We are so very honored to inspire the first collaboration between LA Weekly and Back Stage for coverage of the inaugural Hollywood Fringe Festival. Both publications are featuring over 40 reviews from shows premiering during our first weekend online with a selection of reviews in each printed publication.

Special thanks to Steven Leigh Morris and Dany Margolies for their support and wisdom. I am sure our audiences appreciate their guidance in navigating this massive celebration of emerging art.

Without further introduction, I present to you…

The LA Weekly Reviews
The Back Stage Reviews

Ben

Greetings, all-

Another Fringe day…and here I am writing you past 2:30am, sitting on a Fringe Central couch amidst the bitter remains of kicked kegs and wildly unsorted flyers (seriously, I spend half my life sorting your flyers).

A few themes of the day:

• The hand gesture of a plane taking off – seemingly to represent the the uptick in house sizes
• Various jokes involving flyers and flyering (there is no proper way to spell that word)
• Everyone seems to be talking about crack/meth heads – not sure why
• Ever more exotic pronunciations of the word “Edinburgh”

This was the biggest, most badass Monday in LA theatre history – and you are all the players. And yes, I will plug it again: End your night at Fringe Central where the beer flows and the gods swoon.

Don’t worry, not gonna tell you how much I love you tonight.

Ben

(serious news time)

FREE/PWYC SHOWS
Thanks for all your submissions. We have posted a free/pwyc link of free shows. It’s been a harried day, so if I missed anyone’s show or misrepresented your PWYC details, please let me know: http://www.hollywoodfringe.org/learn/content/342 Got some free/pwyc shows to announce? Send an email to support – god knows we don’t get enough emails.

AWARDS
So a quick course corrections in awards … thanks to those of you who didn’t say outright the original plan was a bad idea. Turns out it was very bad – don’t say we don’t listen to those of you who don’t mind calling us out on bad ideas. I am going to make a proper post about this tomorrow (too tired now), the gist of the matter is this: We are moving to a peer-reviewed system where every registered participant project will receive a ballot. As I said, more info in the harsh light of day.

FRINGE JAM
Tonight was the largest jam yet and MC’d by the inimitable Kent Valentine of the British Invasion featuring the piano stylings of James Sherwood. Thanks to a rocking set by kings of comedy Booth & Pat, the stand up of Abie Philbin Bowman (sans the Jesus jumpsuit), the comedy assault of Jim Smallman (apparently I look like Hugh Grant on steroids…not gonna live that one down anytime soon), and more laughs and larks from BI and beyond (can I interest anyone in yet another interpretive dance?). The end was a perfect love song to Fringe (and the potential finale of our imminent documentary), 30 jammers on stage, singing “We are the Champions” to an audience of no one. That was the single Fringiest moment thus far…thank god we have it on tape.

REVIEWS
The reviews are in – check out the online versions of LA Weekly and Backstage for reviews for over 40 shows in the Fringe. Take what you can to market your shows for the rest of the Fringe. Suggestion: Print many copies of key parts of your reviews (preferably the favorable parts), and staple them to your pre-existing flyers. This is what people do…in Fringes. We have also seen scores of reviews from LAist, LATheatreReview.com, and the constant and wondrous coverage from Bitter-Lemons.com. And, of course…the ever developing Fringe Reviews from members of your community: http://www.hollywoodfringe.org/reviews

Yes, these emails are getting more and more bizarre…but there is a crackhead in the lobby.

Another day of Fringe! I would like to take a quick opportunity to point out some of the things that I am personally loving about this experience thus far:

• I am seeing a lot of young people. Knowing that our art forms have hope for the future – and that we as a community have something to do with it – gives me very warm feelings.
• Many of you are telling me you are having a lot of fun. In the end this is what our little project here is all about. I don’t think many of us are under the illusion that we are going to earn Trump dollars from this. The act and joy of making art itself can be a wonderful reward – I think we all know what I am talking about here.
• Community is really happening. We see this every night at Fringe Central as artists, patrons, and community gather here for drinks, laughs, and jam. It’s rewarding to know that Fringe has already fostered relationships that had hence not existed
• Perhaps this is a strange thing to hear me say, but I am overwhelmed with the quality of the shows we have been seeing. You wonderful Fringe people are making wonderful work on non existent budgets. This is a testament to all of you – your work has been well worth it.

Thanks for reading that … a little self indulgent gushing, but it’s from the heart. I love you guys, what can I say? Now for the “serious” news…

FRINGE CENTRAL
Jam is happening. Check out this video from our new friends at The British Invasion in their first stint hosting the nightly Fringe Jam at Fringe Central. And I will say it again: $2 beers and the BEST sangria in town made by the wonderful Abbie Wagoner. We are here every night until 2am, so stop by after your shows to see our budding community in action. Each night the Jam is a little different – last night for example, we had an hilarious game in which everyone took part – it was called “The Game is Called Standup”. You kinda needed to be there to experience the hilarity, so be there next time!

CORRESPONDENCE INTERVIEWS
Keeping up with our crack fringe reporters? We are interviewing 6-8 producers a day and posting them all on YouTube. Check them out, it’s great stuff. It’s a great way to learn more about shows going on in the Fringe. Thanks to Fringe publicist Stacy Jones and James Babiarz for doing a ton of work putting these together.

FREE SHOWS
Are you trying to attract audience for your show through “free admission” or “pay what you can”? We will be posting daily listings of free/pwyc shows starting tomorrow – so send us a line at [email protected] to be included.

REVIEW THESE SHOWS!
If you are reading this now, you have probably seen a good handful of Fringe shows. Today, we posted a running list of reviews written to date. We need your voice! The #1 complaint I am hearing from patrons is that they are having a hell of a time selecting shows to see with so many options. To support ourselves, we must establish a peer reviewing culture. So if you see a show, take 5 minutes and express your thoughts. To review a show, click “add your review” on the show page of the show you just saw. This is important, folks!

GAVIN WORTH ART SHOW
Most of you are familiar with our friendly mascots The Fringe Freaks. The creator of the Freaks – Mr. Gavin Worth – has a happening art show at Fringe Central. His work is selling fast – so if you are interested in an investment in some wonderful art, stop by and consider taking one home.

T-SHIRTS
As I mentioned before, we printed a very limited run of these. Many of you have expressed interest in purchasing a few for your casts (buy 9 get one free). Please let us know your intension asap so we can put them aside for you – we are selling dozens a day and they will run out very soon.

Here’s a little update from all of us at the Fringe Team to all of you in Fringe land. Don’t hesitate to stop by Fringe Central anytime…we pretty much sleep there, so someone should be there to assist you.

Happy Fringing!

Ben

REVIEWS
We have made a few changes to how paneling for the Fringe works, including (controversial) anonymous reviews, automatic approval, and a published list of panelists. Read more…

FRINGE CENTRAL
For those of you who’d like a place to hang out where the beer flows freely and the laughs go on to the wee hours of the evening, stop by Fringe Central at 1625 N Las Palmas (entrance on Las Palmas, walk around to the West side of the building). We have a bar/cafe and lots of cheer and with a $5 Fringe Card, you can drink for the duration of the Fringe for $2 a beer.

Let me repeat that: $2 per beer! You cannot find a better deal in Los Angeles anywhere.

FRINGE JAMES hosted by THE BRITISH INVASION
At 11:30pm every night through the 23rd, we are hosting the FRINGE JAMS hosted by our friends across the pond with the British Invasion. Have a bit of your show you’d like to stage in front of a well-lubricated audience? Stop by the Fringe Jam (free & no reservation required) and laugh it up. You can come and leave as you please – talk to some new friends, do a piece from your show, and have a few drinks. New at the bar today: Delicious sangria. nice.

VISIBILITY STAGING
Thanks to everyone who came out today. We set up a little impromptu faire in the Egyptian Courtyard to draw in families and tourists passing by. From this point forward, show up anytime during the following slots (no reservation needed) and promote your show. Feel free to bring set pieces, costumed actors, dance performances – come anytime and do anything. The Egyptian Courtyard is located directly east of the intersection of Hollywood and Las Palmas on the south side of Hollywood blvd.

We have the space during these slots:

• 1pm to 7:30pm June 20;
• 2pm to 7:30pm 21, 22, 23, 24 and 25
• 11am to 7pm June 26
• 2pm to 5pm June 27

CORRESPONDENCE
We have posted our first correspondence video. Check out your fellow participants in interview mode.

T-SHIRTS
Supplies are very limited and they are going fast. There won’t be another chance to own the 2010 official Fringe T-shirt available at Fringe Central (1625 N Las Palmas). Want to buy a bunch for your cast? Buy 9 and get number 10 for free.

OPENING PARTY SLIDESHOW IN LA WEEKLY
Send these links to all your friends and tweet facebook all about. If we get a lot of views, it will be featured on the LA Weekly website:

• Slide Show 1
• Slide Show 2

We’ve made a few changes to how paneling works based on some feedback we are receiving…

First off, we have made the application project automatic. No more waiting for an overworked fringe staffer to approve you – you are automatically approved to start reviewing. If we find that bogus panelists are being added, we will go back an disable the account. So, reviews will no longer be slowed down by pending applications. Good Stuff.

We have also enabled a controversial “anonymous” feature to reviews. Many of you have requested this feature and several of you feel uncomfortable with this due to issues of transparency. We weighed both options. In the end, we decided anonymous reviewers may be more honest – especially if they are fellow participants. In the end, these reviews are for the benefit of patrons, and honest reviews lend to a better patron experience. If there is fishiness, we will investigate on our end.

Finally, we have published a list of all panelists so that participants can invite them to attend their shows.

So jump in there and review all the shows you have seen thus far…think of it as a public service.

Ben