Stages: a Horror Play - Maximum Verbosity
A bickering brother and sister repeatedly awaken in strange scenarios to witness terrible things happening to each other. Why is this happening? Does it matter? Does anything? An expressionistic nightmare about anxiety, loss, madness, love, grief, and table salt.
"A single human intellect is irreplaceably unique. And the destruction of one? Hoo-boy."
I have followed phillip andrew bennett low and Maximum Verbosity on their long and winding Fringe journey since way back with their first Fringe outing in 2004 with Lokasenna (just a year after I started blogging about the Fringe), so I’m not likely to give up now. phillip is a writer whose love of and way with language never fails to dazzle and intrigue and delight me (#2 on my 2007 pre-Fringe Top Ten list). Mom was also a huge fan. And while neither of us normally seek out the creepy or unsettling horror side of the Fringe, if phillip was in charge, we were gonna be in the audience, because we knew we were in good hands - and could normally rely on any Maximum Verbosity production to give us plenty to mull over and discuss afterward. Heck, he quotes me from a past review so let’s just throw that on the pile:
Of previous horror from Maximum Verbosity, I say “It positively hums—high energy on a tight leash. It’s a bullet aimed at the dark corners of your brain...sharp as a razor. I marvel at how this thing was put together."
Blurbs from other critics in Indianapolis, Washington, and Chicago are also listed to back me up on that (see their More Information tab)
Be forewarned: there’s adult language, violence and death. But if it’s based on one of phillip’s stories, I’m always game to give it a try. I’ll just make sure I’ve got something light and fluffy scheduled for the next couple of slots in my schedule to take the edge off. His horror stories tend to get under my skin and linger there (which is, of course, the point).
Addendum: they had a Fringe preview
(You can click on the following links to see a set of links to the full Top 10 list, the Top 11-20 list, a list of returning favorites, and the full coverage of the 2022 Fringe on this blog.)
(Side note: Also during Fringe season, Minnesota has a primary election coming up on August 9th. Early voting options are currently available. You can also check out what's on your ballot ahead of time on the Minnesota Secretary of State website, as well as other voting services and information. In Minneapolis, not only do we have the Governor and Lt. Governor on the ballot, but there's our U.S. Congressional Rep., our MN State Senator, the MN Secretary of State and MN Attorney General, as well as our County Sheriff and County Attorney, and two members of the Minneapolis School Board. These are the people who decide what laws we live under and how they get enforced. These are the people who decide whether or not we have voting rights. These are the people who decide how our kids learn. This is how we change things. Personally, I'm alternately furious and despairing that my goddaughter and her little sister now have fewer rights over their own bodies than they did a month ago - there are things we can do, voting in the primary (and the general election) is one of them - here's a place you can go to do more.)
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