Hollywood Fringe Festival: Getting it started

It’s a familiar sight for any Edinburgh Festival Fringe veteran: an improvised stage on the town’s main street, with a gathering crowd gawking at the performers while smiling minions press flyers into the spectators’ hands.  What’s different is that this is Hollywood Boulevard.

My first experience with a theatre festival was all-in: I was assistant technical director at a multi-space venue company in Edinburgh.  Now, I’m hooked–I’m so into the adrenaline of theatre festivals, the intensity of this kind of coming together of theatrical risk-takers, I can’t imagine life without it.

And so I’m on tour.  And so I went to the Hollywood Fringe.

It’s the first annual Hollywood Fringe, and I have to say it’s impressive what the organizers have pulled together.  From the impressive variety of shows in the brochure to the razor-sharp art direction to the friendly atmosphere at the bar at Fringe Central, this crew of deep-end divers have really made it work.

Over the next couple of days we’ll post some interviews with Hollywood Fringe (@HollywoodFringe, #HFF) staff and performers, and a few photos from the first weekend of the festival.  Stay tuned!