BOULDER, COLO. — What the second annual Boulder International Fringe Festival lacks in longevity it makes up for in zeal. This year's festival, running Aug. 17-28, features more than 70 local, national, and international groups presenting more than 350 performances in a group of venues centered in the heart of downtown Boulder, the still-hip city that ran neck and neck during the 1960s with Berkeley, California as the "fringiest" location in the nation.
Such impressive statistics perhaps explains the enthusiasm of the festival's personnel. Alana Eve Burman, the festival's director, is a Miami native and a graduate of Boulder's Naropa University. She first began to explore fringe festivals as an alternate venue for performance several years ago, and after checking out the Toronto Fringe — at the time 33 plays in 11 days, she says, and substantially more today — she took her solo show, We Is All Of Us Wanting or Be Your Self: A Post-Human Autobiography, to Toronto in 2002.
"I think it would be accurate to say that the Boulder Fringe was started by a 'group initiative' that David and I now carry forward," Burman says, referring to David Ortolano, executive director of the Boulder Fringe. The core staff also includes associate producer Ambika Leigh Travis; webmaster Jason Honrath; "lead abacus" Karen Spies (a money person, naturally); sponsorship director Brandon Thomas; special events coordinator Dan Gaytan; event producer Theresa Klebert (who runs the popular Pick of the Fringe contest); and Ryan Eggensperger, coordinator of C.R.A.B. (Constantly Risking Absurdity, Baby), which offers local performers a place to strut their stuff.
That stuff-strutting venue is the Laughing Goat, a coffeehouse on Pearl Street. During the festival, the site doubles as Fringe Central — a clearinghouse for festival information.
Ortolano and Burman say they are pleased that the number of volunteers for the Boulder Fringe has grown to more than 100. It has helped, for example, to convince Downtown Boulder, Inc., a nonprofit that seeks to preserve and enhance local quality of life, that the Boulder Fringe is an idea with lasting potential. Last year, the organization was understandably wary: Boulder, a college town and hippie enclave, has been known in the past for fly-by-night ventures and feared the Fringe might be one more. However, the list of venues for this year's fringe, in addition to the Laughing Goat, illustrates real community cooperation: Allison's Espresso, the Boulder Museum of Contemporary Art, Boulder Co-op Commons Community Center, Boulder Theater, the Dairy Center for the Arts, Naropa University, and Trident Booksellers. The Fringe also allows BYOVs (Bring Your Own Venue) shows, should performers need a rigged-out yellow school bus, say, for a song and dance piece. Sites for BYOV shows are the Boulder Shambhala Center and the Urban Collective Artist Studios and Gallery.
So what does the Boulder Fringe offer this year? When asked which shows she is most looking forward to, Burman's response is politically smart: "Well, that just wouldn't be fair for me to say now, would it?" What stands out for this writer, however, includes all the opening night events at the Boulder Theater; Buntport Theatre Company in Something Is Rotten (described as "sassiness regarding Shakespeare"); a company called the Roodie Pancake Experiment presenting Londoner Jimmy Hogg in Curriculum Vitae, an "intense, verbose, exhaustive" monologue outlining his employment history; the Denver Independent Choreographers' Project with Fragments of Divine; and the Boulder Film Collective screening selected shorts.
Not to be missed following the official festival is the Pick of the Fringe, running Sept. 1-3 at the Dairy Center. This special event, orchestrated by Klebert, celebrates the best of the festival according to genre — theatre, dance, film/video, music, and visual arts, as voted on by audiences.
For more information on the Boulder Fringe, visit www.boulderfringe.com.