Minnesota Fringe Festival 2024: "Juliet & Juliet: Improvised Shakespeare"

Day: 5

Show: 18

Title: Juliet & Juliet: Improvised Shakespeare

Category: Comedy / Improv / LGBTQIA+ Content / Shakespearian elements

By: Juliet & Juliet

Created by: Meghan Wolff & Sami Haeli

Location: Theatre in the Round

Summary: Just as the title says - two women improvise a new Shakespeare play, written by the Bard himself!

Highlights: This show is a lot of fun. Meghan and Sami have obviously done this a lot, because the Shakespearean language (with lots of prithees, thous, and perchances) flows effortlessly off their tongues. At the beginning of the show they ask for a couple of themes and some names, and they're off and running. The show I saw was about friendship and being unprepared. We meet two friends at the king's court who need to deliver him a message, which one of them received from a forest sprite. Scenes go back and forth between the faery world and the king's court, and then the worlds collide and the two actors are running back and forth playing multiple characters in the same scene! They manage to work in quite a few Shakespearean tropes - an apothecary with a magic potion, faeries doing mischief to mortals, and character soliloquys while the other one is standing right there but cannot hear. If you're a fan of Shakespeare, or improv, or having a good time - go see this show!

Read all of my Fringe mini-reviews here. 

Minnesota Fringe Festival 2019: "Cat Confidential: The Secret Lives of the Mothers of Lions"

Day: 5

Show: 16

Title: Cat Confidential: The Secret Lives of the Mothers of Lions

Category: COMEDY / DANCE / MUSICAL THEATER / SPOKEN WORD / STORYTELLING

By: Weggel Productions

Created by: Anna Weggel, Lauren Anderson and the cast

Location: Theatre in the Round

Summary: Sketches, songs, and stories about the most magnificent of creatures - cats - and the women who love them.

Highlights: This show about cats made me cry more than the show about grief! Which probably tells you all you need to know about me. As the mother of three lions (currently, seven total in my life), I found these stories to be so relatable and human. Because it's not just about cats, really, but about how having animals in our lives enriches our lives. They provide emotional support, love, a purpose, comfort, entertainment. Each cast member (Anna Weggel, Danna Sheridan, Emily Townswick, Heather Meyer, Liz Coucil, Mandi Verstegen, Maria Bartholdi, Meghan Wolff, Pam Mazzone, and Siri Hellerman) tells a sweet or funny or sad story about her cat, and how the cat helped them through grief, divorce, anxiety, or just the complications of living life. With a couple of funny sketches about the life of cats. The show is very well constructed, with each sketch or story followed by a charming song (by Anna and Mandi) that directly relates to the previous story (and often comes from the musical theater canon), while the women, all dressed in black, move around the space like cats. This show is a must-see for cat-lovers (I'm certain it's way better than the upcoming Cats movie!). And if you don't love cats, well, I don't even know what to say to you.

my babies Moritz Stiefel, Claude Hooper Bukowski, and George Berger

Read all of my Fringe mini-reviews here.

Minnesota Fringe Festival 2018: "Swords & Sorcery: The Improvised Fantasy Campaign"

Day: 7

Show: 24

Title: Swords & Sorcery: The Improvised Fantasy Campaign

Category: Comedy / Improv / Audience Participation

By: The Bearded Company

Created by: The Bearded Company

Location: Theatre in the Round

Summary: An improvised fantasy play based on the rules of Dungeons and Dragons.

Highlights: It's the same show as last year, but different. First of all, the Bearded Men have rebranded to the Bearded Company, because they now have some Bearded Ladies in their midst (Maria Bartholdi and Meghan Wolff), which is nice to see. Secondly, it's improv, so it's different every night, even if some of the characters are the same (which I don't know for sure, maybe that's different every night too). Dungeon Master Allen Voigt sets the stage and rolls the dice to determine how strong a requested move (kick, punch, sword strike) is. The improvises (also including Joe Rapp, Lucas Vonasek, MJ Marsh, Tyler Michaels, and Tyler Mills) create specific characters (spoiler alert: not all survive) and scenarios, all involving quests and demons to fight, while Jack Barrett improvises the always appropriate musical accompaniment on keyboard. This show is simply fun, although not so simple for the improvisers to come up with funny dialogue and cool moves on the spot. And improvised choreography has to be extra hard, but they still make it look cool (and safe). If you like improv, fantasy, D&D (confession: I only know what that is from watching Freaks and Geeks and Stranger Things), and fake sword-fighting, check out one of their two remaining shows.

Read all of my Fringe mini-reviews here.