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The Hartford Fringe Festival returns for its third year this month, and founder Jeffrey Kagan-McCann is looking forward to its return to normalcy after the past few years.
The festival will take place at the Carriage House Theatre (360 Farmington Ave.) in Hartford Oct. 20-30.
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The Hartford Fringe Festival returns for its third year this month, and founder Jeffrey Kagan-McCann is looking forward to its return to normalcy after the past few years.
The festival will take place at the Carriage House Theatre (360 Farmington Ave.) in Hartford Oct. 20-30. Kagan-McCann, a Hartford native with a long history in local theater, said the festival is based on the original Edinburgh festival that began in 1947.
“It consists of different acts from theater, comedy, and dance to comedians and solo performances, and it occurs in different venues all around Edinburgh,” he said.
There are now several hundreds of fringe festivals held throughout the country and the world. Since Hartford has a strong arts community, Kagan-McCann felt the event would be perfect for the city.
“It’s a bunch of different performing acts and shows, plays and more, and the tickets are reasonable,” he added.
The concept of fringe hails from the Edinburgh iteration, when acts that weren’t invited to the original organized their own happenings on the outskirts of town, or the “fringes.” Eventually, those acts grew more popular than those invited to the established festival.
One of the upcoming performances in this year’s festival is “Quarantined,” a one-man show by Connecticut resident Joel Roman. It was a 2020 finalist in the International Independent Short Film Awards.
“Quarantined” follows Pastor Pass the Plate as he travels the streets of Bridgeport to see if people are following pandemic rules. He encounters some crazy characters along the way — DD, Pockets, and The Fiend — who test his word against their street theology.
Kagan-McCann said Connecticut has a long history of theater work, and the population is very supportive of it. “People from all over the state came out the first year,” he said.
One especially positive thing about the Hartford Fringe Festival is that it gives performers who might not have the budget for large venues a place to perform. It also offers artists the opportunity to workshop their work in front of a live audience. Kagan-McCann said the festival is always looking for more participants.
The festival has an annual audience vote for Best of the Fest. Kagan-McCann’s play “Black Irish” won the title back in 2019. Many hit shows have emerged from fringe festivals as a result, including “Fleabag.” The award-winning comedy series began as a one-woman show written and performed by Phoebe Waller-Bridge at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival.
The Harford Fringe Festival opens Thursday, Oct. 20 and runs through Sunday, Oct. 30. That Sunday, the shows voted as audience favorites are invited back to perform again. “Quarantined” will be performed on Thursday, Oct. 27, at 9 p.m.
For a full list of acts, ticket information and more, visit www.hartfordfringefestival.org/.