Fringe preview: An unapologetic love letter to David Lynch

RED LODGE, MONTANA: Week 1 from The Antidote on Vimeo.

“David Lynch has created some of the boldest cinematic visuals of all time,” says Michael Osinski, director of The Antidote’s 2019 Fringe entry Red Lodge, Montana. “We’ll be paying homage to those visuals and creating some memorable ones of our own.”

Red Lodge, Montana is a new work co-created by director Michael Osinski and the ensemble cast. Set in the former girls’ locker room in the basement of Bok, the show follows a troupe of actors as they attempt to produce their own send-up of Lynch’s landmark television series Twin Peaks. What they end up creating is a live-action nightmare. Audience members will follow the characters through the performance space as if they are walking through one of David Lynch’s films.

41Red-Lodge-Montana“What’s most unique about Lynch is how he gets viewers emotionally invested in some pretty bizarre stories,” says Osinski. “He gives people a puzzle to solve, and he populates that puzzle with richly drawn and decidedly idiosyncratic human beings. That’s what we really hope to achieve with this show.”

Osinski, the former co-founder and producing artistic director of Flashpoint Theatre Company, returned to Philadelphia in 2015 after completing his MFA in Directing at The Theatre School at DePaul University. Since receiving his degree, he has directed for Azuka Theatre, assisted Tony-winning director Rachel Chavkin at the Old Globe in San Diego, and completed a fellowship with the Drama League Directors Project in New York.

The project features Philadelphia favorite and Barrymore Award–winner Amanda Schoonover, who recently shot the independent film We Need to Talk with James Maslow. Schoonover is also an avid Lynch fan.

“What I love most about David Lynch’s work,” says Schoonover, “is the dreamlike dance between beauty and the macabre. His films are like moving paintings left open to the interpretation of the viewer.”

The show also stars Kelly McCaughan, Anthony Crosby, Josh Hitchens, Terrill Braswell , Megan Edelman, and Geremy Webne-Behrman. As a nod to Lynch’s weekly television series, The Antidote released a series of weekly trailer videos in August, filmed by Daniel Ison, to introduce audience members to the characters and the basic plot points. Red Lodge runs September 7–15, 2019, at the BOK [down the exterior stairs at 8th & Mifflin] fringearts.com/event/red-lodge-montana

 

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