Greetings from Rob and Schatzie, your VTC Fringe Co-Producers and Co-Hosts.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We’re excited to be coming back once again with a combination of “traditional” Fringe and “story relay” Fringe. If you’re new to the Conference, you may be wondering what that means. A quick breakdown is that the Fringe has traditionally been a series of short plays, but in 2021 experimented with a new format, teams of writers participating in a Story Relay. Including both elements in 2022 was amazing fun, so of course we’re continuing that going forward. 

Pictured above are Rachel Maquez and 2023 Jerry Harper Service Award Recipient Kim Estes.

What is the Fringe:

The Fringe portion of the Conference takes place in the evening as a fun and sometimes irreverent conclusion to the day. It’s an additional opportunity for writers and actors.

This Year’s Format:

• Super Short Plays: Three to four short plays per night (up to 7 pages max), submitted and curated prior to the conference.
• Story Relay Teams: Two teams of five writers per team, each playwright writing one nightly episode (5 pages max) for their team’s continuous tale (episodes presented Sunday through Thursday). Teams finalized in early April and writing completed in early May.
• Other short performances (up to 5 minutes) of any sort (puppetry, mime, music, dance, standup, or non-traditional theatre), submitted and curated prior to the conference. 

A brief (incomplete, and perhaps from some points of view, slightly inaccurate*) history of the Fringe….

*Please submit any corrections to our Fringe email address (which is in one of your welcome messages from the Conference Coordinator).

1998 – Play Lab founder, Circle Rep’s Michael Warren Powell, wanted to hear a play that hadn’t gotten into the Lab. The gathering of people that night in the student commons at the college was the seed from which the Fringe grew. For the first few years, it was very informal.

2001-2011 – Erick Hayden and Barry Levine took over coordination of the event in 2001, resulting in more regular scheduling and more support from the Conference.

2012-2014 – Bostin Christopher and Janna Shaw coordinated the event, with Bostin as host.

2015-2018 – Janna Shaw and Rob Lecrone coordinated the event, with Rob as host. In 2017, Rob wrote the Fringe theme song, which rhymes Valdez several times with itself, and invited Schatzie Schaefers to sing it with him at the beginning of each night. The audience soon started participating in the singing of the song.

2019 – Schatzie Schaefers joined Rob Lecrone in co-coordinating and co-hosting the event.

2020 – In response to the Covid-19 pandemic, there was no Conference (except the online version of the Monologue Workshop), so no Fringe.

2021 – The Fringe shook up its format, experimenting with a Story Relay event, five teams of five writers passing the baton throughout the week. This was our first year at Magpie’s on the Fly Coffeeshop.

2022-2023 –Fringe these years was/is a combination of Story Relay (two teams of five) and regular Fringe.

Over the years, the Fringe has taken place in many spaces, including the Prince William Sound College, Totem Inn, Ernesto’s Taqueria, the Hotel Glacier, the Fat Mermaid, and the Best Western. Regardless of location, there is rarely an empty seat at this popular event. This year, the Fringe returns again to Magpie’s on the Fly Coffeeshop at 350 Galen Dr.