show: "best thing I saw today; mix of scenes, spoken word, movement, rap, w/drag show thrown in at the end, great performances to match material; hard to summarize."  They were right near the top of my pre-Fringe Top 10 list last year, and they exceeded all my very high expectations.  I'm so glad they're part of this fundraiser so people get another chance to see them at work.)

Hit the Lights
(crazy talented live-action, music and shadow puppetry performers responsible for recent Fringe hits like 2017's Dungeon, and 2018's Fringe/Family Fringe double feature, Whales and Horsetale)

Oncoming Productions
(doing the Fringe horror thing, which isn't always my bag, but I know some of the artists involved, and they do great, creepy work in this genre, including last year's avenging space ghost story, Geminae, which was later also was part of the 2019 Twin Cities Horror Festival)

SAATH (formerly Bollywood Dance Scene)
(Another Fringe hitmaker, they've also got their own slot in the Nightly Fringe kicking off Saturday 8/1 as well)

Somerville Productions
(First Fringe show out of the gate for them in 2018 was the huge hit Not Fair, My Lady - which was the kickoff show to Mom's and my last Fringe together, not that we knew that at the time.  It was fantastic, and we weren't the only ones that thought so.   And they had another hilarious hit last year with Size.)

The Winding Sheet Outfit
(produced venue-stuffing, award-winning Fringe hits three years running (The Memory Box of the Sisters Fox, Blood Nocturne, and You Are Cordially Invited to the Life and Death of Edward Lear) that were so popular you might not have been able to get a ticket to get in to see them - well, here's one of several chances to correct that - other work by Winding Sheet is also on the Digital Hub the entirety of the festival for your viewing pleasure, details on that later)

Great entertainment, great cause.  Two hours well spent in our virtual theater world.


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