Fringe: The Beatitudes

The final performance of Eidolon Ballet's The Beatitudes is tonight at 8 p.m. at Dixon Place. I recommend trying to make room for it in your Fringe schedule. At only 35 minutes, it can easily fit in between two other shows.

The dance piece begins with Ray (Jerry "Chip" Scuderi) serving in WWII and follows his journey as he returns to New York, discovers the Beat Generation, heads west, and eventually returns home. The dance is set to jazz music as well as readings by Allen Ginsberg and Jack Kerouac. I don't claim to be a dance critic, but to these eyes, the dance set to spoken word is particularly engaging because it enhances the poetry of the language. The choreography by Melanie Cortier is lovely, if at times repetitive.

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FRINGE: Richard 3

                       KING RICHARD III
I am goth!  Look at my eye makeup!


                       ELIZABETH
I am also goth!  Look at everybody die!


                       EVERYBODY
When World War 3 is over, anybody who doesn't die will be
Goth!


                       CAST OF AMERICAN IDIOT
We'd complain that you stole our "thing", but you sing 
better than us.

[Read full review @ BroadwayAbridged]

Fringe: The Conveniences of Modern Living

Best not to dwell on the talking Dryer (Jessica Love)--it's enough that an innocent face simply peers out of that door with fabric softener sheets crinkled through her hair and a long slinky-pipe of an arm. Such imagery fits perfectly with the precocious poetry of ten-year-old Bobson (Zack Palomo), who is falling for his babysitter, Agnes (Maya Baldwin)--and not just in their make-believe games. It also saves Agnes's husband, Harold (Rory Sheridan), from having to explain exactly what he's doing on those late nights with the Dryer. The less it's acknowledged, the easier it is to accept that--following the loss of their child--this is just how things are. But as the play continues, it becomes self-aware of its absurdity, veering into a farcical and campy dinner scene with Bobson's horrible parents--the selfish and sniping Bettina (Tavia Trepte) and the drugged-out and arrogant Bernard (David Ian Lee)--and runs out of things to say.

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Fringe: Feed The Monster

Feed The Monster starts off strong when Rita Emerson (Stephanie Ehrlich) takes the stage to perform the title song by Ehrlich, who also wrote the show, and composer Jim Keyes. She channels a psychedelic rock goddess and for that moment, it feels as though we've been transported to the 70s, but unfortunately, the rest of the show is a little dull in comparison.

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Fringe: Get Rich Cheating

Like all good satire, comedian Jeff Kreisler's fake wealth-building seminar gets closer to the truth than the putative objects of its scorn. The form is a mockery of those "Rich Dad, Poor Dad"-type get-rich seminars that rely on role play, humor, catchphrases and revival-tent adrenaline to convince listeners that their lives and fortunes are really about to change. Kreisler's real targets, though, are the "cheaters" who amass wealth through exploitation and dishonesty—the Enrons and AIGs and politicans on the take, of course, but also the Sarah Palins of the world and even Barack Obama, who earns a gentle ribbing from this liberal comic for gaining the highest office in the land through the power of words.

Kreisler covers a lot of ground in this energetic hour. The premise is amusing, he's got the motivational speaker shtick pretty well down, and many of his zingers hit their targets. Through jokes he paints a grim picture of a world in which "your being is based upon your bling" and "people are stupid...they'll buy Apple products on the day they're released." By excoriating those easy corporate targets, he makes a little more palatable the deeper message that we're all complicit in this sad, dirty game.

Fringe: Jen and Liz in Love

In Jesse Weaver's slow-starting but ultimately funny and effective one-act, two fortyish small-town women with over-the-top Boston-area accents alternately tiptoe and stomp around a shared past they've never spoken of before. The key that opens up the subject is the absurd circumstance: Liz (Helene Galek), who has spent the day in the local fair's kissing booth, kissing every man in town through a small aperture, finds herself locked inside as the day draws to a close. Her old friend Jen (Cindy Keiter) hangs around to keep her company while they wait for Liz's husband to return with the key. Here, contrary to the old saying, out of sight means more in mind than ever. In a faint Beckettian echo, we see nothing of the emotional and loudmouthed Liz but lips and an eye, while dowdy Jen drifts uncertainly around the booth, one moment plaintively touching the belly of the cartoon vixen painted on the side, the next moment stomping off angrily. Out of the intentionally overcooked broth of jokes and accusations, a small, honestly touching story of love and regret emerges like aromatic steam.