IndyFringe Day 0

I wanted to tell you that I am safely in Indianapolis. I know you were worried.
The road trip from Minneapolis took just under 12 hours.
We were going the speed limit pretty much the whole time, with the exception of when we hit 88 miles per hour just to see some serious shit. Anyone? Is this thing on? Doc Brown? Forget it.
I was getting a little punchy when we hit the border of Indiana.
I got a little more punchy when Jason started punching me to help keep himself awake.
Deciding that maybe what we needed were some 'country roads' I looked at a map at a rest area and saw that we could pop on over to Highway 31 instead of taking 65 the whole way to Indy, which is notoriously boring. (I don't care what you say. Boring.)
It was appropriate that John Mellencamp started playing on the radio as we flew by the corn and soybean fields getting to 31. It was not appropriate that the song was 'Dance Naked'

I still sang along, loving every minute of awkward.

So we got to Indy, and arrived at The Dorchester. The Dorch is the apartment building that has now become an asylum for my old friends from High School. They have taken one building and conned every one of their other friends into renting apartments there as well, so it might as well be a commune without all the membership dues or blood sacrifices they do. I have been bringing my casts to The Dorch for the last couple of IndyFringes. Invariably, we end up drinking a little too much or making other mistakes that fall under 'I had an awesome time in Indy'
Since it is just Jason Kruger and myself staying here, I find that I will have more time to spend with the newest of the Dorch Gang: Annabeth Irene West. She was just born about a month ago to Lisa and James. Probably the most beautiful baby ever made by man or science.
One of these nights, I will be sick of the drinking game called: 'if you come to see my show, I will buy you a shot' and I will be playing something called 'babysitter'.
I think if I really believe that I want one of these 'children' I should have spent a night trying to keep one alive. Kind of like those movies where I can inherit the haunted house if I just spend one night in it. Only Annie isnt a house. Nor is she haunted. She is part cyborg, according to her mother and father. I guess the only time she blinks is when she is downloading her newest batch of instructions. More on the babysitting another night. I should talk about something fringe related.

Tonight was the Opening Night Celebration of Party fun time happy for the festival.
Several groups were asked to perform 3minutes of their show to an audience of at least 200 people. Doesn't sound like a whole lot, but it was in a small-ish room, and I am a big big man made of beef and Iron, so I am bulky even on a day where I don't feel bloated. Needless to say, I was getting a bit claustrophobic.
The audience was in charge of randomly picking the group who would give them the most important 3 minutes of the rest of their fringe lives. The one that would put the sour taste or the chocolaty delicious taste in the audiences' mouths.
In true Andy Brynildson tradition, I didn't have anything planned. Hell, two of my cast members are still out of state at the 1am hour I am writing this. (And yes, our tech rehearsal IS at 10am. thanks for pointing it out.)
So it is just Jason and myself. I have certain bits in the show that i don't want to give away for fear you may think the whole show is one big freak show of a train wreck. I will tell you that Juice boxes play an important role. Well, at least they are there. Maybe not a big plot point.
So I thought it would be fun to give away juice boxes to all of the attendees of the Opening night extravaganza. Something even more clever would be to put our show information on all of the juice boxes.
I am clever sometimes. Not often, but it happens.
To make a long story short, I did the juice box thing, Jason tapped danced and I wore a Panther suit that I borrowed from my friend Dustin.
The people clamored for the juice boxes. You would have thought I was giving away playstation 3's.

I saw an awful lot of really good looking shows who performed in the three minute slots.
I even saw some dance groups perform who were amazing and made me rethink my dislike of dance shows. I might actually check some of them out in my downtime.
Of course there was the occasional 'I take my art WAY TOO SERIOUSLY' groups'. But if they never did the Fringe, how would I ever have been able to make fun of them in my show?
I love me some Fringe, and it is going to be a really good festival. I look forward to meeting new people and challenging them to drinking games involving show attendance. But for tonight, I sleep the sleep of the road weary and overheated panther suit wearing fringe producer.

If you are interested in seeing what my show is all about, please come to my opening night
Tonight (August 22nd) at 10:30pm at The American Cabaret Theatre.
for more info, go to www.indyfringe.org

Have a good night, Indianapolis. Happy opening night.

Stay Awesome

Andy Brynildson