Sub-Total
2023 Audience Reviews
Member Reviews
The following reviews were submitted by Fringe Member: Katherine DuGarm
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Company: EnCompass Theatre
Show: Funny, Like an Abortion
Venue: Rarig Center Arena
Powerful message
This play takes place in a not-too-distant future where abortions are illegal, listening devices are everywhere, and birth control is available to only a few people. I am glad to live in Minnesota where health care for women is still legal. This reminded me of the book The Handmaid's Tale (less singing than the opera and I haven't seen the tv show so can't compare.) It was unsettling that women ( and men and others) who knew medicinal properties of herbs were burned or drowned as witches, and knowledge was lost. There was more herbal knowledge than abortifacients-only. For some people it is better to lose knowledge than it is to know how to prevent or end a pregnancy even at the cost of a woman's life. The methods depicted in the show are not safe to try at home!
Company: Phina Pipia
Show: Ha Ha Da Vinci
Venue: Southern Theater
Multi-talented performer
Phina Pipia can do it all it seems - singing, playing the tuba, dancing, slight of hand, playing guitar! This was an enjoyable hour with Leonardo Da Vinci and a time travel machine.
Company: Chrisdavisdoesstuff
Show: CHRIS DAVIS DOES STUFF
Venue: Strike Theater
I hope Chris comes back to MN Fringe
Chris was funny and warm and knocked down stereotypes. The story of the first person he knew who had AIDS and the first person he knew who died of AIDS was moving. I hope that Chris' number comes up for him to participate in future Fringes.
Company: Nightfall Productions
Show: Fargo Allegro
Venue: Rarig Center Thrust
I got the jokes!
With too many adaptations at Fringe, I don't know the source material. I know Fargo, so caught the references. I kept laughing. The person who played Jean shuffled beautifully. The person who played Carl was in another play as the hawk puppeteer. Maybe not as much contrast as it seemed first - hawk or inept crook.
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Company: Ken Takata
Show: Butts in Seats: How to Get People to Attend Your Shakespeare Production by Having Musical Settings for the Lyrics in His Plays. Numerous Examples Included.
Venue: Mixed Blood Theatre
Lots of information
There was a lot of explanation for each song. I would have preferred less talking and more music. Let the compositions speak for themselves. I enjoyed the different flavors of each song and the different styles each singer brought to their songs.
Company: Wet Splat Productions
Show: 20,000 Leagues Under the Telltale Heart
Venue: Rarig Center Arena
Skilled actors
I liked the concept of these authors corresponding with each other. I wasn't expecting so much improv. The actors are skilled. Improv isn't usually to my taste and I rated on my taste, not on the actors skill.
Company: Thee & Me Productions
Show: Omar Khayyam Club
Venue: Rarig Center Thrust
Another poetry-based play
Is it just me, or are there many poetry themed plays this year? I learned about the poet/mathematician/astronomer Omar Khayyam, publishing and how a book goes viral in the mid-1800s, art styles, and women artists. From the menu on the program, it seems that the club had a pretty good dinner as well. I learned as much as in a lecture, but the format of the play made it easier to absorb. How did the British Museum get those poems that the friend copied for Edward Fitzgerald? Who did the copying, since it would have taken longer in the days of hand scribing than in our days of photocopiers? You will be both entertained and learn something when you go to The Omar Khayyam Club.
Company: Wells Farnham
Show: Wells Is Third On The Waitlist
Venue: Augsburg Studio
Tears of Laughter
At times when Wells was summarizing his friend's imaginary movie franchise I was laughing of hard I cried. I appreciate the respect Wells has for librarians who work in taxpayer-funded Blockbuster, IIRC.
Company: Paper Soul
Show: NPC! (Non-Player Character)
Venue: Rarig Center Xperimental
Difficult start
I was doubtful at the beginning because of the constant repeating of the video game script. I had faith in Motz-rhymes-with-boats ability and was rewarded. We learned about roller coasters and d.j.ing weddings. This year more than in the past, I felt like Motz made himself so vulnerable to us. Wow.
Company: Black Lives Black Words International Project
Show: Baldwin's Last Fire
Venue: Theatre in the Round
Baldwin as an action figure
I enjoyed seeing James Baldwin and Park as investigators. The other actors took on a variety of roles sometimes fun sometimes serious. There was one actor who sometimes stood on a platform above to stage and I had trouble hearing him because the background music drowned him out. Black words matter. It was interesting to see how racism in France is similar to an different than racism in the U.S.
Company: Kyle B. Dekker
Show: Audacious Ignatius: Lost in Atlantis
Venue: Theatre in the Round
An Entertaining Look at a Minnesota Man
I wish all history lessons were this entertaining. I learned about the racist nature of Atlantis, who was a Baconian, and the power of hubris. Will this play be coming soon to a History Center near you? I. L. Donnelly believed the myth of the American hero, and not in the power of the collective.
Company: John Heimbuch
Show: Gilgamesh
Venue: Theatre in the Round
Something new each time I hear this
This is the second or third time that I've seen this play. It bears seeing multiple times. Things I didn't pick up on last time were the repeated use of "six days. and seven nights" or the story of how Utnapishtam(sp?) came to be where he is. I recommend seeing it at this Fringe and then seeing it again the next time John Heimbuch does Gilgamesh.
Company: David Graham
Show: The Spell of the Yukon
Venue: Rarig Center Arena
Memory box of poems
This was more than reciting poems, it felt like the poems were told as stories as well.
Company: Viet Nguyen
Show: Reincarnation Soup
Venue: Southern Theater
Starting with the best
I was moved by so many of the vignettes in this play. I could see each of the characters, whether an old man, a young boy, an older woman. The framework of waiting in a line in hell tied the individual parts together. This is Fringe at its best!