The Drexel Players bring us with their adaptation of Aesop’s fables, AE$OP, re-hashing the fables’ warnings concerning might and deception, but subvertting others for our society in which money speaks the loudest.
View More AE$OP (The Drexel Players): Fringe review 6Category: Fringe reviews
Reviews of theater and performing arts events in the Philadelphia Fringe Festival. Phindie is providing more critical coverage of the festival than any other publication in Philadelphia.
RHINOCEROS (Idiopathic Ridiculopathy Consortium): 2014 Fringe Review 5
Director Tina Brock brings spot-on casting, lightning-quick pacing, and non-stop hysteria (of both the panicked and hilarious varieties) to Idiopathic Ridiculopathy Consortium’s FringeArts production of Eugène Ionesco’s RHINOCEROS. The devastating consequences of mindless conformity, social apathy, and turning a blind eye to a growing threat are the important themes of the darkly comic Theater of the Absurd masterpiece.
View More RHINOCEROS (Idiopathic Ridiculopathy Consortium): 2014 Fringe Review 5THE RAPE OF LUCRECE (Philadelphia Artists’ Collective): 2014 Fringe review 4.1
As indicated by Phindie’s 2014 Critics’ Awards, the Philadelphia Artists’ Collective is one of the most consistently excellent independent theater companies in the city. Their…
View More THE RAPE OF LUCRECE (Philadelphia Artists’ Collective): 2014 Fringe review 4.1Intimate Exchanges (1812 Productions): 2014 Fringe Review 1.2
What makes film different from theater is that film is fixed forever, performances and lines repeating endlessly year after year, while theater has the ability to surprise us. And what makes theater different from life is that theater is scripted and life is random, unexpected, not planned out ahead of time. And what makes Philadelphia’s FringeArts Festival fun is that it delights in performances that confound expectations.
View More Intimate Exchanges (1812 Productions): 2014 Fringe Review 1.2CLOSURE (Aleksandra Berczynski & MB Grupa Realizacji): Fringe review 3
Aleksandra Berczynski once again brings a short, delightfully self-indulgent mono-drama to Fringe audiences.
View More CLOSURE (Aleksandra Berczynski & MB Grupa Realizacji): Fringe review 3SUSPENDED (Brian Sanders’ JUNK): Fringe Review 2
Have you ever been caught between two conflicting emotions at the same time? Have those ambivalent feelings left you hanging, unable to decide what to think or how to act? Have you turned to your most primal impulses to figure out who you are and where you’re going? Baring body and soul, Brian Sanders’ JUNK explores the psychology and physicality of uncertainty and transition in SUSPENDED.
View More SUSPENDED (Brian Sanders’ JUNK): Fringe Review 2INTIMATE EXCHANGES (1812 Productions): Fringe Review 1.1
Alan Ayckbourn’s inventive rom-com about failing and budding mid-life relationships in suburban London is that the play (or more accurately, the first volume of the playwright’s original two-volume work that is performed here) offers sixteen plot options and eight different endings. And for the first time in its production history, 1812 shines the spotlight on random members of the audience to decide spontaneously which path the characters should take as they reach a series of crossroads in their lives.
View More INTIMATE EXCHANGES (1812 Productions): Fringe Review 1.1[78] STUDY HALL (Philly Improv Theater): Fringe review
The conceit of Philly Improv Theater’s STUDY HALL is that we the audience are a bunch of prep school students, awaiting a lecture in an…
View More [78] STUDY HALL (Philly Improv Theater): Fringe review[77] BAT BOY: THE MUSICAL (Life Theater Company): Fringe review
Weekly World News is known for a lot of things, but heartfelt sentiment isn’t one of them. Surprising, then, that the tabloid birthed BAT BOY:…
View More [77] BAT BOY: THE MUSICAL (Life Theater Company): Fringe review[76] BASTARD PIECE (No Face Performance Group): Fringe review
You are in a spacey kind of facility thing. It’s all white in there, with some technological lookin’ kinda lights. There are three doors; soon,…
View More [76] BASTARD PIECE (No Face Performance Group): Fringe review[75] REGGIE’S BRODIE: A VAUDEVILLE EXTRAVAGANZA (Cut House Productions): Fringe review
Is your only experience with burlesque the 2010 Christina Aguilera / Cher movie? Never fear: the good people of Cut House Productions are here to…
View More [75] REGGIE’S BRODIE: A VAUDEVILLE EXTRAVAGANZA (Cut House Productions): Fringe review[74] BEYOND THE LIGHT (Leila Ghaznavi and Pantea Productions): Fringe review
Beyond the Light is a devised puppetry/theater/music/acrobatics/dance exploring unrequited love through whimsical, nighttime wonderment. A blonde boy and a black-haired girl stand in separate shadows,…
View More [74] BEYOND THE LIGHT (Leila Ghaznavi and Pantea Productions): Fringe review[73] ROOTS (AKA performance): Fringe review
AKA performance is a new dance collective, formed by young choreographers Katrina Atkin, Ann-Marie Gover, and Alessandra Delle Grotti to showcase their individual approaches to…
View More [73] ROOTS (AKA performance): Fringe review[72] XY SCHEHERAZADE (Unstuck Theater): Fringe review
XY SCHEHERAZADE works very hard to conjure the moment when “a story that you’re telling a friend becomes, for a minute, a shared perspective.” But…
View More [72] XY SCHEHERAZADE (Unstuck Theater): Fringe review[71] STRIPPED OF COMMON SENSE (Joint Bender Productions): Fringe review
“Back to the grind. Literally.” So begins a shift for five young women, dancing for a living. Set in the dressing room of a strip…
View More [71] STRIPPED OF COMMON SENSE (Joint Bender Productions): Fringe review[70] ONE YEAR (MamaCITA Five): Fringe review
Anyone stumbling into ONE YEAR by accident, like I did, will realize immediately that they had broken in on something transcendent. In front of a backdrop…
View More [70] ONE YEAR (MamaCITA Five): Fringe review[69] BASEMENT (Gunnar Montana): 2013 Fringe Review
This is the only place where baby doll dismembering, Santa Claus chopping, guts wearing, head smashing, dub-step listening, and wrapping a woman in plastic are…
View More [69] BASEMENT (Gunnar Montana): 2013 Fringe Review[68] EMANCIPATION SWEET, A PLAY WITH MUSIC (Theatre for Transformation): Fringe review
Theatre for Transformation is a Lancaster-based company focused on performing African-American stories for diverse audiences. This active group has toured their original works to over…
View More [68] EMANCIPATION SWEET, A PLAY WITH MUSIC (Theatre for Transformation): Fringe review[67] LUCINDA’S BED (Brainspunk Theater): Fringe review
Mia McCullough’s LUCINDA’s BED has a great premise: a monster hiding under a young girl’s bed continues to haunt her into adulthood. The monster (Brendan…
View More [67] LUCINDA’S BED (Brainspunk Theater): Fringe review[56.2] THE TALKBACK (Berserker Residents): Fringe review
You know that scene at the end of The Matrix (spoiler alert) where Neo sees the green code and jumps into Agent Smith’s belly and makes him…
View More [56.2] THE TALKBACK (Berserker Residents): Fringe review