London Fringe performers bringing "on the edge" theatre to the city

A murder-mystery, a banjo comedy show and a pole dancing performance are among the unconventional shows hitting London, Ont. stages this week as part of the city's five-day Fringe festival.

London Fringe will feature 18 different shows across six theatres in the city, including events at the Palace Theatre in Old East Village and the Grand Theatre downtown.

"The shows are uncensored and they're unhinged," said Kelli Gough, chair of the festival's organizing committee. "People bring what they want to bring."

"Fringe is an opportunity for experimental theatre people to put on shows that they haven't put on in other venues," Gough said.

This year's fringe festival has doubled in size compared to last year's 9-show event. Italso added a new venue to its lineup: Fanshawe College's Good Foundation Theatre, just off Dundas Street at Market Lane.

But the festival is still not up to pre-pandemic levels whennearly 50 shows at 18 venues made up the fringe repertoire.

"We've been growing in very tiny increments," said Gough. "We have to keep getting audiences."

The festival features a mix of local, national and international talent.

"I love coming to London and I think fringe festivals are a very eclectic group of people," said Tony Molesworth, a five-time London Fringe performer from Toronto.

"They're open and receptive to whatever you're producing because at the fringes, you're allowed to create whatever you want," said Molesworth, who is bringing his banjo comedy show, Banjoker, to the festival this year.

Local writers, actors takethe stage

For some local performers, bringing their shows to London Fringe is a full-circle moment.

"I went to as many fringe shows as I possibly could," said John Palmer, an actor and retired economics professor at Western University who has lived in London for the past 14 years.

"Some [shows] were really good and some were downright horrid," he said. "That's what Fringe is all about: a lot of people experimenting and trying new things."

Palmer wrote and is acting in Frontline Murder, an interactive murder-mystery show, at London Fringe this year.

He said the show will combine the format of a traditional theatre performance with the audience participation of a murder-mystery dinner, bringing actors off the stage and into the crowd.

Performers say that fringe festivals are opportunitiesto be flexible and to gather feedback on their experimental shows as they look towardtaking them to other fringe festivals.

"What we're really hoping to gain from this experience is figuring out what people related to, what they felt touched by, what they laughed at, what they cried at," said Maggie Kennedy, co-creator and actor in While We Wait, a show about two friends waiting at a bus stop.

Kennedy said she and her co-creator, Jenette Meehan, continued making changes to the show's script until the day before opening night, which isn't the norm in traditional theatre settings.

"We are running the whole show ourselves. We have the space and time to keep making changes until the last minute," said Kennedy, who grew up in London and has danced at two London Fringe festivals in the past. "Here, it feels more like two friends hanging out, playing around and making a show."

Gough said that there are shows at Fringe for everybody. She said some are funny, while others are thought-provoking. Some are entertaining, while others are informative. Some are fun for the family, while others should be for a night that the kids are at home.

"It's fringe theatre, it's on the edge," Gough said.

London Fringe runs from Aug. 13-17. Tickets for all shows are available for $15 online or at the doors.