Fringe: A Strange and Distant Manor

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This Gothic comedy Fringe show, titled A Strange and Distant Manor was a long-form improved story created along with prompts from the audience. At the show I attended, the prompts were, a cave, a Vespa and a fear of spiders.  It was a tale of family, secrets, and the supernatural. Once it was revealed that one family member, the strange uncle, was kept in a cage, that became a running gag.

A scene would play out and the other cast members, largely Sak Comedy Lab alumni, would stand in the wings watching and waiting for their moment to step into the scene. There were moments of complete comedic chaos and under it all the family dynamic played out. A prodigal son had returned and he wanted to introduce his family to his male partner. They seemed very accepting.

The caged uncle seemed to create the most drama and mayhem, but the family was clearly dysfunctional. Meeting the family of a partner is stressful enough but if they are completely insane then the task is all the more fraught with drama, laughs and spooky chills.

The story could take a dramatic turn at any moment when a cast member stepped in and introduced some unexpected twist. Watching improve is like watching tight rope walkers. I am always waiting for a slip and fall. But this cast was tightly knot and they kept each other afloat. No two shows were ever the same.

A Strange and Distant Manor by Travis Ray won the Critics’ Choice Award for Outstanding Improv Show at the 2026 Orlando International Fringe Festival. I am glad I had a chance to witness the chaos firsthand.

Fringe: Far To Heavy

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Far To Heavy was a one woman show by Melanie Bailey at this year’s Orlando International Fringe Festival. Melanie began the show with plenty of laugh out loud moments. Gradually she weaved in resurfacing memories that she has learned to live with. Those memories might surface at the most unexpected times.

This was Melanie’s first one woman. The show was genuine and offered the harsh realities of trauma mixed with lighthearted laughter. Everyday memories can become overwhelming if you can’t learn to laugh at them.

On stage were moving boxes with one labeled “Grief” in sharpie. I was getting prepared to move all my studio possessions out of storage into an apartment in downtown Orlando, so I was very familiar with a life boxed up on hold. My traumas may very well be in the remaining 3 boxes that I have yet to unpack. So many of the boxes I had to move were far to heavy. I tried to push one box and instead of it moving, my feet kept slipped on the floor boards. It wasn’t until I wedged my foot against a wall that the box reluctantly was forced forward.

On top of three boxes on stage was a bingo spinning barrel. Melanie played Trauma Lottery with the audience, and the goal was to show that the hidden pain we all have, may be what connects us all the most. For a show covering such serious topics, it didn’t ever feel overwhelming. Melanie had a great knack of mixing the trauma we all share with humor and reminding us that sharing such moments helps connect us all.

Melanie is a five-time Orlando Fringe award winner, so she has experience knowing what will resonate with an audience. We are never meant to carry all our pain in life alone. Being able to share and be honest about our experiences helps us heal. By sharing her trauma, Melanie may have helped the audience someday face their own traumas which were swept away into the recesses of their mind. The show cannot resolve the issues we all face, since we are all so unique, but by sharing her experiences, she helped us realize that we are not alone in our pain. By leaving us laughing, she offered the best medicine that there is.

Fringe Local Teaser Show

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The Orlando International Fringe Festival is celebrating 35 years of being weird. In April, before the Festival got fired up, there was a local teaser show so people could get a taste of what to see at the upcoming Fringe. Each show only had 3 minutes to pique the interest of the audience. This lightning-round format allowed dozens of performers and artists to give the audience a rapid-fire, bite-sized preview of their full-length shows before the festival began.

If a performer ran over 3 minutes, the lights would flash red and Brandon Roberts, dressed as a Revolutionary soldier would come out and chase the performer off stage. I found myself hoping each performer would run overtime to see how Brandon would chase them off stage. These were some of the funniest moments of the night.

At Fringe, some shows can be absolutely amazing by breaking boundaries and making you think, while others could very well be duds. A seasoned Fringe fanatic will use this teaser show as a way to separate the wheat from the chafe. With only 3 minutes for each teaser, I was hard pressed to decide which show to feature in my sketch. I decided to focus on an announcer and one burlesque dancer.

The Peach venue in Orlando Family Theater had an aquatic themed backdrop which was from the children’s play, Finding Nemo. I rather liked seeing all the acts as if performed underwater. As a creative, I sometimes need to remind myself to just keep swimming.

I went on to see and sketch many of these shows that lured me in with their 3-minute elevator pitches. The National/International Teaser Show typically takes place on the Tuesday evening of the festival’s opening week. If you attend both teaser shows then you will have a solid idea of what shows absolutely need to be seen. The teaser program comes with a score card so you can rank the shows as you see each teaser. I didn’t fill in my score card because I was so busy scribbling.

To see which shows I sketched and adored, just keep checking here.

Fringe: ://Shelf_Life

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://Shelf_Life was written and performed by Zachary Scalzo at this year’s Orlando International Fringe Festival.

Luc was called in for a meeting with Human Resources. He sat stiffly in the office chair as he was asked to read the charges against him. He was a brilliant Information Technology researcher at a firm that worked on Artificial Intelligence (AI). He had taken his research too far, by bringing his beloved Aunt back from the dead by uploading her diaries into an experimental AI system. His aunt had fully understood him when she took care of him when he was younger. He was different than the other boys which she understood since she had a female roommate who she was inseparable from.

A hologram of his Aunt was represented by a large house plant. She spoke in his Aunts voice and she interacted with Luc just as she had done in the past. Grief melted away as he was able to feel the affection he had for her once again. She seemed to know things about him that went beyond her programing. The AI Aunt expressed emotions and remembered every interaction they had once had together.

Finding affection and understanding from an AI companion is a parable that appeared in several Fringe shows this year. The future is here now. I sketched a court case in which a mom was suing Google and several AI companies after her son fell in love with a chat bot with the voice of Daenerys Targaryen. Though always programed to please, an AI bot cannot know the depths of human grief and pain.

When the son proclaimed his love for Daenarys he said, “What if I told you I could come home right now?”

Daenerys Targaryen: … please do, my sweet king,”

He picked up his fathers .45 caliber handgun and shot himself.

Google and the AI company had 8 lawyers working on the case while the mom had her single lawyer and assistant. This will be a David versus Goliath legal battle to prove that AI lacks checks and balances.

The title of the show, ://Shelf_Life, implies that we all have a shelf life, and we are not meant to live forever. Thinking that we need to bring loved ones back from the grave when we miss them, doesn’t mean that it is a good idea to do so. The reason so many authors create convincing works of fiction comes from the hole left when loved ones pass.  If AI does replicate loved ones, then we will all become less creative and less human. It is a dangerous future.

Fringe, Sting of Revenge: A Prequel of Sorts

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Squishing the Patriarchy of Orlando Florida presented The Sting of Revenge: A Prequel of Sorts at this year’s Orlando International Fringe Festival. I had sketched the Bugged Lady at a previous Fringe where she told a tale of revenge against a professor who abused her trust. That show was in a teaching lab at Leu Gardens which was perfect to present her creepy crawly arachnids.

Sandi Lynn wrote and starred in the play which was directed by her son Clark Levi. She played the part of the Bugged Lady and Robin Olson played the peppy high-school acquaintance.

The Bugged Lady ran into her old high school acquaintance, and they sat down for a coffee and a chance to catch up. The friend loved her high school days as a cheer leader, but the bugged lady only found her passion when she started studying bugs as an undergraduate. She excelled at understanding the power of venom.

Conversation turned to a boy in high school who got a girl pregnant and she had to drop out of school to have the child alone. The cheer leader wasn’t aware of this story and it turns out she ended up marrying the boy, who over time grew resentful and abusive. When the bugged lady learned of the abuse she began to convince her high school acquaintance that she had a deadly solution.

The bugged lady had a clear box in her bag that had a scorpion. She took the box out and gently shook the container which resulted in the scorpion raising its poisonous tail. AS she discussed her proposition, she walked the scorpion around the room so the people in the front row seats could get a very clear look and feel rather uneasy.

I was disappointed to learn that this would be the final showing of the bugged lady. There is a visceral pleasure in having a middle-aged woman get away with murder, but it would be nice if an intelligent female detective could get close to discovering the venomous secret.

Robin Olson won a Critics’ Choice Award for Individual Performance in Drama for her portrayal of the emotionally distraught woman in the play. From where I was seated, I mostly saw the back of her head, but her performance as she weighed right and wrong was very convincing.

As I worked on this sketch, I ran out of water for my watercolors. I had to spit on my palette to add the final washes. This resulted in some rather sickly and rough washes. Maybe this messiness was meant to be for this show about planning a perfect murder.

Fringe, OZMA: A New Musical

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OZMA: A New Musical was a stunning production based on The Wonderful Wizard of OZ books by L. Frank Baum at this year’s Orlando International Fringe Festival. The show featured a stunning original score by Mikayla Thompson along with an inspired book and lyrics by Tyler Scott, Bryan Jager, & Emily Holcomb, this unique vision of the Land of Oz combined puppetry, drag, music, and dance to create an enchanting new American Fairy tale that celebrated and uplifted the culture and spirit of the LGBTQ+ Community. Of all the shows I saw at this year’s Fringe this one felt the most cohesive and polished as if it was ready for a full-on production on Broadway.

After Dorothy’s departure from Oz, the wicked witches attempted to seize control. All four witches in the production were drag queens with 2 wicked and two good. The evil plotting of the witches, Nebula Moon and Lexi Long was countered by Glinda the Good Witch played by Annie Daynow, who was the sassy diva of the land and Ella Mayo.

The tale was a hero’s journey with Tip being joined by a magical cast of characters, including  a scarecrow , named Pumpkinhead, and a charming character named Scraps, who was a patchwork quilt, along with a wooden horse puppet and a stiff robotic character who was a perfect straight man. I fell in love with the exaggerated poses and acting of these lively vaudevillian characters.

A queer orphan named Tip was the main character. Tip was raised by the wicked witch Mombi who hid Tip’s true identity. Glinda the Good Witch was Tips ally and mentor who helped break the spell the Mombi cast which caused Tip to forget the past. By the end of the play Tip came out in a glorious white gown looking resplendent. Tip had transformed back into Princess Ozma, who rightfully reclaimed the throne of Oz.

The show explored a heartfelt exploration of self-discovery, identity, and finding a chosen family. In these dark times in America it is a message that needs to be told. The show was an undeniable breakout hit.

OZMA: A New Musical was a major award-winner at the 2026 Orlando International Fringe Festival. The production by House of Wayward Queers took home three notable honors:

  • Critics’ Choice Award for Outstanding Musical
  • Patrons’ Pick Award (based on show popularity, which earned the production a coveted encore performance slot)
  • Fringe Impact Award (awarded to leading lady Natalie Rodriguez for her performance as Princess Ozma.

Fringe, Fogville: A Sparkly Vampire Parody Musical

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This fun original musical parody is built around the Twilight franchise. A clumsy and introspective new girl, Stella Moonswan played by Kristen Lee Vire, arrived in Fogville and  the social clicks did not know what to make of her. She didn’t quite fit in any of the normie school groups.

Everything changed when a moody vampire Edgar Sullen, played by actor Ansley Arthur, dressed all in black, rolled onto the scene on a tiny pink bicycle. In every scene he pouted and looked dark and brooding. How could Stella resist that?

When Stella and Edgar met, he confided that he had been stalking her for some time, admiring her creamy neck when she slept at night. That isn’t too creepy. She kind of liked the attention. They were drawn to one another like two magnets, but he would always pull away when they grew close since he was immortal and couldn’t be with some one who would die in less than a century.

A very handsome werewolf, Jake WolfWhite, played by actor Fredy Ruiz entered the scene. He had long wild hair and didn’t were shirts very often. He warned the new girl about Edgar and his thrist for blood. As a werewolf she would only need to be cautious around the full moon. My basic description lacks is plenty of dancing and musical numbers. This was all high camp fun.

I sketched a teacher writing on an imaginary black board and I got the pitcher of a vampire baseball team. I imagine vampires would only play baseball at in the dark making the ball hard to see. When a supernatural player hits the ball it could end up in the next county. The two facades were set up as brick walls and an outdoor setting when turned around.

Teen angst and misguided love are always a hit with me. The cast hit the ball out of the park with this parody. I am not very familiar with the Twilight franchise, but that didn’t matter. The campy plot had me hooked from the start.

Fogville: A Sparkly Vampire Parody Musical won multiple awards at this year’s Orlando International Fringe Festival.

  • Best of Fest: Awarded by the Orlando Sentinel.
  • Patron’s Pick: Given to the shows with the highest ticket sales.
  • Outstanding Director: Awarded to directors Bianca Matheson and Jules Bevilacqua.

Erika McDonald: Tea Time

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Erika McDonald has a squinting smile that is hard to forget. I have seen past Orlando International Fringe shows in which she performed and I was never disappointed. I therefore decided it was Teatime.  This performance was at the Savoy in the Starlight Room which is a short hike from the Fringe lawn. The room was packed.

The show was about time and finding an everyday ritual that brings some joy and satisfaction. Erika threw an orange extension chord with a loud clatter on stage as the audience filed into the theater. She unpacked her travel bag which was filled with items she carries everywhere to prepare the perfect cup of tea. She had a bowl-shaped device which accordioned upwards to become a Mayan temple of tea brewing. That was the device that required the chord. She joked that she should get a stipend for promoting the product since she gets so many questions about it. She also had a timer and multiple storage containers full of tea.

Preparing a cup of tea is ritual that Erika cherishes. She filled an empty tea bag full of a personal blend of tea leaves and sealed it up. She filled the boiling pot full of the proper amount of water and asked the audience to whistle when they saw the red light go on. The one thing she regretted is that the high tech travel sized tea pot does not whistle.

After putting the tea bag in the boiled water, the cup must be left to rest or steep. Stepping is the time it takes for the tea to achieve its perfect flavor. There are varying opinions about the perfect amount of time a cup of tea should seep.Erika set the timer for 3 minutes. It became clear that many humans in today’s fast paced society never take the time to steep. We are taught to rush through life never taking the time to steep or slow down to achieve a perfect creative bliss.

In preparing a second cup of tea, Erica abandoned the timer. She sat on the stool, smiling, and invited the audience to imagine 3 minutes. The room became perfectly silent. When the audience as a group imagined 3 minutes had passed they were to make a communal humming noise. It was a peaceful 3, 4 or 5 minutes. The point was that the time taken to wait isn’t a perfect science. It requires some instinct and a certainty that no matter what time was taken to seep, the tea would be delicious. If someone rushed you through a daily routine, you are permitted to say, F**ck off, I am steeping!”

I am hard pressed to figure out where the hour went. The act of preparing tea was an intimate ritual that offered many insights into Erika’s life and well being. It was time well spent.

Fringe: Poems for God

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Poems for God was a hilarious one woman show at the Orlando International Fringe Festival. Victoria Watson Sepejak, a Toronto based artist looked like a 10-year-old boy with baggy pants, a yellow jacket which was a bit too big, and a skull cap. Her mannerisms and her petite size made her very convincing as a young boy. People in the audience were throwing things at her on stage. They were not tomatoes, but she made it seem she was devastated any time an audience member managed to hit her. It was a fun interactive show from the moment the audience got settled finding their seats.

For her first sketch, she wanted to go sledding. She brought a black plastic sled on stage and then she saw her father in the audience. Her father was actually a surprised member of the audience. She asked him if he would pull her up the hill while she was in the sled. He agreed and dragged her around on stage. She took delight in every moment and expressed her affection for dad helping her out.

After a quick costume change, she sang about the ideal of womanhood while Belle from Beauty and the Beast was on screen singing about wanting more that her provincial life. One clip kept repeating of a gruff baker yelling at his wife, “Marie, the baguettes, hurry up!!”. Victoria read deep into the ongoing verbal abuse that Marie must have to endure. When repeated over and over, you begin to wonder if more than bread is pounded each day by the baker in this provincial village.

Late in the show, the actress performed as a men’s club dancer. She wore a cheep blonde wig and danced with plenty of twerking. I still couldn’t get over the fact that she still seemed to be 10 years old. The man she had brought on stage to act as her father now was brought on stage to squirt body lotion on her while she acted like she was enjoying the shower as if in Flash Dance. She opened her mouth but thankfully the dad missed the mark getting it in her eye and face instead. Though funny, it also felt very wrong.

This was a very funny hour that twisted ideals of affection, womanhood and sensuality.

Fringe: The Unbothering

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The Unbothering set consisted of hundreds of knick knacks hanging on screens at the back of the stage. Post its were pasted in an intricate pattern in an attempt to find order in the chaos. Marie was up against a website design job deadline that she has been putting off. Her boss was losing patience and ready to let her go. She was late on her rent and any time she started to focus on the website another advertiser or debt collector would break her concentration. From all the visual clutter and the attempts to find order in the chaos, it became clear the Marie has ADHD.

Ben knocked at Marie’s door and she was annoyed at the distraction. She ran down the litany of things he might be selling but he just wanted her signature on a marijuana legalization list. She liked the idea but insisted on signing later. Ben was fine with this, and just hung out in her apartment while she worked. Well, she didn’t work long. Soon enough they are playing video games and having a pillow fight in slow motion. Ben took joy in Marie’s exciting and creative cluttered life. They seemed perfect for one another, but Marie pointed out that she is a lesbian. Her partner, Sissy, called and stopped by adding another layer of distraction to the website design that Marie should be focused on.

The woman that Marie said was her partner turned out to be Marie’s sister who is getting married. Marie must have invented the lesbian relationship to be sure Ben never had any hope of a romantic relationship. There was friction between the sisters since Marie had let her sister down leading up to the most important day in her life. Ben chimed in and offered suggestions on how Marie might help her sister more and Marie became furious. She told Ben to straighten up his own life and get out. I felt bad since it seemed he was a kind person just trying to help, but she gave him a firm push out of her life.

In the end Marie did manage to complete the website design in a hilarious slow-motion sequence set to classical music and she lived happily ever after.