Fringe: Ground to Cloud

                     MAN SHADOW
I wish I could figure out how to shadow light
this shadow lightbulb.


                     WOMAN SHADOW
I have a socket shadow.


                     MAN SHADOW
Can I shadow screw into it with my shadow
lightbulb?


                     WOMAN SHADOW
Shadow yes!


                     MAN SHADOW
Heh.  Heh heh heh heh heh...
The shadow lightbulb represents my shadow--

                     WOMAN SHADOW
I KNOW WHAT IT REPRESENTS.
SHADOW.

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FRINGE: Terms of Dismemberment

                       WACKY CAST MEMBER 1
Let's sing about gun nuts, wont that be funny?


                    WACKY CAST MEMBER 2
Let's sing about drinking pee, that should be hysterical
right?


                    WACKY CAST MEMBER 3
Hey everyone, you should join me in a song about selling
a 14 year old's ovaries, that'd be CCCRRRRRAAAZZZZYYYY!


                    ANY PEOPLE IN AUDIENCE
                    WHO ARE ACTUALLY LAUGHING
Ha ha, my friends in this show are so hysterical.
Especially when they gave me free pot before the show
began.

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Fringe: Veritas

There is no doubt that Stan Richardson's Veritas, which sold out its entire run before the Fringe Festival even began, is the hit of the festival. So, is it worth the hype? Well, it needs some work, but mostly, the answer is yes.

In 1920, Cyril Wilcox, a student at Harvard University, committed suicide at his home. His brother, Lester (an intense Doug Kreeger), discovered letters sent to Cyril implicating his classmates in homosexual activities. "The Court" was formed by the president and dean of the university to interrogate the students. The play offers its version of these events. This disturbing period in Harvard's history was only uncovered in 2002. It's an important story that deserves to be told. The writing is quite powerful, effectively using repetition and greek chorus style where the actors often speak at once. The use of music and Shakespeare monologues make this a lovely production (directed by Ryan J. Davis), but the downside is that the play is a little too artsy and it would be hard to connect to the characters were it not for the cast of talented up-and-comers. Sam Underwood deserves particular recognition as the shy and awkward Joseph Lumbard, one of only two to be deemed not guilty and allowed to return to the school, but Justin Blanchard, Paul Downs Colaizzo, Mitch Dean, Morgan Karr, Eric Nelsen, Matt Steiner, Jesse Swenson, Joseph Yeargain, and Kreeger deserve recognition for their fine work humanizing the play.

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Fringe: I Don < 3 U Ne Mor

If you see one musical at Fringe this year, make it the endlessly fun I Don < 3 U NE Mor, with music by Frank Grullon and Cathy Thomas and lyrics by Daren Taylor. With its tight book (also Taylor) and John Hurley's fast-paced direction that never drags, this fully realized production could transfer with very little editing, a rarity for Fringe.

The musical begins with "Out of Service/Out of Touch," a number with colorful costumes and dance moves (courtesy of choreographer Curtis LeMoine) that look like a parody of High School Musical. The dancers repeatedly stop mid-song to answer their cell phones, which is a smart set-up to a show about the dangers of technology. Ron (Dewy Caddell) and Sam (Elise Link) are about to lose their jobs as archivists for an Internet company after a merger leads to the creation of Verizon Micronet unless they can come up with a new job position. In the midst of trying to save his job, Ron is also trying to win over the girl of his dreams, Daliya (Felicia Hudson), who doesn't know he is alive until Ron's roommate Nic (Cameron Leighton Kirkpatrick) introduces him to the power of cell phones, texting, and My Facester.

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Fringe: Together This Time

Together This Time is like a City of Angels for literature instead of film. Scenes are split between a novelist's life and the characters in his novel, sometimes overlapping. There is a fundamental problem, though, that makes it impossible for the show to work. The story our protagonist is writing sounds so dumb that I cannot imagine why anyone would want to read it.

Jay Allen Jones (Jonathan Whitton) was a successful writer in New York City, but he moved to Colorado to get away from it all. He has spent the last four years working on a novel about two 18-year-olds in love, Jamie Gower (Andrew Redlawsk) and Gillian Wilder (Emily Olson). His girlfriend and editor Emily (Tro Shaw) wants to move back to the city, so she leaves him, and he follows her, winning her back through his novel. Emily is apparently an in-demand editor (as we learn through the song "Can You Help Me With My Book?") and Jay is a critical darling, so why would they be spending all their time on a book where nothing much happens except that Jamie and Emily leave home to start a life together and then come back home but this time it will be different because they will be in their own apartment.

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Fringe: Have A Nice Life

For a show called Have A Nice Life presented by Nice People Theatre Company (the most adorable name for a theatre company ever), the characters are not very nice. I wouldn't want to spend 90 minutes hanging out with any of them, but spending 90 minutes watching them is not so bad.

The show takes place during a group therapy session led by Patrick (Benjamin Michael). Jackie (Amy Acchione) brings her new best friend Amy (Miriam White), who she met only three hours earlier, to join the session. Each character gets a song or two, but we never get to know much about them beyond their basic problems, which are pretty familiar (mommy and daddy issues, etc.). Book writer Matthew Hurt often brings up topics but doesn't explore them, such as when it is mentioned that the macho Frank (Gregg Pica) might be gay. I suppose this is realistic in that not everything can be addressed and dealt with in one group session, but that doesn't make it any less frustrating.

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