IndyFringe 2022

IndyFringe: The Barn Identity

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This is part of IndyFringe 2022, Aug. 18-Sept. 4 (individual performance times vary) in downtown Indianapolis. Details and tickets at IndyFringe.org.

By John Lyle Belden

“The Barn Identity,” by Erika MacDonald, is about falling-down barns.

It might seem like it’s about children’s games, the leaf-circle dance, the Fourth of July feeling, bringing the outside in, her mystery illness, or that night she stood on the sidewalk with 5 percent of her brain – How many times has she told this story? – but she insists, it’s about falling-down barns.

MacDonald gently brings a kaleidoscope of storytelling fragments into focus as we dive into her world of seven-year-old Old Ladies in snowy beds and bent old structures that you wonder how they still stand. Her view out the window, and looking within, take us on a fascinating journey that is both deeply personal, and the essence of a great Fringe performance.

And why she doesn’t go to movies. And how she’s obsessed with falling-down barns.

Wonderful to the last “theatre sigh,” with recorded music by fellow Fringe performer Paul Strickland, “The Barn Identity” has performances 5:15 p.m. Saturday, Aug. 27, and Thursday and Sunday evenings, Sept. 1 and 4, in the Athenaeum.

IndyFringe: Scars, by Sears

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This is part of IndyFringe 2022, Aug. 18-Sept. 4 (individual performance times vary) in downtown Indianapolis. Details and tickets at IndyFringe.org.

By John Lyle Belden

One of the benefits of the Fringe festival format is that it allows performers to work on new and developing material. It gets a sort of dress rehearsal before an audience who bought inexpensive tickets to be part of the process, rolling with the technical glitches and jumbled lines, seeing the genius at work behind the eventual polished product.

Lissa Sears, a standup comic who has more worldly experience than most who picked up the mic only a few years ago, is developing her one-person show, “Scars” over the course of this year’s IndyFringe. Wendy saw a lot of potential in its first-ever presentation last weekend, and what I saw last night shows something truly special and inspiring in the making, and I encourage you to be part of the process.

Being a very out-and-proud lesbian is about the most ordinary thing about Sears. The first “scar” was internal, the onset of multiple sclerosis at age 25, temporarily paralyzing one side of her body. In her discomfort, she says she had rather it be cancer, which can be cut out. “Be careful what you wish for.”

As she approaches 40, a lump in her breast has her seeking “a girly doctor” and entering chemotherapy, and eventually surgery. Still, “you gotta embrace the suck, or the suck will embrace you.”

Throughout her journey, she defies any weakness in her body by taking up boxing, martial arts and distance running, even doing the Indy Mini Marathon with a walker. A chance encounter with performer and former Colts kicker Pat McAfee has her trying out and enjoying standup. She meets other celebrities, including the late Louie Anderson.

Removal of her breasts means she can go topless (though she’d rather not show her belly). This also leads her to the “flattie” community and more opportunities to spread a message of pride and empowerment.

Her personal motto is, “Don’t tell me I can’t,” and I wouldn’t dare say that of this constantly improving showcase of her ongoing brave life. Help a feisty, funny woman as she focuses her story, Saturday afternoon, Aug. 27, and Friday night and Saturday evening, Sept. 2-3, at the Athenaeum.

IndyFringe: Leland Loves Bigfoot

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This is part of IndyFringe 2022, Aug. 18-Sept. 4 (individual performance times vary) in downtown Indianapolis. Details and tickets at IndyFringe.org.

By John Lyle Belden

Last year, standup comic and Kentucky hippie Stewart Huff asked: Do jokes still work? Well, his do.

In this year’s one-man show, “Leland Loves Bigfoot,” he revisits some of that material, but has a new central anecdote, his night with a stranger waiting for a cryptid to show up.

As he looks for that sweet spot “between chaos and capitalism,” he recommends going to a snake-handling church for entertainment rather than a major theme park. He disagrees with fellow liberals saying we can’t fix what’s wrong with America, “but WILL we fix things?” he shrugs. And he decries insults taking the place of debate, “I dream of the day we have an (actual) argument.”

And he relates his visit to the little town of Mays Lick, Ky. While drinking at the local redneck bar, he is approached by a man who asks if Huff would like to go with him to his farm and look for Bigfoot.

Against his better judgement, he goes.

While they sat outdoors in lawn chairs drinking moonshine, Huff realized, “I love Leland. But I’m afraid of Leland, because he votes.” As they discuss vaccines, Scooby-doo, condemned statues, and nude driving, he maintains a brotherly affection for the man despite not agreeing with anything he says.

And that’s the main point, if there must be a moral to an incredibly funny show, that we can disagree with someone without hating them.

His energetically delivered observations elicited constant laughter and some devious thoughts, such as, “if you see someone in old-time aviator goggles, follow him” because something crazy is about to happen.

“You don’t goggle-up in the planning stages.”

Plan to see Huff at the Athenaeum, 8:45 p.m. Saturday and 3:30 p.m. Sunday, Aug. 27-28.

IndyFringe: Exes and Embryos

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This is part of IndyFringe 2022, Aug. 18-Sept. 4 (individual performance times vary) in downtown Indianapolis. Details and tickets at IndyFringe.org.

By John Lyle Belden

Standup comedian Mandee McKelvey (who brought us last year’s “How I Got My Warts Prayed Off”) returns with a new hour of comedy that’s a bit discomforting and roll out of your seats hilarious.

An out-of-the-blue inquiry by a distant friend – would Mandee like to take her extra frozen embryo? – sparks a rather twisty train of thought that includes 15 solid minutes of ranting about semen (using the more common crude word that sounds like a verb). If you can manage that, she also talks about her abortion.

For mature audiences with mature minds who don’t mind some crude humor, this is a must-see. McKelvey’s frank and upbeat delivery (“just trying to find lightness in the darkness”) will win you over. Learn how IVF is like an expensive carnival game, and that standup comedy is not “family friendly” from the comic’s perspective.

Performances are Friday and Saturday evenings, Aug. 26-27, and Saturday and Sunday afternoons, Sept. 3-4, on the Indy Eleven stage at the IndyFringe Theatre.

IndyFringe: Beyond Ballet

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This is part of IndyFringe 2022, Aug. 18-Sept. 4 (individual performance times vary) in downtown Indianapolis. Details and tickets at IndyFringe.org.

By John Lyle Belden

Indianapolis Ballet returns to the Fringe to showcase its talent in this year’s edition of “Beyond Ballet.”

We get the traditional ballet in pieces like “Bartok Sonata,” “Miroirs” (opening and closing with a dancer tableau), and the exquisite “Le Corsaire Pas de Deux” featuring Yoshiko Kamikusa and Humberto Rivera Blanco. In “Diamante,” classic ballet meets contemporary composition, dancing to Karl Jenkins’ “Palladio” – music you might hear in the background of a TV show or commercial that needs something intense and serious.

For the “beyond” your expectations, we get “Smile” by Charlie Chaplin, with Ahna Lipchik’s charming portrayal of Chaplin’s famous Tramp character, working with Kamikusa and Blanco in a graceful meet-cute. For the big finish, we get “Summer at the Fringe,” a salute to disco diva Donna Summer with routines to four of her hits – some truly “Hot Stuff” right up to the “Last Dance.”

Choreography is by Kristin Young Toner, Lipchik, Victoria Lyras (who also did costumes), and William Robinson (the dancer in the program photo). Other company members include Nicholas Bentz, Colette Blake, Reece Conrad, Haley Desjarlais, Eli Diersing, Brigid Duffin, Jane Gordon, Jacqueline Hodek, Scholar Idjagboro, Journie Kalous, Kaci King, Jessica LeBlanc, Sierra Levin, Maria Jose Esquivel Losada, Robert Mack, Abigail Marten, Grace McCutcheon, Lucy Merz, Jessica Miller, Ada Perruzi, Katie Pilone, Amanda Piroue, and Macyn Malana Vogt.

For a great sampler of professional ballet at a Fringe festival price, see Indianapolis Ballet “Beyond Ballet” in the Basile Auditorium at 5:30 p.m. Thursday, Aug. 25 (today as we post this); noon Sunday, Aug. 28; 9 p.m. Thursday, Sept. 1; and 3:30 p.m. Sunday, Sept. 4.

IndyFringe: Hope – A Theatrical Dance

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This is part of IndyFringe 2022, Aug. 18-Sept. 4 (individual performance times vary) in downtown Indianapolis. Details and tickets at IndyFringe.org.

By Wendy Carson and John Lyle Belden

Gerry Shannon and Melissa Hawkes have come down from Maine to bring us a spectacular piece of theater, “Hope: A Theatrical Dance.” The story is told through the dances of the two performers onstage, as well as in a video projected behind them highlighting memories of Asher (Shannon) with his wife, Hope, and his child (both played by Mackenzie Krueger).

Asher enters the scene clearly depressed and drinking heavily. A pair of hands appear out of the curtain behind him causing him to be manipulated like a puppet. While this may sound like whimsy, the sheer heartbreak he manages to convey keeps the audience rapt with attention. Soon the strings are cut and Asher is once again left to his own devices.

Hope, as a concept, enters as an Angel (Hawkes) and dances around him, forcing him to remember and relive the happier days of his marriage. Just as he is beginning to smile, we are transported to the birth of his daughter and the loss surrounding this event.

Grief once again threatens to overtake him, but he is shown that “hope” lives on.

The entire show is presented without words, the narrative woven through dance, mime and music by various artists including The Chainsmokers, Better Than Ezra, Jason Mraz, and Ed Sheeran.

A note to anyone who saw this show at a previous Fringe: Shannon has restructured it and cut some of the songs, making it a lot less funny than you’d remember.

Wendy’s thoughts: When I first watched the show, the portrayal of Asher’s grief hit me hard. Not only was it perfectly enacted, Shannon is literally an “everyman”. He looks like the kind of guy who’d be more at home at a sports game than dancing on stage. Still, the skill of both he and Hawkes make the show tender and unforgettable.

From the program and with talking to others who have seen it at previous Fringes, this is just a portion of the full show. Knowing that, I really hope that Shannon will return to us in the future and present the entire show. The taste I was provided has me hungry for more.

John’s thoughts: I was really struck by the lack-of-control feeling illustrated at first by Shannon, a true reflection of grief. Krueger (a St. Paul, Minn., based dancer and actor) was a wonderful addition, her sparkling talent making us see and feel the love between Asher and Hope. The innovation of having the distant and departed partner on the screen communicated their separation in an impactful way. At points, he was there with her in the video, but she is never with us here.

Hawkes ties it all together nicely, portraying “hope” in a more tangible way. Her dance reflects the support of true friends, as well as that small voice that tells you to look up from your sadness and see what more the world has to show.

We “Hope” you experience this performance as well, at the IndyFringe Theatre, 9 p.m. Thursday, Aug. 25 (today, as we post this); 1:45 p.m. Sunday, Aug. 28; 7:15 p.m. Friday, Sept. 2; and 3:30 p.m. Sunday, Sept. 4. 

IndyFringe: Play by Play

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This is part of IndyFringe 2022, Aug. 18-Sept. 4 (individual performance times vary) in downtown Indianapolis. Details and tickets at IndyFringe.org.

By John Lyle Belden

Clerical Error Productions presents “Play by Play: Tiny Little Plays by Mark Harvey Levine,” directed by Jon Lindley, and written, of course, by Levine, a master of creating humorous and heartfelt little stories that take just a few minutes. Perhaps some remember his “Cabfare for the Common Man” or his contributions to Phoenix Theatre “Xmas” shows; if you do, it’s more of that.

The framing device, as the topics are all over the place, is a parody of network sports announcers, played by Bryan Ball and Adam Crowe, who introduce the series, deliver a Halftime assessment, and announce the Two-Minute Warning near the end. To announce each little play is the Referee (David Molloy), complete with whistle and arm signals not sanctioned by the NFL, which perturbs the on-stage Director (Kate Duffy).

The plays are acted superbly by Ball, Crowe, Tracy Herring, T.J. O’Neil, Talor Poore, and Michelle Wafford. There are grown-up children’s games, the politics of fish, restaurant scenes, questions of reality, encounters with deities, and – a running theme in this year’s IndyFringe, it seems – a cryptid.

Every year, once people learn I’ve seen and am reviewing a whole bunch of Fringe shows, I’m asked what is good to recommend. This one’s at the top of the list, with something for every sense of humor and not too challenging on the feels (though one bit comes close).

There are numerous opportunities, as well. “Play By Play” is at the District Theatre 5:30 p.m. Thursday, Aug. 25; 5:15 p.m. Saturday, Aug. 27; 9 p.m. Thursday, Sept. 1; and 3:30 p.m. Sunday, Sept. 4.

IndyFringe: The Princess Strikes Back

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This is part of IndyFringe 2022, Aug. 18-Sept. 4 (individual performance times vary) in downtown Indianapolis. Details and tickets at IndyFringe.org.

By Wendy Carson

Victoria Montalbano had an awkward childhood, growing up as a theater nerd with very little romantic experience. Suddenly her life is changed forever when the “Star Wars Trilogy” is rereleased and plays in her local theater. Since there is only one woman in the entire movie, she naturally identifies herself as Princess Leia and falls madly for the “scruffy nerf-herder” of a rogue, Han Solo.

After college she moves to Chicago to become the next Tina Fey. Her exceptional improv skills aside, few acting opportunities provide themselves for her. Still, she remains ever hopeful that her leading man will find her, and she will eventually star in the story of her dreams.

As one might conclude from the show’s full title, “The Princess Strikes Back: One Woman’s Search for the Space Cowboy of her Dreams,” her co-star has yet to be cast. Still, the tales she tells of her personal and professional ups and downs are delightful to hear. Besides, if you don’t attend, you won’t learn the correlation between virginity and pumpkin pie.

The Force compels you to attend 7:15 p.m. Thursday, Aug. 25 and/or noon Saturday, Aug. 27, at the District Theatre.

IndyFringe: Experi-Mental

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This is part of IndyFringe 2022, Aug. 18-Sept. 4 (individual performance times vary) in downtown Indianapolis. Details and tickets at IndyFringe.org.

By John Lyle Belden

Mentalist Steven Nicholas provides an interesting hour of entertainment and surprises in “Experi-Mental.”

Nicholas is apparently one of those extraordinary humans who can memorize a great deal of written information. It started, he says, when he was the slowest in his grade-school class because he thought through every math problem too thoroughly. To aid his scores, he worked on his memory, and now has thousands of digits of Pi locked in his head – this is not a boast, he is nowhere near the record.

Still, he can demonstrate that practically any grouping of numbers can be found in that famous irrational sequence. Also, he claims he can unlock the memory potential of audience members, using only 52 numbers – each written on a different playing card of a standard deck.

This opens us to some mentalist tricks that deliver the “wow” factor, and in a different way than other magician/mind-readers at this year’s Fringe.

Also, if you attended the preview show, he’s the guy who had us all touch our fingers against our will. He’ll do it again – how long can you resist?

Go “mental” with Nicholas at the Athenaeum, Friday and Sunday evenings, Aug. 26 and 28, and Friday and Saturday, Sept. 2-3.

IndyFringe: Sadec 1965, A Love Story

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This is part of IndyFringe 2022, Aug. 18-Sept. 4 (individual performance times vary) in downtown Indianapolis. Details and tickets at IndyFringe.org.

By Wendy Carson 

A brilliant storyteller, Flora Le spins the tale of “Sadec 1965: A Love Story,” her quest to discover her father’s hidden past in Vietnam prior to his arrival in Canada, where he attended college and married her mother.

Le’s relationship with her father was never great. He left the family when she was five. During her bi-weekly forced visitations she was neglected and abused. He refused to tell her anything about him, his family or Vietnam, no matter how much she asked.

This lack of a male touchstone in her life led her to make some poor and questionable choices along the way. However, her friend convinces her that the only way she will truly learn about the man is to visit Vietnam for herself. So, she leaves her soul-sucking job and goes upon a motorcycle tour of the country.

She proudly buys herself a beautiful motorcycle, disregarding the fact that she has never ridden on, let alone driven one. She is excited to see the foreign land, disregarding that she only knows approximately three phrases in Vietnamese. Still, she valiantly forges ahead.

Her discoveries throughout the countryside are interspersed with memories of her father. When he is struck down by a brain tumor, she visits him in the hospital but his treatment of her has not changed since she was a child. In fact, she only learns of her father’s past from interviews of the Vietnamese man her brother hired to sit by her father’s bedside.

Through him she finds out about her father’s first love, whom he left behind. She pledged herself to be faithful and wrote him over six hundred letters during a span of about six years. This devotion makes Le desperate to meet the mysterious woman, but will that connection actually be made?

Le’s story is raw and lovely as she pulls no punches regarding anyone’s faults (especially her own). However, the tapestry she weaves is engaging and beautiful and hopefully there will be another opportunity if you missed viewing it during the opening weekend of IndyFringe.

Flora Le’s story continues on her website, containing photos of those involved as well as some of the letters written. Check it out at https://www.sadec1965.com/