London's Fringe Festival is back again for its 19th year

Header image for Interrobang article CREDIT: PROVIDED BY JESS MCAULEY AND LONDON FRINGE
This is Step One is many of the performances that will be taking place at Fringe Festival, which runs from May 29 to June 9.

London will be hosting its annual Fringe Festival for its 19th year starting on May 29 to June 9.

The executive producer Kathy Navackas, tried to define what Fringe is for the Interrobang.

“It’s almost indefinable, what is Fringe? We can go with that we’re twelve days in theatre and visual arts extravaganza because that’s really what happens. But, it’s a little more than that, it’s a mingling of art and artists creativity,” Navackas said.

Navackas went on about what Fringe means to her.

“Being in a theatre to me that is just absolute magic there is nothing that compares to it. It’s just I’m not that that experienced, you go in and if there’s music playing that’s because the artist has decided that for something and you’re sitting there in the anticipation,” Navackas said.

The Fringe picks all performers involved by complete luck. All applicants names are put into a BINGO cage, in a Facebook Live, names are drawn at random for the 45 spots.

“It’s one of the beauties and it’s one of the drawbacks here because every year there are some great companies that you would love to have come here but they didn’t make the lottery. They just weren’t drawn,” Navackas said. “In some ways it’s very socialistic festival everybody pays the same fees, gets the same services, the same marketing, they get the same everything.”

Navackas said that this way of choosing is fair, since it gives all types of art a fair shot and allows what might be considered odd, a chance to perform.

“What I really look forward to is some of the new works the premieres that we get to see, just some of the more unusual productions that just don’t show up here,” Navackas said.

One such group that may be odd to some is the Red Bastard: Lie With Me clown performance.

“There’s a whole history of the clown and they’re the ones that are physically grotesque, for lack of better terminology. It’s different,” Navackas said. “There’s a history of that type of climbing and it is it is funny in its intimate but it’s very poignant and it says something about ourselves.”

A local performer, Jess McAuley, has written and will be staring in a production for the fringe called: This is Step One. The production is based on a true story that McAuley has lived through. She describes it as “a walk down memory lane with me kicking and screaming”.

McAuley further described the show to the Interrobang.

“My formative teen years into going to university. It’s focused more on someone who has depression and has been through so much trauma and they’re trying to find themselves, trying to hold. It’s someone thinking they have their life together but they really don’t,” McAuley said. The play deals with heavy issues such as depression, rape culture, and abuse.

Tickets for McAuley’s show are $15 with opening night of the performance is May 31 at 5 p.m. in Procunier Hall in the Palace theatre (Venue 7).

All performance tickets are $10 to $15, while dates and times for all performances can be found in the Fringe program which is also available online.