Fringe - 1st weekend down. Also: Speech! playlist

Wobbles the Kitty, MN Fringe mascot.

Congrats to the MN Fringe Festival on another record opening weekend, with another ticket record broken. Congrats also to all the show writers, producers, directors & performers who put them together. Our show, Speech!, had a terrific opening pair of shows, with long lines and big crowds who quite seemed to enjoy themselves. As of this writing, we are in a tie for the second-most-reviewed show on the Fringe website. The Pioneer Press named us a must-see! And the notoriously dyspeptic Fringe Famous gave us a rare five-star review! Yowzah!

I'm really proud of the show and everyone involved, but of course it's not over! We have three more shows,Thursday at 5:30, Friday at 10, and Saturday at 7, the last of which features Audio Description for the vision impaired. Ten dollars to anyone records the Audio Description for me. Seriously.

(Incidentally, if you're going to click on the reviews above, you should know: OMG SPOILARZ ALERT! Really, many of the audience reviews and both of the press bits above give away several moments that would otherwise be a surprise in the show. As does Saturday's Fringe slide show, featuring some lovely shots from the production. Kudos, by the way, to Fringe Famous for spoiler-warning the reader.)

((Also incidentally, what have you seen? I've seen six shows so far, all worth your time for various reasons: The Quest, Bite Me Twilight, Zombie High School [biggest surprise in the bunch so far], Cosmo the Musical, Match Game Minnesota, and Mike & Matt. Melissa also saw Can Michael Come Out to Play, and loved it; I hope to be able to fit it in before we skip town later this week.))

Lastly, to keep you in the musically-contemporary mood for the show, here's the list of pre- and post-show songs lovingly selected for our little play. If you come to the show, chances are you won't hear them, because even though the music volume in Rarig is a little high (especially for folks near the sides and therefore the speakers), the pre-show level is definitely not. And there's definitely no time for this much music anyway. So here's what you're missing (and a YouTube playlist of all of them):

Pre-Show!

1. Green Day: When I Come Around
2. Montell Jordan: This Is How We Do It
3. Ini Kamoze: Here Comes the Hotstepper
4. Collective Soul: December
5. Sheryl Crow: Strong Enough
6. Stone Temple Pilots: Interstate Love Song
7. TLC: Creep
8. Elastica: Connection
9. Blessid Union of Souls: I Believe
10. Bush: Everything Zen
11. Dionne Farris: I Know
12. Freedy Johnston: Bad Reputation
13. Sponge: Plowed
14. Melissa Etheridge: I'm the Only One
15. Pearl Jam: Better Man

Post-Show!

1. The Toadies: Possum Kingdom
2. Soul Asylum: Misery
3. Madonna: Take a Bow
4. Hootie & the Blowfish: Hold My Hand

See you all on Thursday!