S#!t I’m in Love with You again at Fringe

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Rachelle Elie from Ottowa, Ontario presented S#!t I’m in Love with You Again with musical accompaniment by Luke Jackson on acoustic guitar. Rachelle spoke about her mother’s care free attitudes about sex and then about her own early love life. Each stage off her love life was accompanied by an original song. The stage was set up with a glitter curtain and plenty of clothes for costume changes during the show.

When she found the man of her dreams she sang about the myriad of details of their married life. Things eventually slid south and affection turned to loathing. The honesty in this part of the show rang true as being absolutely sincere. The couple separated and went their own ways, but in time, they got together and discovered that there was still a spark despite their differences, thus the title of the show. I kept wondering about Luke. Was he the husband she was singing about or was he a lover? Unfortunately he was just a side note in her story, meant to be ignored except for his music.

I’ll give the show 5 out of 10 feather boas.

Thrones! The Musical Parody at Fringe

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I binge watched Game of Thrones with Pam Schwartz a few months ago. We were left wanting as another season needs to be written and filmed with the ominous news that “Winter is coming.” Of course in Florida that might not be as ominous. This Fringe show is about a rabid group of Thrones fans introducing a friend to the show. Like the show their introduction is gory, sensual and at times hilarious.

Several woman waiting to get into the show admitted that they had never
seem Game of Thrones. They wanted to see if they could follow the plot
regardless. Since the show is about the fans rather than the entire plot
of the series, they might have succeeded but knowing the story arch
would certainly help going in.

One entire song was themes around stabbing. In one sensual scene Ygritte sings that, “You know nothing Jon Snow.” Probably referring to his virginity. In another scene  Daenerys Targaryen kneels on the arm chair being penetrated from behind by her Dothraki husband Drogo. Her song is about wanting to see him face to face as they make love. In each of her songs she proclaims who she is and her destiny to rule the seven kingdoms. Her repetition becomes a running gag.

50% comedy, 20% simulated sex, 20% song and dance and 10% fast costume changes, and everyone dies, the show was a strange light hearted fun romp.

Weekend Top 6 Picks for June 9th and 10th

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Saturday June 9, 2018

8 a.m. to 1 p.m. Free. Parramore Farmers Market. On the east side of the Orlando City Stadium, across from City View. Purchase quality, fresh and healthy food grown in your own
neighborhood by local farmers, including Fleet Farming, Growing Orlando,
and other community growers.

1 p.m. too 4 p.m. Free. CLOWN NOSE WORKSHOP with Cheryl Ann Sanders. Valencia East Campus Building 3 Main Atrium/Lobby. To clown… or not to clown… that is the question. Clown nose can be a
great tool for any actor who is processing a scene, character, or any
physical choices. Comedy is one of the hardest crafts to master. Why?
Because we try too hard! What is funny? There are moments that make us
laugh every day, and they usually stem from the most ordinary and
simplistic acts. Learn how the clown nose can help you identify the most
honest moments, connect directly with your audience, obtain a greater
sense of timing, and gift you with a sense of safety as you embrace the
absurdity and vulnerability of life. Details and Requirements: •
participants should arrive early and be physically warm to start class
on time • long hair should be pulled back and secured away from the face
• clothing should be void of any logos or lettering, preferably solid
black, well fitting but unrestrictive, and depending on the classroom •
pictures, video, and note taking is both allowed and encouraged, but
please silence phones • participants will be led through a series of
exercises both individually and as small groups • participants will be
asked to go beyond their comfort zones • there is no right and wrong •
all supplies and props will be provided but must be returned.

5 p.m. to 7 p.m. $10 Saturday Open Studio. Orlando Artists League – Gallery/Studio 2636 W State Rd. 434, Longwood, Florida 32779. Join us for another open studio with
our model, Megan Crawford. Also, feel free to check out the artwork on display from our resident
artists!

Sunday June 10, 2018

10 a.m. to noon. Free. Heartfulness Relaxation and Meditation Class. University, 5200 Vineland Rd, Orlando, FL 32811. The Method of Heartfulness A simple and practical way to experience the heart’s unlimited resources.

1 p.m. to 4 p.m. Free. MOVEMENT TECHNIQUES – Forsythe with Rebekah Lane. Valencia East Campus Building 3 Room 113. In this three hour workshop we will explore the movement improvisation
tools developed by choreographer William Forsythe. We will take movement
and character impulses from images and expand those choices into
phrases and full movement scenes. This workshop is appropriate for all
movers – dancers and actors included.

Sponsored by Valencia College Theater and Valencia College Student Development.

6 p.m. to 8 p.m. $24.67 General Admission tickets $58.40 VIP seating in the first 3 rows, O-Town Produced and directed by David Lee.

A shorter version of O-TOWN: Voices from Orlando was Created for The 2017 Orlando International Fringe Festival and the Full Length World Premiere was Presented last June to benefit the #onepulsefoundation

This year, the event features Updated Material and Some Very Special Guests…

O-TOWN: Voices from Orlando is
a play comprised of stories, interviews and speeches from Orlando and
across the Globe collected during the weeks and months following the
Pulse Nightclub attack in Orlando.

O-TOWN was created and
directed by David Lee and features Local Orlando Theatre Artists: Peg
O’Keef, Alexander Mrazek, Mike Carr, Julie Carr, Matt Rush, Daniel
Cooksley, Sarah E Mathews, David S Monge, Fabiola Rivera, Janine Klein,
Jason Blackwater, Gabriella Juliet, Clark Levi and Jenn Gannon. I am excited to see Michael Marinachio play the part of Thor in the show.

This
year, the event will also feature: Barbara Poma (Pulse Nightclub Owner)
Neema Bahrami (Pulse Survivor) and The Orlando Gay Chorus.

Jon Bennett: Fire in the Meth Lab at Fringe

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Jon Bennett from Melbourne Australia wrote a play about his brother called Fire in the Meth Lab. His brother is in jail and in various letters he warned his brother not to write the show. In general this on man show was a coming of age story. We all have had siblings who acted like bullies. His brother was a life long bully. He showed us a clip from the Wonder Years, a TV show in which most people identify with the young boy Kevin. His brother identified with that young boys jerk of an older brother, Wayne. The older brother is picking up the younger brother after a date. Each time the younger brother reaches for the car door his jerk of a brother pulls away. The date watches the nonsense and the lad is mortified.

Jon’s brother did far worse, like sticking his dick in his brother’s ear. I can’t imagine. Things got silly when Jon shared clips from his brothers favorite pop star.  It was some Australian singer and the lyrics left little impression. He read some cards from the pop starts board trivia game and the answers were obscure and impossible to guess. Only a rabid fan might have a chance.

Things got serious when his brother decided to start a meth lab. A fire broke out and rather than leave the product to burn, his brother went in to save the meth. He then drove away before police arrived. When he was later picked up the police ordered him to get out of the car. He couldn’t. He had third degree burns and his flesh had melted onto the car seat effectively gluing him in.

Jon lost his pet dog and then befriended a dog down the street. He felt so close to this dog , that he decided to take him home. On that trek, a neighbors dog barked violently. He turned to the dog at his side and barked as well, in his mind saying “It is us against the world.” The dog misinterpreted his barking and lunged for his face, violently biting him and intending to kill. he woke up in a hospital bet with multiple stitches, deeply wounded. The dog was put down. Only much later did he learn that his brother had followed him on that day and saved his life from the attacking dog. His brother might have treated him like a jerk most of his life, but in the end brothers stick up for each other.

Eleanor’s Story: An American Girl in Hitler’s Germany

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Eleanor Ramrath Garner wrote an award winning memoir about her youth, surviving WWII as an American trapped in Nazi Berlin. GLAM, Global Arts Management from Fullerton California presented the show at this years Orlando Fringe Festival. In the play, the young Ingrid Garner pays tribute to her grandmother by telling her story as a one person historical drama.

In 1939 her grandfather decided he would move his family from New Jersey to Germany to pursue a lucrative job offer. On the boat trip over, war breaks out in Europe. By the time they dock, it is to late to turn back. The family became trapped for seven years in Hitler’s Germany. The young girl tries to blend into the new society even wanting to join the Hitler Youth. When teachers find out she is American she is punished for no good reason.

The actress did an incredible job of making air raids terrifying and visceral. Photos of the actual basements and bunkers mad the scenes even more real. The most terrifying moments came when Russian soldiers swept through her neighborhood at night. She could her women screaming as they were raped. She woke up feeling herself being pulled down towards the foot of the bed. A man loomed over her pulling at her bed clothes. Her mom screamed entering the room and waving their American passports. The Russians held the documents upside down, confused and indifferent, but decided to move on to easier prey.

The play is dark, showing the worst of humanity in times of war, but in the end there is hope for survival and a chance to rebuild. This was the most powerful drama I saw at this years Fringe Festival. It was the show I recommended any time a friend would ask for my recommendations.

Banned in the USA at Fringe

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Gerard Harris from London grew up watching James Bond films rather than become a spy, he ended up becoming a comic. Being a comic does involve some international travel and his one man show is about how he has been treated like a spy or threat by the world’s super powers when he travels. His one man show was about trying to get through airport security. The posters he designed for his Fringe show at the time were not a help. One was designed like a Cuban Soviet poster. The title of the show, Banned in the USA also didn’t help as he tried to get to this year’s Fringe.

The set consisted of a  was a red couch and a folding chair to hold his laptop computer. He seemed to be making the show up on the fly with the laptop as a back up for details he might have forgotten. He is a manic storyteller. He crawled all over the couch at one time sitting on the back as he told his tale. He used to work at a tech company and his boss who usually went to conferences to talk about the companies goals and mission was not able to go so Gerard was asked to go.

The entire show was about being held up in the airport and the struggle to try and get to the conference on time. The petty nature of international borders was the ongoing theme. At one point the office that could resolve his issues was just a few yards away  but it was in another country so he couldn’t stroll over for the answers. Despite his rapid fire delivery he started to run long and so he had to wrap up his story quickly at the end. We seemed to be the guinea pigs for a dinner party story he had told many times before he decided to convert it into a Fringe show as we watched.

Scum: A Manifesto at Fringe

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Scantily Glad Theatre from Saskatchewan Canada presented, Scum: A Manifesto which is a two woman show that takes a look inside the mind of Valerie Solanas, the mother of radical feminism and the woman who shot Andy Warhol. The premise is simple, Men are Scum who should be eliminated from the earth. Being male, I suppose I agree. Since these woman turned from men they needed to turn to each other for physical intimacy. They never quite pulled it off.

The Andy Warhol connection was visualized by a projection of Marylin Monroe‘s silkscreen print on the back wall of the theater. I imagine the corn Flakes boxes were synonymous with Warhol’s use of common day commercial items in his art. He was better known for soup cans one which did appear on a t-shirt. There were lots of on stage costume changes. One woman had street smarts and Valerie’s accent but she was sure any creative idea she had would be stolen. The other woman was a true radical wanting to kill all men. They were cut from the same bolt of cloth. Scenes revolved around everyday event like brushing their teeth and getting dressed. A bottle of booze was handed out to a woman in the audience and she ultimately finished it off by the end of the show.

I didn’t quite know what to make of the show since “my kind” being male and an artist, was under attack. There were a few funny moments and I laughed uncomfortably since I might be finished off at any moment.

Title and Deed at Fringe

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Kangagirl Productions in association with Susan Turner presented Title and Deed written by Will Eno and performed by David Lee. The one man show is a dry witty meditation on life. The character questions everything. What is his roll in life, does he belong? He begins by stating that “I am not from here.” He addressed the audience intimately yet was clearly set apart perhaps a foreigner. As an artist , being apart is needed for perspective, an outsider looking in. Perhaps that is his role but he also seems mundane and everyday.

The set consisted of two empty book cases and a backpack with a stick in it. I thought the stick might be a divining rod, but he used it to strike his leg multiple times to prove to himself that he had feelings. His was an existential dilemma which he shared with reckless abandon. David’s delivery was dry and monotone, at times getting a laugh from the audience. We all question our place in the world and this show was an open forum for those concerns. He points out the things in our everyday life that are difficult for an outsider. What is most important? Family, Career? What do we miss? How do we truly feel at home? Our society which runs at a mad efficiency might be missing a few things when viewed from a different perspective.

Another Year Passes at the Orange County Regional History Center

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I sketched the final day of the exhibit install for,
Another Year Passes: Orlando After the Pulse Nightclub Massacre. The Exhibit will be on display from June 2, 2018 through October 14, 2018. Last year’s exhibit honoring the victims of the
Pulse Nightclub shooting was only up for one week because a
wedding was booked in the exhibit hall. This year the exhibit will be up
for four months in a different space.

I was on hand to sketch the install of a huge piece of art created by Jeff Sonksen of

Paint the Trail fame. He paints
on wooden fencing and has created a long stretch of art along the biking
trail in Longwood, Florida. After the Pulse Nightclub massacre he
painted 49 portraits of the victims of the shooting.
The portraits surround a large fence panel that has the Orlando skyline
along with several tourist attractions in silhouette. The museum staff
had to remove the heavy and cumbersome wooden supports he used when he
left the panels freestanding at the Dr. Phillips
memorial in 2016. They devised a method of disassembling the panels so
it could be brought into the museum and installed for the exhibit that
is opening just two years after the fateful shooting on June 12, 2016.

Assembling and hanging the piece was a herculean task. The staff looked like the soldiers who raised the flag at

Iwo Jima in the famous WWII
photo and sculpture. The sign, along with a set of 49 beautiful
hand-painted tiles, however will not be present for a few days to the
public and will have to be taken down intermittently throughout
the exhibition to allow for weddings happening in the same space. If
isn’t up when you come, I recommend you come back another time to see
them. 

I walked through the exhibit and it is incredible, with so much
information about how this community continues to try and heal after the
tragedy. It wraps around the second floor hall bringing the walls close
for an intimate view. Over 1,800 images of quilts
from the Orlando Modern Quilt Guild were miniaturized and then
exhibited en mass together on one wall. The shear volume of colorful
quilts is staggering. A few of my sketches from oral histories are
scattered throughout the exhibit.


The museum staff have to be commended for again crafting an incredible exhibition.
The Orange County Regional History Center has received five significant national awards from the
American Alliance of Museums,
the American Association for State and Local History, and
the Southeastern Museum Conference for their work on the One Orlando
Collection in the last two years related to the impact and legacy of the
mass shooting at the Pulse nightclub on June 12, 2016. It is hard to
see their hard work needing to be compromised
against a funding initiative. It would be a great day when the museum
was well enough funded by the community so it no longer needed
income from weddings.

Weekend Top 6 Picks for June 2 and 3, 2018

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Saturday June 2, 2018

11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Beefy King 50th Anniversary. 424 N Bumby Ave, Orlando, FL 32803. I have heard there are some amazing deals at this Orlando iconic restaurant to celebrate 50 years in business.



5 p.m. to 10 p.m. Free. Virginia (Dr) is for Lovers of art, music, food & drink! Virginia Drive, Virginia Dr, Orlando, FL. Stroll Virginia Drive while enjoying local artists and vendors! Stop in
your favorite shops! Musicians Texas Outlaw – Jerry J and John Jude will
be located next to IBEW Local 606 along with SwedeDISH Food Truck,
Voodoo Kitchen Food Truck and Flapjacks Original. Frankie Messina will
be spinning your favorite songs at The Barefoot Spa Wine & Beer
garden! Come on out on Saturday, June 2 and support our small
businesses!

 8 p.m. to 10 p.m. Free. Shuffleboard. Orlando’s Beardall Courts 800 Delaney Ave Orlando FL. 1st Saturday of each month. Free fun! https://www.facebook.com/OrlandoShuffle?notif_t=fbpage_fan_invite

Sunday June 3, 2018

10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Free. Lake Eola Farmers Market. South East Corner of Lake Eola Park.

Noon to 1 p.m. Donation based. Yoga. Lake Eola Park near Red Gazebo. Bring your own mat.

Noon to 3 p.m. Donation based. Music at the Casa. Guitarists Troy Gifford and Chris Belt. Casa Feliz Historic Home Museum, 656 N Park Ave, Winter Park, FL 32789. Members of the public are invited to visit our historic home museum on a
Sunday afternoon from 12 to 3 pm, listen to live music and take a tour
of our historic home museum and the James Gamble Rogers II Studio by
trained docents.