7th Annual Houston Fringe Festival
Contact:
Mollie Miller
mollie@freneticore.net
(832)649-2096
www.freneticore.net
www.houstonfringefestival.org
Dates: September 24-28, 2014
Locations: Frenetic Theater, 5102 Navigation Boulevard, Houston TX 77011
The Barn, 2201 Preston Street, Houston TX 77003
Super Happy Fun Land, 3801 Polk, Houston, TX, 77003
Tickets: $10 per individual performance/ $45 5 show pass/ $80 10 show pass/ $90 All festival pass.
Purchase tickets at https://freneticore.secure.force.com/ticket.
For more information please visit www.houstonfringefestival.org.
The 2014 Houston Fringe Festival is a 5-day performance feast celebrating the finest in fringe art-making. This year marks the lucky seventh anniversary of the Houston Fringe; the festival runs September 24-28 at Frenetic Theater, the Barn, and Super Happy Fun Land. All venues are located in the heart of Houston’s culturally diverse East End. The 2014 Houston Fringe Festival will feature the best independent theatre, film, dance, music, and visual arts through twenty unique and cutting-edge shows. Performers include recognized talent from across the state of Texas, as well as out-of-state participants from Louisiana, Indiana, and Quebec.
The Fringe line-up features veteran performers alongside visionary newcomers working in variety of disciplines ranging from thought-provoking one-woman shows and comedically-tinged burlesque revues, to insightful dramatic theater and stunning contemporary dance. Other featured genres include circus acts, comedy shows, experimental music, and improv theater. Each Fringe show has been curated to ensure a high-quality theatrical experience. Audiences can expect to be excited, shocked, provoked, delighted, and, most importantly, entertained. Each work is between 15 minutes and 1 hour in length. Shows that are less than 1 hour will be paired with shorter works so that each ticket ensures a full slot of fringey performance art.
Look out for more information about other upcoming Fringe Happenings at Frenetic Theater, including the Press Peek on September 24, FringeKIDS, Fringe Benefête on September 27, and the closing night performance, ‘Anything Goes’ on September 28.
Other Fringe Happenings:
September 24-28 The Visual Arts Exhibit at Frenetic Theater will be on display every day of the festival and features work by Yamin Cespedes, Steven Trimble, Moe Profane, BeJay Davis, Brandon Zech, Anahit Burke, Hillaree Hamblin, Marine Kojanyan, Claire Lake, Jessica Jacobi, John Moon, Domokos Benczedi, Alexandra Kontromaite. Curated by Bret and Rachel Harmeyer.
Press Peek September 24 at 7:00pm – Press and public are invited to view short excerpts from a selection of Houston Fringe Festival performances. This free evening of snippets on the Frenetic Theater Fringe Benefits Patio will serve as a kick-off for the festival and opening of the HFF visual art exhibit.
FringeKIDS September 27 at 12:00pm – The first annual FringeKIDS festival is joining forces with LibroFEST for an afternoon of presentations by authors, arts activities, and performances by Andy Roo & The Rooniverse, FrenetiCore Dance and Tish Hinojosa at Flores Neighborhood Library.
Fringe Benefête September 27 at 9:30pm – Party with the performers and producers of the Houston Fringe Festival at the outdoor Fringe Benefits Patio after a day of outrageous performances!
Anything Goes September 28 at 7:00pm – Fast-paced, over-the-top works from any and all disciplines by Houston’s best performance artists will close out the festival at Frenetic Theater. Performances by A Dance Collective, Ayo the Poet, Diana Bailey, Jessica Brown, Dorianne Castillo, Catalina Molnari, Nicolay Dance Works, Michael Stinson, Jadd Tank and more.
2014 sponsors of the Houston Fringe Festival include The Naked Grape, A Wee Publishing Company, Real Ale Brewing Company and Karbach Brewing Company.
B.L.K. Gurls ~n~ W.H.T. Boiz: Singin’ ‘bout Gawd! – Jhon Stronks & Jasmine Hearn
Rated R – 60 minutes
9/24 9:30pm & 9/25 8:00pm @ The Barn
An evening of solo and duet performances by choreographers Jasmine Hearn and jhon r. stronks. B.L.K.~n~W.H.T. is a ritual for spiritual reconciliation. A guided meditation through the fluidity of gender and race revealing the community of acceptance shared between these two artists. For more information on the show visit http://www.thereinthesunlight.com/B.L.K.%20~%20N%20~%20W.H.T.html.
Jasmine Hearn is a native Houstonian, graduated from Point Park University with her B.A. in Dance. She currently lives in Pittsburgh. Jasmine currently moves with the Staycee Pearl dance project (PGH), Marjani Forte (NYC) and anonymous bodies (PHIL). Her choreography has premiered in the Pittsburgh area.
jhon r. stronks is often accused of presenting his audiences with seemingly disobedient work that behaves according to its own sanity. Stronks’ passion for giving address to the gaps between what is perceived and what is present, lands his work somewhere between a cry for personal consciousness and a plea for social justice.
BLACK – Good Dance Since 1984
Rated PG – 60 minutes
9/25 9:30pm & 9/26 6:30pm @ The Barn
Black the color of coal, ebony, outer space, the darkest color, resulting in the absence of or complete absorption of light. Good Dance Since 1984’s representation of Black will take you to a place heavily soiled with color, culture, and charisma. A compilation of works will examine contrasting differences amongst mammals in captivity, relationships, and a celebration of the Mardi Gras Indians. Black presents grace, strength, and athleticism, which will be both captivating and dynamic.
Good Dance Since 1984 is a multi-faceted dance company that represents grace, poise, power, athleticism, strength, and most of all, art at its finest. Director/Choreographer Donna Crump is a native New Orleanian. Her extensive career has included engagements in New York, Brazil, Zimbabwe and South Africa, and her dance company regularly performs in festivals across the United States. She received the Big Easy Tribute to Classical Arts Award for Outstanding Choreography New Work (2013) and Outstanding Modern Dance Presentation (2014) and Modern Dance in 2012 and 2014. Our belief is that dance starts with a feeling, ends with an action, and lives in the soul.
Photo by Jafar M. Pierre.
Borrowed Ideas and Forgotten Bits – Lori Yuill
Rated PG13 – 50 minutes
9/24 8:00pm & 9/25 11:00pm @ The Barn
Borrowed Ideas and Forgotten Bits exists in four parts: Obstacle Course, Senses, Flip Book, and Snap Shot. Throughout the piece the audience will take a journey through the roles of actor/dancer, active viewer, director, photographer, and may even be asked to be a part of the set. Having worked with a number of artists over the years choreographer Lori Yuill finds that their ideas and processes sometimes appear unintended in the movement that she makes. In this piece Lori embraces the idea that all things new come from something old and excavates her movement memories for engaging bits of information.
Lori Yuill, choreographer, grew up without noticing her sense of smell until she spent a summer in North Carolina and the scent of the Magnolia trees came alive. She likes movement that is muscular yet flowy and her favorite color is green…or maybe it is really pink.
Brian Buck, media and set designer, is a movement based media artist who loves to move counter clockwise. He often recalls the scent of roses wafting in the air at his first apartment. Romanticizing the color of his wife’s green eyes, his work is inspired by dance.
Abby Flowers, mover, loves the many smells that accompany a long hike, especially after a rain shower. She enjoys moving athletically, constantly shifting between being on the floor and her feet. Her favorite color is definitely green.
Tati Vice, mover, grew up in Brazil and loved to spend summer holidays at her grandma’s, where the smell of food, coffee and rain forever invaded her skin. She likes to move with the flow and her favorite colour depends very much on her mood. She is not a very moody person.
Cafe Red
Rated PG13 – 45 minutes
9/28 @ 3:00pm @ Frenetic Theater Patio
Cafe Red is supposed to be a place where art can exist for art’s sake, but the outside world keeps interfering. The young artists must confront its judgments and prejudices. Cafe Red is a unique, immersive, immediate piece of theatre created by the actors/playwrights, all juniors and seniors at the High School for the Performing and Visual Arts. Through performance poetry, music and rap, monologues, scenes, movement, and a live social experiment in which the audience participates, these emerging artists explore the micro-aggressions and other forms of discrimination they encounter on a daily basis.
Chris Bennett is a senior at The Houston High School for Performing and Visual Arts, where he has appeared in Too Much Light Makes The Baby Go Blind, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Dream Girls, and An Ideal Husband. Upon graduation, Chris hopes to obtain a BFA in Film & Television Production in order to continue his education in acting. Chris wants to thank both his parents for letting him pursue his dreams and especially his mother for constantly pushing him for greatness. Let go and let ART.
Jazmine Blas is a musical theatre student at HSPVA. She is 17 years old and is currently a senior. She hopes you enoy Cafe Red!
Jade Jackson is a senior from HSPVA. She has received acting training all four years from her high school.
Raven Moore is a senior theatre student at HSPVA. Her performance credits include genres from All In the Timing to The Importance of Being Earnest. She’s excited to perform at the Fringe Festival and wants to thank Troy Scheid for bringing Cafe Red to life!
Joi Pierre is a senior at The High School for Performing and Visual Arts were she studies theatre. She is so excited to be performing Cafe Red again.
Kaylin Smith is a senior at HSPVA and has been studying theatre since she was in Elementary School! She hopes everyone enjoys the show!
Troy Scheid, an HSPVA graduate, is a theatre director and educator. Her work has been seen at Main Street Theater, Texas Repertory Theatre, Black Lab Theatre, the Landing Theatre Company, HSPVA, and others. She produces innovative theatre for everyone with her own group Brave Little Company, touring through Young Audiences of Houston since 2013.
Jessica Stevens is a senior lighting and makeup/wig designer at the High School for the Performing and Visual Arts.
Daisha Warren attends HSPVA as a senior in the theatre department. Creating Cafe Red has been one of the best experiences of my high school years. Hope you enjoy.
Call of the Ouroboros – The Knells
Rated G – 30 minutes
9/27 8:00pm & 9/28 5:00pm @ Super Happy Fun Land
Amanda Gregory and Patrick Renner have worked collaboratively to bring to life The Knell’s in a theatrically-engaging performance-installation. Gregory employs her powerful vocals as middle voice in the luscious three-part sonic experience, supported by a sculptural set piece executed by Renner, based on the duo’s conceptualization. Amanda transforms into a Siren-like figure towering above the audience in a monstrous body sculpture that invokes three figures in one, guiding the viewer through a lucid waking dream.
Patrick Renner has gained recent attention for his first large-scale public installation, Funnel Tunnel, sponsored by the Art League Houston. The piece was given a 2014 Year in Review award by the national organization Public Art Network. In addition to making sculpture, Renner teaches art at the high school level at the Sharpstown International School, and is a founding member of {exurb} collective, which creates ambitious multi-media installations.
Avant garde opera singer Amanda Gregory recently moved to Houston from NYC, where she continues to perform in one of New York’s leading hybrid ensembles The Nouveau Classical Project, and was one of 3 female singers in The Knells, signed by New Amsterdam Records. She has performed traditional operatic roles all across the US and throughout Italy, Germany, and China, and specializes in performing and premiering contemporary works by composers such as Schoenberg, Berg, Stockhausen, Peter Maxwell Davies, Boulez, Tan Dun, Ginastera, Ligeti, Crumb and frequently collaborates with new composers. Gregory recently premiered a large scale atmospheric work by sculptural artist Töri Wranes, and she is now expanding her career as a performance artist. In addition to her professional career, Amanda also has a YouTube channel called “Operamanda”, where she bombards civilians with operatic parody and whim, lyrically comments on politics and media, and simplifies science and technology through ariatic vocals.
The Knells (composed by Andrew Mckenna Lee) are a post rock, neo-psychedelic chamber prog band from Brooklyn, NY. Their debut album, which the New York Times describes as a collection of songs that “sweep ahead, through passages of tolling solo electric guitar, of elegiac vocal melodies and harmonies, of note-bending quasi-Indian strings and guitar, of progressive-rock processionals,” was released on New Amsterdam Records in November 2013, and was cited as one of the year’s most notable releases in The New Republic, The Washington Post, The New Yorker, The Daily Beast, Textura, and many others.
Egor and Nema – Beatific Beat
Rated PG – 20 minutes
(paired with Take A Word/Leave A Body Part)
9/25 8:00pm & 9/27 11:00pm @ Super Happy Fun Land
Through improvised movement and sound, two twin performers explore the relationship between their seemingly opposite natures–undifferentiated love and the discriminating logical mind. Amanda Gregory plays Nema, androgynous and beautiful, while Scott Gregory plays Egor, tattered and resilient. Their connection is deep but pathological, and we observe as their relationship shatters and reforms. Whether the new formation is more harmonious is yet to be determined.
Scott and Amanda Gregory have been a formidable team since they shared a womb in 1986. They were raised in a suburb of Houston, Texas, which is okay. Amanda has been developing her voice since childhood, eventually earning a Masters in Opera from Manhattan School of Music and performing as an avant grade opera singer with Nouveau Classical Project and the Knells in New York City. Scott has been fooling around with sounds for many years, and more recently got caught up in the Ecstatic Dance movement, Authentic Relating Facilitation, and his music duo called Caffeinated. The twins also founded an organization called Beatific Beat- a project that produces concerts with a radical atmosphere of liberation and connection.
F. Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald Save The World!: A Maladjusted All-Star Comedy Disaster – The Hideout Theatre
Rated R – 60 minutes
9/25 9:30pm & 9/27 9:30pm @ Super Happy Fun Land
The Hideout Theatre (since 1999) is a 2-stage improv theater and coffee house in the heart of Downtown Austin, TX, serving up coffee and tasty local treats, 7 levels of classes, and 10 shows a week. ‘F. Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald Save The World!’ comes from The Hideout’s Stargazer Series, curated by Artistic Director Roy Janik. The Stargazer Series specifically promotes and stages intimate, diverse, and experimental improvised theatre.
In F. Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald Save The World!, the famously dysfunctional literary couple continue their side-career as mercenaries and assassins for hire in the mysterious world of international espionage in the Jazz Age 1920s, where all notable artists and intellectuals are multi-talented friends or foes to the Fitzgeralds, and automatons, time machines, secret amulets, and ancient curses are all in a day’s work. This time, however, our unreliable (and probably drunk) protagonists Zelda (Kaci Beeler) and F. Scott (Curtis Luciani) are in over their heads!
Inspired by the NYNeoFuturists, classic spy films, and seizure-inducing anime, F. Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald Save The World! is part improvised play, part character-driven sketch comedy, with a dash of interactive game show thrown into the mix.Produced by and starring Kaci Beeler (Austin Chronicle Best Actor 2012, Parallelogramophonograph) and Curtis Luciani (Your Terrific Neighbors, Austin Sketch Fest) as their version of the infamous Fitzgeralds, joined by an all-star ensemble cast featuring Michael Jastroch (ColdTowne founder), Jericho Thorp (Midnight Society), Valerie Ward (PGraph), and Courtney Hopkin (Your Terrific Neighbors). With Chris Albano as technical director.Warning: This show is NOT for the kiddies, so leave ’em at home!
Fruit Flies Like A Banana – The Fourth Wall
Rated G – 60 minutes
9/27 6:30pm & 9/28 6:30pm @ Super Happy Fun Land
3 performers. 20 pieces. 60 minutes. Working at break-neck speed, The Fourth Wall combines music, theatre, and dance in this sprint-triathlon variety show. The audience determines the show order by choosing cards from a deck and even determines the parameters for pieces created on the spot! Lauded for their “…Keystone Cops energy, Three Stooge silliness, and virtuoso musicianship,” at IndyFringe 2013, Fruit Flies Like a Banana is sure to make you laugh, sing, and wonder “How’d they do that?”
The Fourth Wall explores a new hybrid of the performing arts in which musicians are also dancers and actors. Recent appearances include the National Flute Association’s annual convention, the Indianapolis Fringe Festival, and the Old Songs Festival in New York as well as residencies at schools from Alaska to Massachusetts, the International Flute Symposium, and as teaching artists for Indiana’s Arts for Learning program.
Leave A Word/Take A Body Part – Frenetic Theater Artist Board
Rated R – 25 minutes
(paired with Egor and Nema)
9/25 8:00pm & 9/27 11:00pm @ Super Happy Fun Land
While exploring perceptions of the body as it pertains to sexuality, our performance will include favorite childhood parlor games with a twist: free form mad libs, the Exquisite Corpse with adult humor, and evoke the neurotic/erotic nostalgia of paper dolls. We will confront and transcend gender norms while allowing the audience a fun, open forum to explore these ideas. A live improvised score will compliment the elements of the performance, and will be provided by the Frenetiwhorechestra.
This performance is a collaborative creation by the 2014 Frenetic Theater Artist Board Members: Alexandra Kontraimaite, Brett Harmeyer, Jessica Brown, Les Campbell, Nick Zamora, Rachel Harmeyer, Thomas Helton, Veronica Triplett, and Varina Rush.
NUT BOMB QUEER BAIT – Leslie Scates & Erin Reck
Rated R – 30 minutes
(paired with Wash)
9/24 6:30pm & 9/26 8:00pm@ The Barn
Scates and Reck are in process. They agreed to create an evening length duet based on high physicality, dancey stuff, improvisational and repeatable movement. Scates and Reck are interested in naming the normal, predictable, expected components of performance and movement techniques associated with post, post, post, post modern dance and are working in opposition to those elements, qualities and trappings. Expectations create frameworks for dance watchers and makers. They also can create a vortex of stagnation. Scates and Reck are interested in spending time and force working a way out.
Leslie Scates and Erin Reck use improvised and repeatable choreography to frame real-time action performance. Collaborating with intent… to upset and redirect, deconstruct construction, reconsider virtuosity, consider and abandon the expected, poke at normal, and to lie face down and ramble.
Erin Reck has been dancing, choreographing, teaching, and drumming up projects in New York City from 1997 to 2010. She relocated to Houston, is an Assistant Professor at Sam Houston State University, and creating work under the name of Recked Productions. Recked Productions is a multi-level platform to continue creating her own work as well as collaborating with and production coordinating various projects of other artists. For more information, go to erinreck.com. She is thrilled to be creating this entirely collaborative work with Leslie Scates.
Leslie Scates is a member of Lower Left Performance Collective and works with Erin Reck, Sophia Torres, CORE Performance Company and is currently beginning projects with Blaffer Gallery Houston, Lone Star College Dance Program, and Sam Houston State University Dance for the 2014-15 season. Leslie teaches Contact and Dance Improvisation at the University of Houston Dance Department and guest teaches for local performance collectives. She has worked with Deborah Hay, Jordan Fuchs Dance and many artists locally and across the US. She is teaching, performing and studying at Tanzfabrik and Live Legacy Project in Germany this July.
Re: The Art of Everyday Politics – 3395
Rated PG – 20 minutes
(paired with Bat)
9/25 6:30pm & 9/26 8:00pm @ Frenetic Theater
Re: The Art of Everyday Politics is an exhibition in four acts of artists’ perspectives on everyday life. Utilizing performance and installation, Baker explores internal and external perceptions of community, Partiai examines the intricacies of interpersonal relationships, Rodriguez deconstructs environments to reconstruct their politics, and Zech explores the self and the everyday. The interactions between these four acts are not limited to simultaneity. Each of the artists’ pieces stands alone, but can be presented as one piece.
Amber Baker is a growing artist and choreographer in the Greater Houston area. She recently graduated from the University of Houston with a BA in dance and a minor in Interdisciplinary Arts. Amber’s work centers on family, community and togetherness by focusing on the lives and stories of individuals she makes contact with everyday. Her work searches for how individuals and strangers are alike for the purpose of coming together in a united pursuit for God. Amber’s desire is to continue to grow in her craft and help make dance more available to students in low income communities.
Anasheh Partiai is a recent graduate from the University of Houston with a Degree in Dance and a Minor in Interdisciplinary Arts. Her work focuses on absorbing from life experiences from the people around her and exploring the individuality and uniqueness to make art through storytelling and movement. She plans to stay in Houston to work in diverse dance atmospheres to grow as both a dancer and choreographer.
Sarah Rodriguez is an artist interested in power structures and accessibility. Rodriguez’s work deconstructs environments in attempts to reconstruct its politics.
Brandon Zech is an artist and art historian studying at the University of Houston. His work draws primarily from personal experience and art history. Through drawing, printmaking and performance, Zech explores the self, the concept of language and the everyday.
slut (r)evolution – Cameryn Moore
Rated R – 60 minutes
9/25 9:30pm & 9/27 8:00pm @ Frenetic Theater
Cameryn Moore is back with slut (r)evolution, merging memory and manifesto to explore incendiary events from her very sexual life. How did it feel? What the hell was she thinking? And how will it affect tonight’s hook-up?
“…a study in vulnerability that manages to achieve catharsis and healing through a talented performance. … This is not a show for the squeamish or the faint of heart, but those who stay will be in for a touching performance and one heck of a show.” (The Marble)
slut (r)evolution won a Best of Fest award at the 2011 Winnipeg
Fringe Festival, and was an official selection of the 2013 Zoofest Festival in Montréal.
Cameryn Moore is an award-winning playwright/performer, sex activist. educator, and, oh yeah, a phone sex operator. Her work in theatre, literature, and activism/advocacy is both a challenge and invitation to adventurous audience everywhere. She is the creator and performer of multiple sex- and kink-positive solo shows, including Phone Whore (2010), slut (r)evolution (2011), for | play (2012), and Release (2013). Since 2010, Cameryn has toured to over 50 cities around North America and the United Kingdom.
This Infinite Closet performs a Bat
Rated PG13 – 35 minutes
(paired with Re: The Art of Everyday Politics)
9/25 6:30pm & 9/26 8:00pm @ Frenetic Theater
This Infinite Closet performs a Bat – a surreal auditory form of improv done in total darkness. This mélange of Station Theater alumni, students & instructors came together over their shared love of absurd storylines, entertaining characters and experimental sound. The troupe consists of Roger Anderson, Jessica Brown, Matt Graham, Laura Helmers, Monica Marcha, Nicholas Martinez, Steven Saltsman and Antoine W.B.
Antoine W.B. graduated from Station Theater’s Comedy Conservatory in 2012 and has since performed in various Station house troupes as well as in several festivals.
Jessica Brown is a destination marketer by day and Station Theater improv performer, instructor & coach by night. She also oversees marketing for Station and a couple of badass comedy festivals. Jess is a graduate of ComedySportz Houston and The New Movement training programs and is a member of the 2014 Frenetic Theater Artist Board.
Laura Helmers has been performing improv for six years. She is a faculty member at Station Theater and enjoys teaching young improvisers the joys of comedy!
Matt Graham is a member of the teaching faculty and performs improvisational comedy at Houston’s Station Theater. Monica Marcha has been doing improv for about a year and she truly loves all the different things that it can be. She’s so happy to have found a family in her Bat-mates.
Nicholas Martinez is a graduate of Station Theater’s Comedy Conservatory. He performs with several Station Theater troupes and has really great hair.
Roger Anderson is a Houston area improv performer, teacher and coach. He’s an improv program graduate of both The Upright Citizens Brigade Theater LA and Austin’s The New Movement Theater, as well as being a trained vocalist
Steven Saltsman is a pretty cool dude. Among other things, he has 8 years of experience performing and teaching improv, a degree in chemical engineering, and a hand puppet in his own likeness.
The Furniture Shop / The Sweet Dream Experience
Rated PG13 – 20 minutes
(paired with Through You)
9/25 8:00pm & 9/27 6:30pm @ Frenetic Theater
In The Furniture Shop, The Minx delivers her cocky but silky smooth rendition of a traditional-burlesque chair classic. It’s all about business, and her bossy attitude, her playful eyes, and her sheer finesse will make for the best damn sales pitch you’ve ever heard…In The Sweet Dream Experience, It’s BeJermaine Suga blends masculinity and femininity in this magnetic piece. His journey is an intense and textured union of Boylesque, dance, and pure Diva-dom that will keep you on the edge of your seat and thirsting for more… you’ll hate for it to end,
The Minx is a sassy but reserved Southern Belle who brings many years of trained dance and theatrical talents to the stage, along with solid business savvy off stage. It’s BeJermaine Suga is a passionate craftsman who has fiercely captivated audiences of all ranges for many years as a dominating singer, dancer, and choreographer. Both are members of ‘Feline Noir,’ a Houston-based neo/variety burlesque troupe best known for its highly stimulating productions and out-of-the-box revamps of burlesque, dance, pole, and other variety acts.
Then and Now – Edge Theatre
Rated G – 45 minutes
9/25 6:30pm & 9/26 6:30pm @ The Barn
Edge Theatre, winner of an Audience Favorite Award in Fringe ’11, presents two new one-acts by Jim Tommaney – “Then” and “Now” – both are political comedies. “Then” is based on transcripts detailing the total breakdown in communication among Navy, White House, and Department of Defense officials that hurtled us into the Vietnam War. “Now” chronicles the deceptions that made the Iraq War seem desirable, including how the NY Times fell for “pillow talk”, and was conned into support for the invasion.
In “Then”, White House transcripts, plus phone conversations that the Navy recorded, add revealing details that illuminate the personalities of LBJ and McNamara, as well as of key naval officers. Seldom has the “fog of war” been more at work, as sheer incompetence on all sides led to misreading an intercepted North Vietnamese message as referring to an attack on August 4. The message, however, had been recorded and received before the alleged attack, and referred to an Aug. 2 incident. There was no North Vietnamese attack on Aug.4, yet this intercepted message was the basis for the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution that gave LBJ a blank check to attack North Vietnam.
In “Now” an Alien suddenly appears in Grand Central Station in Manhattan, and, protected by a force field, resists attempts to capture him. With force not effective, various officials from the police department, Wall Street, the Church, and the military attempt to use persuasion, including offering male and female sexual surrogates. The Alien’s mission is to save Planet Earth, but it looks as though this is going to be more difficult than the rulers of his home planet, Arkturia, had predicted.
Edge Theatre has produced over 140 plays in South Florida and ten in Houston. Jim Tommaney, its artistic director, has written 25 plays, most of them produced to audience acclaim. He is a theater and art critic for the Houston Press. In “Then”, Houston trouper Jim Salners, who has had starring roles at Main Street, Texas Rep and Country Playhouse, portrays President Lyndon Baines Johnson. Roy Hamlin, who has performed all over town and is directing “Nunsense” at HFAC, portrays Secretary of Defense Robert S. McNamara. In “Now”, Aaron Echegaray, who this year starred as both Hamlet, Oberon, and D’Artagnan, portrays a powerful Alien who seems to know the future of Planet Earth.
Through You – Stacey Ramsower
Rated R – 35 minutes
(paired with The Furniture Shop)
9/25 8:00pm & 9/27 6:30pm @ Frenetic Theater
Our human attempt to describe and make sense of the world around us, our relationships, our inner turmoil, is the very cause of our perceived “separateness” from one another. Rather than existing as a continuum of each other, humans tend to isolate and divide through classifications based on judgement. “Through You” explores the mutual interdependence inherent in human relationship and what happens when we embrace/deny it using movement, music and sound.
Stacey Ramsower: I have been moving and shaking since birth. Always seeking out new ways to move, I have studied ballet, tap, jazz, modern, yoga, martial arts, Bellydance, Samba, capoeira, Afro-Brazilian dance and mime. Yes. Mime. It is through the body that I seek to understand and connect to the world, and it is through the body that I can best express my findings.
Tintinnabulation – Invisible Lines
Rated PG – 50 minutes
9/26 6:30pm & 9/27 5:00pm @ Frenetic Theater
Tintinnabulation is a primal exploration of raw emotion, the unraveling of seasons in each human life, using a blend of Edgar Allan Poe’s final months, his poetry, improvisational music, and Japanese Butoh dancing. Tintinnabulation is a multimedia presentation of the final seasons of Edgar Allan Poe’s life using Butoh dance, Poe’s apologia “Eureka,” his poem “The Bells,” and an accompanying musical score. Tintinnabulation explores themes of despair, damnation, and the transitory character of life. Spoiler alert: Poe died in 1849 after a prolonged drinking bout and was seemingly accosted by political ruffians and left for dead.
Invisible Lines is a troupe of performance poets who met in a downtown bar. The Lines’ mission is to bring poetry on stage and give audiences an immersive experience in the heart and aesthetic of poetry along with a peak at the demons that make it necessary. Invisible Lines principals are Bucky Rea, Salvador Macias, Mike McGuire, and Baltazar Canales.
Wash – Lauren Burke
Rated PG – 15 minutes
(paired with NUT BOMB QUEER BAIT)
9/24 6:30pm & 9/26 8:00pm@ The Barn
WASH invites the audience to peek into the lives of the invisible. Sex trafficking is an ever-present oppression that leaves those enslaved with an overwhelming desire to be clean of the unseen affliction. “Texas is considered the epicenter of human trafficking in the United States. The I-10 corridor is the most heavily traveled thoroughfare for traffickers and victims of international human trafficking” (yourhoustonnews.com). To rid oneself of bondage, to wash away fears, and to be free of modern-day slavery, it cannot be done alone.
Lauren Burke is a recent graduate from University of Houston with a B.A. in Dance. She is partnering together with Katrina Woods, a current UH Dance student, to create and produce multi-disciplinary works. They both seek to pursue a journey of performing and producing dances.
¡VIDA! – Cirque La Vie
Rated G – 45 minutes
9/26 9:30pm & 9/28 5:00pm @ Frenetic Theater
The meaning to life is to live. The best way to live is through love. Vida tells the story of a weary old man who has lost his love to live.
Cirque La Vie is a small modern contemporary circus arts company based based out of Houston Texas that was founded and created by Houston’s own Reyie Nal. Although small and young CLV has already been featured in such productions like America’s Got Talent, Without a Net film premiere, Le Petit Cirque, Cirque Du Monde, Discovery Green, Children’s museum of Houston and many more. For more information visit http://cirquelavie.wix.com/cirquelavie
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