13 Dead Dreams of “Eugene” at the Fringe

Posted on by Thor

X-Files meets The Twilight Zone in the dark! Fringe veterans, Paul Strickland and Erika Kate MacDonald  team up in this creepy
flashlight and shadow play with original songs. “13 Dead Dreams of Eugene” is based on the true story of a body that was found in Sabina on June 6, 1929. The unidentified dead man was
50 to 80 years old was
found on the 3C highway
near the Borum Road. The only
identification that
could be found on him
was a slip of tablet
paper with the address
1118 Yale Ave.,
Cincinnati written on
it. The Cincinnati
police checked the
address and found it was
a vacant lot. The
closest man to this
address was a man named
Eugene Johnson and for
this reason the unknown
man was given the name
of “Eugene.” It became known as the Sabina Mummy. It
was placed on display in hopes of identification. That’s when the Dead
Dreams began. Experience the shared recurring nightmares that haunted
one sleepy Ohio town, and the stranger-than-fiction story of “Eugene.” No one ever came to claim the body and it wasn’t buried until 1964.

I made special arrangements with the performers to let them know I would sketch the show from the back row to avoid letting any member of the audience see that I was creating this sketch. Pam and I arrived winded because we had gone to the wrong venue and had to run across Lock Haven Park to try and get to Dead Dreams before the doors closed. A woman seated in front of us gave us a high five for our winded enthusiasm. Get sat down and the theater immediately went black.

A slow ghostly voice began talking about the experience of being dead. He recalled his wake, the people crying and learning about his family from fragments of conversations. The dead lack memories so they linger to find out what they can. Eugene was a black man who had been murdered. He was never identified, and his murderer was never found. His body was on display in the town of Sabina for decades, a macabre side show attraction. After the body went on display, people in the town began having recurring nightmares and these were written down for posterity. Town’s people didn’t like to recall those nightmares. Once written they were filed away to be archived and forgotten. Paul and Erika however kept asking about these memories and they were finally given access to the recorded nightmares found in a cardboard box. Those documents are the foundation around which they built the show.

Flashlights, rear projections and string silhouettes are used to recount the tales. Much of the time the room is pitch black with just the ghostly words to carry the tales. This show is Fringe at it’s best. Solid story telling wrapped in mysterious light and original song. Definitely a “must see show” at this year’s Fringe.

812 E Rollins St, Orlando, FL 32803. Tickets are $12 plus a $10 Fringe button needed to get into any Fringe Show.

10:45 PM 

7:15 PM 

5:30 PM

4:45 PM

Evacuated at Fringe.

Posted on by Thor

Erika Kate MacDonald told an unforgettable story of her time in Indonesia as an exchange student at Fringe this year. She recreated the bustle and excitement of the crowded city, often stopping to explain what some exotic word might mean. She was so well versed in the language and culture that she might forget to explain every nuance.

To explain the beauty found in the culture she decided to sing a song about a popsicle.  The song was so lyrical and moving but was only about walking with a frozen desert. 

Erika described an evening as she tried to go to sleep. In the corner of the room was a strange scraping sound; something was trying to climb the wall. it would get half way up and then collapse back down to the ground. She lay in bed terrified not sure what to do. So, she decided to research what it might be. She never found the answer but the book fell out of her hands and crushed whatever it was. 

She described an evening swimming in the pool with friends and seeing what looked like shooting stars. The flashes came at regular intervals until she finally realized that they weren’t stars at all. The flashes were actually bats flying through the spot lights. There was magic and mystery all around her.

Then came a day when all the TV stations showed news of uprisings in Jakarta. In a particularly jarring scene with flashing colored club lights, Erica recreated a plea of a woman telling everyone to get out of the country, that foreigners were not welcome. Foreigners had to be evacuated. The exchange students went to the airport as fast as they could with the help of others, but flights were booked. They returned day after day trying to escape. The uncertainty and fear of the students and parents became visceral in her telling.

This show had me on the edge of my seat the entire time. This kind of straight forward storytelling is why the Fringe Festival is so magical. Personal experience can come alive when played out on the stage.

Tails to Tall for Trailers presented small town humor at the Fringe.

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ManDamsel and FellaLady from Covington, Kentucky presented Tales Too Tall for Trailers. Comedian and Storyteller Paul Strickland and Erika Kate MacDonald joined forces in this off-kilter musical family
comedy! Funny songs, strange southern stories, shadow puppetry, a pet
named “Peeve” and more! Pee-Wee Herman meets Mark Twain in this final
installment of Strickland’s “Trailer Park Trilogy.”

The show began with Paul on guitar and Erika joined in with hysterical lyrics. My favorite part of the show however was when they set up a simple shadow puppet stage with a bed sheet and clothes line. Erica sat down behind the sheet with a bright light just behind her shoulder. Paul acted as the narrator in front of the screen. The tale was set in a tiny town with a tiny post office. To create the post office Erika took an envelope and opened it up to create the roof. She cut a rectangle out of the bottom and that became the doorway. To create a home, the rectangle wan moved up to the roof where it became a chimney.

I now wish I had sketched this magical shadow puppetry segment of the show. What I enjoyed the most was watching Erika’s reactions to the audience. She had a sort of childish joy that most adults loose over time.  I took the most delight in watching her face light up. She used the screen with cinematic grace. Often she would zoom in on a character by moving it closer to the light, the result being scenes that constantly moved and breathed with life. The show was a fun hour filled with music and laughs.