Don Downer here. Or at least that’s how I felt at a critics’ panel discussion, held at Fringe Central on Sunday, the last day of the Hollywood Fringe Festival. Of the six panelists, I was the most skeptical about the long-term effects of the Fringe on L.A. theater.
Fanciful creatures whose images were used as symbols of the Fringe
Sure, as I’ve already written, here and here, I liked the festival’s concentration of so much theatrical energy within one geographical area, at so many unexpected hours of the days and the nights.
But if there’s one thing that L.A. theater already has, in spades, it’s an excess of low-budget productions in small venues. Bringing coals to Newcastle isn’t nearly as redundant as bringing more actors’ and comedians’ showcases to Hollywood.
I recently spoke with a director who frequently stages plays in Hollywood but didn’t participate in the Fringe. Why? Because Hollywood is a perpetual fringe festival, said this director. It might be smart to avoid being associated with some of the lesser work at this organized but totally non-curated festival.
At the critics’ panel, I raised the question of why more local theater artists didn’t participate in the Fringe. The consensus answer seemed to be that not many locals were willing to join in the inaugural year, because they didn’t know if the festival would even get off the ground - but that they’ll probably participate next year. An added lure next year: the Fringe is likely to coincide with the Theatre Communications Group conference - which will attract most of the movers and shakers of the American nonprofit theater to L.A. from June 16 to 18, 2011.
Too bad the TCG conference is just a conference, not a curated festival. A fringe festival needs a more established counterweight to seem like a true alternative. The Edinburgh Fringe, granddaddy of all fringes, was and is a reaction to the Edinburgh International Festival. Still, it’s possible that the TCG get-together will inspire most of the established L.A. companies to make sure they have something to show off during that period - which could, in turn, make next year’s Fringe seem more alternative than this year’s.
Then again, plenty of other kinds of festivals also were happening during this year’s Fringe. The Los Angeles Film Festival occupied precisely the same dates. The Electric Daisy Carnival music festival (AKA a rave) attracted 185,000 people to the Coliseum last weekend. Closer to the theatrical arena, the amorphous, far-flung, three-month Festival of New American Musicals is now at its midpoint - although it feels more like a web site than an actual festival.
Fanciful creatures who appeared on stage in Das Rheingold, the first opera in LA Opera's Ring cycle
Actually, the establishment-bred festival that served as the heaviest counterweight to this year’s Fringe was the LA Opera’s Ring cycle and its adjunct, the Ring Festival LA. L.A.’s first crack at Wagner’s magnum opus attracted a lot of attention from the big media, including the Times theater critic Charles McNulty, who reviewed all four of the operas (before the Fringe opened) but didn’t write anything about the Hollywood Fringe.
I’m not criticizing McNulty for paying attention to the Ring. I saw three of the four Ring operas during the same period that I was also attending the Hollywood Fringe. The visions of the Ring’s Brechtian-influenced director Achim Freyer were more eye-opening and will probably last longer in my memory than anything I saw at the Fringe (granted, those three operas also took up about twice as much time as the nine events I saw at the Fringe).
That word Fringe can mislead. It often connotes something adventurous and avant-garde. Yet in a non-curated festival, no one controls whether the programming is something truly unusual or something that’s more of the same. Admittedly I saw only a tiny sliver of the Fringe’s offerings, but my impression was that most of the Fringe consisted of the same kind of work that we regularly see in L.A.
You certainly couldn’t say that about Freyer’s Ring. Of course Freyer had a lot more money to play with than the Fringe - and a lot more money per opera than any L.A. theater company can muster per play. Tickets were priced accordingly. Maybe the word Fringe should simply connote “low-budget” instead of anything related to the aesthetics. The Ring and the Hollywood Fringe, when seen side by side, contradict the frequently heard notion that big budgets tend to buy conservative, conventional art and that shoestring budgets usually buy something wild and crazy. Here, it was the opposite.
I often hear that same notion when I point to the importance of supporting L.A.’s midsize theaters, as I did at the critics’ panel last Sunday. As I explored in greater detail here, midsize theaters (and those few smaller theaters that work on Equity contracts instead of the 99-Seat Plan) are essential. They commit to paying the actors more than gas money - yet they still maintain much of the intimacy of the under-100 seat arena. Supporting these fragile institutions - which are overshadowed both by bigger theaters and by the vast numbers of sub-100-seat theaters - is the most important ingredient in building a more mature, more professional theater scene here.
Yet too often we hear that if a company expands beyond the 99-seat world, its creativity, its risk-taking, and the scope of its productions must necessarily contract. This expectation is certainly understandable, especially during hard economic times, but it becomes inevitable only if these institutions don’t garner the necessary support that would allow them to pursue their less predictable programming.
I’d much rather see a festival that helps these companies and others pursue such programming on a better funded basis than one that simply invites more fresh young talent to join the hordes who are already flocking to Hollywood.
I’d like to see a Hollywood festival that supports the efforts of the tiny but enterprising Blank Theatre to grow into a larger space and to start paying its talent on a professional basis. Or one that would re-claim the Ricardo Montalban Theatre for theater, as opposed to its current use as a Nike store and as a center for big-screen World Cup broadcasts. And let’s not stop there - let’s also re-enlist the Henry Fonda and the Ivar for real theater, on a bigger-than-a-boutique level.
On the final day of the Fringe, after the panel discussion, I saw T-O-T-A-L-L-Y, a much-recommended Fringe show. In my last post, I wrote that the written description of this solo show in the Fringe program had alienated me, but that word of mouth was good, so I wanted to give it a shot. Sure enough, the performance of soloist Kimleigh Smith was as dynamic as others had claimed. But the writing, in retrospect, didn’t venture far beyond the usual self-affirming message that is found in a hundred other solo showcases.
Later that evening, I saw the final performance of a non-Fringe play, Elephant Theatre’s Supernova, at the Elephant Space on Santa Monica Boulevard, smack dab in the middle of Fringe activity. Timothy McNeil’s moving depiction of an Iowa family on the ropes and the L.A. wage slave who was the last remaining hope of the family’s forlorn matriarch was easily the best show I had seen in Hollywood since the Fringe started.
If you’re going to mount a theater festival in Hollywood, shouldn’t you make sure to include the best theater that Hollywood has to offer?
Fringe photo by Star Foreman.
LA Opera photo by Monika Rittershaus.
While I agree with many of your reasonings, both as an audience member and a co-founder of a baby company that premiered at the Fringe, it seems that your criticism is not with the fact that the Fringe exists in Los Angeles, but rather, that it is non-curated. Perhaps it WILL be in the future, but as of now, I think the message was “it’s okay to have community in theater in L.A.” instead of “plays just HAPPEN”. Our job is to prove to “you” (you being Los Angeles as a whole) that we do indeed have a purpose, and next year will certainly be decisive in that respect.
Thank you for your well-written article, and not just something that blows off the Fringe for purely trivial reasons.
Dear Downer Don!
I appreciate your thoughtful article, but let me speak from my perspective. Not every participant has the backing of a theatre company. The Hollywood Fringe Festival allowed me to test the waters with an original show, one that needed more in the way of production than a spoken word venue has to offer. I think it was very smart for the HFF organizers to go with an uncurated show, at least for the first year. I am still impressed at how well they pulled it off.
I am sure the Ring Cycle was wonderful. The most affordable tickets I saw online were around 50. Sorry, I cannot fund a production myself and go see LA’s hottest theatre at the same time. I’ll happily throw my hat in with those who are willing to put their creativity out there, rather than concern themselves over being associated with ‘lesser work’. I’m discovering there is an audience for almost everything…
I agree that Hollywood (included the Valley) is jammed full of weekly improvisers, playing to houses of fellow students. I would wish that next year’s HFF would insist upon original work. I am in the minority of those who do not want to be in a theatre company, yet wish to do theatre. I’m still figuring it out. But it is obvious to me that Mr. McNulty and the like are just being snobs by not covering the theatre right under their noses. Your criticism about the shows you saw, and what worked and what didn’t, is more of what is needed here.
I wondered why The Blank, located smack in the heart of Fringe, chose not to open their doors and participate. Felt unfriendly. Please forgive me if I have my facts wrong. I’m sure I have missed some of the articles written, and I missed all of the panels. One thing for me that is next too impossible to do, at least when a Fringe takes place my home town, is to get around to see other shows, and take advantage of Fringe events offered.
Hollywood is not a ‘perpetual Fringe Festival’. Clever turn of words, but a misunderstanding of what it means to be Fringe. I would be very interested in stricter guidelines, but I wonder who will set them, what they will be based on, who they will favor (more theatre companies? I hope not…) and so on. And thanks for reminding me that I need to get ready for next year!
My show, Mary Poppins is a BUTTERFLY, was a one-off at ArtWorks Theatre. You can read about it on my link.
Don, Thank you for elaborating your position here on the blog. It was an honor to have you on our panel. Your perspective, however contrarian, is a valuable contribution to the discussion that all of us LA Theatre Practitioners NEED so badly to have, so please keep writing, speaking publicly, and engaging our community in this way. I look forward to not only hearing what you have to say, but also seeing my peers rise to meet the challenges you have put forth.
Don, I will be honest - you make some very good points in your entry about taking chances, about the multiple festivals, about reclaiming lost spaces and supporting the mid-sized companies. However, I first had to struggle with several statements you made early on.
When you said that LA theatre wasn’t there, what LA Theatre people are you referring to? Because by my count, LA Theatre showed up. Theatre Unleashed was there. Moving Parts was there. Coeurage was there. Theatre of NOTE was there. Open Fist was there. needtheatre was there. Absolute was there. Independent writers and producers like David Wisehart, Rachel Stoll, Meghan Gambling, Doug Oliphant and Aaron Kozak were there. I could go on, but I hope you’re getting my point. We’re a part of LA Theatre, too.
These companies and individuals didn’t produce one-person shows, either. We all did full-length mid to large-cast productions. “Friends Like These” (you want ‘curated’ credibility? FLT’s going to FringeNYC in August), “The Birthday Boys”, “Happy Birthday, Mom” (also going to FringeNYC), “Valentino: A Play in Verse”, “Pagan Play”… Original works by LA artists. Not showcases, not one-person monologues. Not masturbatory crap by any stretch of the imagination. We all brought out the big guns to make the best impressions possible. How dare you (or anyone else, for that matter) call the product of our blood, sweat and tears “lesser work” without first taking the time to experience it. Sure, we may not have six-figure budgets to invest in production value, Equity actors, a paid staff and a professional grant writer working for us, but I hope educated and experienced critic like yourself knows that money is not the sole difference between “good theatre” and bad.
For example, I mentioned Mr. Aaron Kozak earlier. Did you see “The Birthday Boys”? I did, and I may not be an educated critic like yourself, but at 29 years old, I’ve spent over half my life involved in theatre as both an artist and a patron and I can say that it was better than anything I’ve seen at one of the “top tier” LA companies. I put it right up there with some Broadway shows I’ve seen. I would be interested to hear what you thought.
We are not parasites preventing your beloved mid- and large-sized theatres from flourishing. We are a part of The Future. Many of us are in our infancy as companies. Those of us that survive childhood and grow into maturity will be the Circle-X’s, the “A Noise Withins”, the Boston Courts and the CTGs of tomorrow. I don’t think ANY of us WANT to produce under the 99-seat plan any longer than we absolutely have to. Many of us are producers by necessity, but artists first - actors, writers, directors and designers - focused on making something GOOD out of absolutely nothing. I think that just by the virtue that we EXIST, especially in such great numbers speaks to the fire and passion inside the belly of Los Angeles Theatre. The Hollywood Fringe gave us the opportunity to break out of our own individual bubbles and bond with other members of the community. How could that NOT change the face of LA Theatre and affect positive growth? LA Theatre needs a focal point - a unifying element to help establish and shape its identity. I’m not calling HFF a fix-all, but it is certainly a step in the right direction.
If mid-sized companies like The Blank, The Colony, The Troubies, etc., didn’t get involved this year, it’s their loss. They may want to get in on the conversation for next year or they’ll get left behind like the LA Times. Speaking of… (and these are my personal views, not the views of any company or professional associations I may be a part of), the LA Times has such little respect for Los Angeles Theatre, it has no credibility in my eyes. When I was talking about critics that recycle our press releases and take no stand, express no opinions, give no critique, I was talking about them, specifically. That’s what we get from them when they bother to show up. If I had my way, we wouldn’t invite them to our productions anymore. It’s just a waste of time and effort. I’ll take Steven Leigh Morris or Geoff Hoff over Charles McNulty any day of the week, and twice on matinee Sundays.
You dismiss us because you went and saw a couple of one-person shows (and two musicals) that fit into your preconceived notion of what a Fringe festival was all about, then judged the contents of the whole festival based on that. It’s a shame, because if you could have attended more of the festival without such an obvious bias, such a huge chip on your shoulder, your opinion may have changed.
With all due respect, if you’re going to sit on a panel and discuss the State of LA Theatre, do yourself a favor and actually come and see what’s going on before you start talking. The future of LA Theatre is in the hands of small companies like the ones that showed up in force to Hollywood Fringe this year, and to the even greater number that will be here next year. And the year after that, and so on. We’re learning. We’re growing. One day, the good ones will earn the status of mid-sized and large companies. To quote Ben Hill, “Theatre is dead. Long live Theatre.”
For the record: Gregory Crafts lists the Blank Theatre as midsize. In fact, it’s a small Hollywood company that has begun a campaign to expand to the midsize level, staying within Hollywood. Also, some readers might misconstrue Crafts’ comment that Circle X and Boston Court are two “mature” companies as implying that they are midsize companies on Equity contracts. They aren’t.
I think deciding whether or not the Fringe Festival was successful depends on one’s expectations. I don’t think any of us expected that the sun would break through the clouds, the Pantages would crumble, and indie theatre artists would be left to dance on the ashes of big theatre. But what is the point of any festival? At the Fringe, artists came together from all over the world, new audience members walked into places where they’d never been, contacts were made, the state of theatre in LA was discussed, plays and performers who might not have had an audience found themselves applauded, new ideas were jotted down on the backs of programs, companies invited performers to audition and writers to submit for the next season, and everyone had a damn good time throughout.
With audiences and grant money disappearing at a frustrating rate, a week that gives struggling, smaller theatres and independent artists encouragement and inspiration is more than valuable. This was exactly what we needed, and I cannot wait to see how the Fringe Festival grows next year.
This is very thoughtful and you’re right- LA is a town of perpetual fringe. But that’s completely
understandable given the climate of this place… a town full of desperate storytellers with little money just trying to be heard. In some ways it’s a caste system- the film studios as kings choosing only a select few from a
community of thousands. So what’s left? A town of artists- some good and some bad. But the common theme is a wish to seen- be it by an agent or a captive audience. So it’s truly no surprise that all over town in pockets
and corners, low budget to mid budget- people are telling stories, performing, and trying to be heard.
Many in the community spend a lot of time judging this reality. Yes, a lot of “not-so-great” theatre comes out of this- sure. A lot is self-serving… but, not all. And sometimes even something self-serving can also be amazing
art. And sometimes amazing art can happen in less than 30 minutes in a 45 seat rent by the night theatre.
So it seems only natural that once a year, there should be a structured and fun loving celebration of this “roll-up-your-sleeves” and rent a venue kind of theatre.
ALSO, I think the Fringe is a great way to reach out to the community and remind everyone to GO SEE ART. Have an experience. And I don’t think that should be tossed off lightly.
So yes, I think the Fringe is a wonderful thing and any venture that promotes artistic exploration and community simultaneously is a good thing. Your idea for a festival sounds nice- If you started that, I’d sign up. But it isn’t the Fringe…
And I am from a horde of fresh young talent that came to LA and I’d venture to say, that sometimes hordes can contribute to the community and make art in this town BETTER and more diverse.
Thanks for fostering discussion and being willing to be a “downer”- I respect that immensely. Keep on asking questions and shaking up the debate!
yours respectfully.
Don, thanks again for a very thoughtful article. While I could be wrong, I think your comment here, attributed to the LA theatre director with whom you spoke, was misinterpreted: “It might be smart to avoid being associated with some of the lesser work at this organized but totally non-curated festival.” It seems as if the director was not calling all of the work in the festival “lesser work,” but rather noting that in an uncurated festival, it’s going to be hit or miss, and while the hits could certainly be great indeed, the misses could reflect negatively enough on everything else that it might be better to keep one’s distance.
Suzan, while I am not privy to any conversations that may have occurred about the Blank’s (non)participation in the Fringe, in their defense, they have always run their Young Playwrights Festival throughout the month of June. Keep in mind that the Blank is still a small company (despite Gregory’s inaccurate assertion to the contrary), and running a festival of this size, involving a dozen different plays, is likely to keep them fully committed. It may just have been an issue of bad timing.
Unfortunately, I was away during much of the Fringe, and so I didn’t get to attend this year (I too saw Supernova, though, with a similarly positive view). I do have to admit, however, to taking a bit of a “wait and see” with it. For me, while I knew people with individual shows in it (sadly, all during the time I was away), I never felt as if I connected with the festival as a whole–at least not to the point where I was willing to immerse myself in it.
Gregory, I was sorry I missed Friends Like These the first time out, and then I was disappointed to be away during all of its Fringe dates. As someone who writes a great deal for young people, it caught my interest.
Don, whatever happened to the Edge of the World festival? It seems that was Fringe-like, but curated. I remember serving on a peer review panel of applications for that back in 2005 or so, but that’s the last I remember hearing about it. But I do think your point about having a curated festival is important, because even if the Hollywood Fringe isn’t going to be truly different from the fringe we see there almost every day, at least we’d know for sure that for 10 days, everybody’s brought their A-game.
Cheers,
Jonathan Dorf
Co-Chair, Alliance of Los Angeles Playwrights
Mr. Shirley,
Allow me to introduce myself. My name is Ezra Buzzington (AKA Jonathan Harris). I am the founder of the first fringe theatre festival in the United States (Seattle) and one of three founders of the largest fringe theatre festival in the United States (The New York International Fringe Festival - FringeNYC).
As I was busy operating one of the venues for the first annual Hollywood Fringe Festival (for which I currently sit on the Advisory Board), I was unable to attend the LA Theatre Review-sponsored critics’ panel on the current state of Los Angeles theatre. But, I hear it was as successful as most of the other events at the first year festival.
I was invited to respond to your article “The Fringe, The Ring and Supernova” but resisted since, first of all, I question the actual motives of your article and secondly, since it’s so blatantly misinformed and short-sighted, I felt it unworthy of comment. I believed that to drive anymore traffic to the article would be a disservice to the local theatre community, the Hollywood Fringe Festival and, ultimately, the theatre itself. I have since changed my mind.
I’m thrilled you at least recognized the value of geographic proximity pertaining to a local fringe fest in your previous articles . It is, undoubtedly, a help when planning such an event. (As the Edge of the World festival learned the hard way.) I’m glad as well that you appreciated the various times available to the audience. Were you more familiar with fringe festivals in general, you would know that this programming is de riqueur. Still in all, thanks for getting it.
One thing you didn’t get, however, is that, for the most part, all cities in the United States housing a fringe festival are blessed with already being theatre towns to some degree. They have the venues, the companies, the audiences and the artists to help support such an endeavor. Simply because L.A. theatre has “in spades” low-budget productions in small venues, doesn’t mean it couldn’t, wouldn’t or didn’t benefit from the first annual Hollywood Fringe Festival. Quite the opposite. Also, there is nothing “redundant” about bringing in dozens of national and international acts (your distaste for solo shows notwithstanding) to Hollywood in celebration of the small theatre. To think otherwise could be viewed as xenophobic by some, elitist by most. And I would place a safe bet that your anonymous and worrisome director associate didn’t participate in this year’s festival not because s/he was worried about the low quality of visiting fringe productions, but, rather, to suss out the first year to see what the competition was like so as not to be shown up. Just a guess, mind you. But I’ve been at this game for a while now and I can easily recognize smoke when it’s being blown in my direction. I’m a little surprised you couldn’t. A “perpetual fringe festival”? That doesn’t even mean anything. A fringe festival is an event that plays host to hundreds of national and international acts over a 3 to 10 day period in a chosen city. Does your frequently staging director not think that New York City could also define itself as a “perpetual fringe festival”? Seemed to work out for them. Let’s all try to think about what we’re saying and writing. And learn to know our histories.
In saying “ A fringe festival needs a more established counterweight to seem like a true alternative”, you’re tipping your hand and displaying useless cards. A fringe festival does not, in fact, need any such thing. Yes, Edinburgh, the first fringe festival in the world came out of a direct response to local artists being shut out of a larger festival. Bully. That was over 50 years and about 35 international fringe festivals ago. You would be hard pressed to find another fringe festival in the world that was motivated by the same thing Edinburgh was. If you knew your fringe history before writing about it, you would know this. I am, without doubt, in the all-hail Edinburgh grouping of fringe participants, and you should know that Edinburgh itself realizes that every fringe festival needs to be loyal first to its local demographic. This is the reason I made the decision to implement the adjudication process for FringeNYC which was wisely supported by my fellow founders John Clancy of The Present Company and Aaron Beall of Todo Con Nada. To my knowledge, it’s still the only adjudicated fringe festival in the world. And there’s a reason for that. (This caused no end of grief for all the North American Fringe festival’s when it was announced at the CAFF conference some years ago, but that’s another story.) The premise of the first annual Hollywood Fringe Festival was based specifically on Edinburgh’s prototype. Edinburgh, as you may or may not know, is a non-juried festival. A non-juried fringe festival is better for the Los Angeles demographic if only for the reason that L.A. audiences are far more daring than New York audiences. They’re willing to take far more chances and will travel further to do it. New Yorkers only like to think of themselves as daring. When it comes right down to it, they need to have someone else sign off on something before they can support it. (Not unlike some local directors who feel compelled to remain hidden in the shadows until other, braver artists have charted the way. See you next year, stranger.) I was correct in my assessment that New York should adjudicate its festival and I agree with Ben Hill and his compatriots that Hollywood Fringe Festival remain non-curated. Besides, the decision to program is left completely up to the individual venue. My production team was very specific in what we chose to host, emphasizing as best we could, a combination of geographic, ethnic, cultural and aesthetic diversity. As a result, we received 8 glowing reviews, 6 “GO!” recommendations, 7 award nominations and 4 awarded artists. Including “Best of Fringe”. One of our international artists, Rhodri Miles in “Burton” has been extended for a 3-day run at Theatre Asylum before he returns to Wales.
I would ask you, Mr. Shirley, to please know and understand the history of the fringe (especially in the States) before praising or lambasting anyone’s efforts in bringing one to Hollywood. It’s only responsible in your current position.
I confess to some curiosity as to which “established L.A. Companies” you speak of when mentioning the possibility of their participating next year. Specifically the ones you think will be “inspired” by the presence of the TCG conference. Whoever they are, they should be reminded that they will also need to apply just like every other production and that there’s no guarantee of their inclusion. (Unless you’re speaking of venues, of course. At which point, I’m sure, they would be welcomed with open arms.) But remind them as well that you will be in attendance only if they curate their guest artists. I would also remind them (and your director acquaintance for that matter) that, while welcomed, of course, they are not needed in the least. The festival was and will continue to be just fine without them. Which is probably the real reason they’ll get involved next year.
One last thing, while I share your admiration for mid-sized theatres, they are not the only way to expand and improve our local theatre scene’s presence and health. They are but one way. A popular fringe theatre festival is another. Look again to your beloved New York City. When establishing that festival’s goals in the first of many meetings together, I said to both John and Aaron that one of my goals of FringeNYC was to have a show on Broadway within five years. That happened with the Tony Award-winning “Urinetown”. My goal for being involved with the Hollywood Fringe Festival is to put Los Angeles on the international theatrical map by showing how supportive our audiences are, talented our artists are, plentiful our venues are and dedicated our hearts are.
This goal has already been achieved. Whether it’s acknowledged locally or not.
Ezra Buzington
I posted my own response at my blog: http://www.gedaly.com/blog/2010/07/dear-don-downer/ but I’ll post it here too.
We know that LA has an “excess of low-budget productions in small venues.” We know that the larger local arts institutions didn’t get involved in the Fringe. We also are well aware that many independent products, such as those in an uncurated festival, are not necessarily very good.
But hey, not all broadway shows are great either. I was able to see CATS at the Pantages a few months back and I must admit that it was the one of the worst — though most polished — pieces of turd I’d ever seen upon a stage. But I digress. Rants about Andrew Lloyd Webber will have to wait.
There have been several comments on your blog and other articles written in response. Many of them very eloquently stating the fact that LA artists were represented in great numbers – just not ones you knew of.
You mention that “A fringe festival needs a more established counterweight to seem like a true alternative.” I would venture to say that the established counterweight is already in place. It exists in the larger theaters you frequent, in the established companies in every part of town, the arts festivals in other parts of town, even the Hollywood Film Festival whose dates coincide with the Fringe. These are the skyscrapers that stand looming before the humble independent carpenters. The Fringe creates a free market of art.
You also say, “If you’re going to mount a theater festival in Hollywood, shouldn’t you make sure to include the best theater that Hollywood has to offer?” Remember too that this is not a theatre festival, it is an arts festival. The fringe is a tool to help us celebrate the arts. All of them. Together.
The word is bold for a reason. The Fringe festival brought us together. We celebrated our art together, we shared ideas together, we spent our time together. We cried, laughed, and drank together. We learned together. Relationships were created, nurtured, and strengthened.
So many artists, groups, and organizations produce all sorts of art without knowing what’s in their own backyard. Small artistic islands float in the Angelino Sea with no apparent desire to navigate the short distance between them. Then came the Fringe and built bridges, gave people boats, showed them that there is life outside and they are not alone.
You can give us facts and figures and others will respond with other facts and figures to rebut your argument, but this isn’t a numbers game. Art isn’t an intellectual exercise. It’s not about the head, this is about the heart.
To answer your previous question, yes, we hope that some of the best Hollywood has to offer is included. Is that the point? No. The Festival is here to promote community among artists, to build bridges between our islands, to promote and support emerging artists. So we can celebrate, share, hang out, cry, laugh, drink, and learn. Together.