FronteraFest Thursday Brings Out The Wild Cards

That's right: it's time to heat up your winter nights again, with the 14th season of FronteraFest. The Short Fringe, the Long Fringe, or Mi Casa es su Teatro -- FronteraFest is five weeks of alternative, offbeat, new, and just plain off-the-wall fringe theatre presented by Hyde Park Theatre and Austin Script Works.
For complete FronteraFest 2007 information, including times and locations for the Short Fringe, the Long Fringe and Mi Casa es su Teatro, and to purchase tickets, visit the FronteraFest website.

Short Fringe - Best of Fest Wildcard - Thu Feb 15 8:00PM, $16

The five pieces that make up Best of Fest’s Bill B will play on two nights during the final week of the festival: Wednesday, February 14 and Saturday, February 17. Four were chosen by a panel from all of the Saturday “Best of the Week” shows, and the fifth was determined by vote of the Saturday night audiences.

Ben Franklin: A Rock Opera by Spencer Driggers, Michael Federico, and Cameron Cobb (The Getalong Gang Performance Group)
All school children know that Benjamin Franklin sold his soul to the Devil. But do they know that on his quest for “the lightning of the gods” he did scale the treacherous mountain peaks of Philadelphia, did meet darkest Evil at every turn, and did stare into the three faces of the ancient three-headed eagle? Do they also know that he rocked? If not, this exploration of history, performance, and pure metal will explain it all for them.

Ben Prager by Ben Prager
Character monologues written and performed by Ben Prager.

Riverview Ritz by Candyce Rusk
For most of the 20th century, Chicago’s Riverside Park was a premiere cultural and entertainment destination for the masses. Next to the world’s largest amusement park, circa 1949, sits a ramshackle rooming house filled with Riverside’s underbelly: the employees. Tough, colorful and tinged with sorrow, this play looks in at the lives of LaFayette, target man for the African Dip dunking game, and Jacek, a Polish immigrant, as they navigate the rocky waters of a changing America. Riverview Ritz briefly exposes the lives of those charged with helping others to “laugh your troubles away”.

The Tale of the Song Bird by Rocky Hopson (RoHo Productions)
Cowgirl Mary and her old west puppet show tell the story of Thomas Smith and his encounter with a songbird.

Parachute by Tom Coiner
Two guys fall out of a plane, one determined to kill himself, the other without a working parachute.

Austinist is an Official Media Sponsor of FronteraFest 2007

photo of Ben Prager by Will Ernst