Theater/Geek 08/01/2012 7:27pm

Let's talk Theater Geeks. Or fringe theater and the geeks who inhabit it. Off the top of my head, I can recall new works where the Bard's characters fought Aliens, engaged in Kung-Fu battles, or fell to hordes of video game squirrels (that one was really weird), and that's when Shakespeare wasn't in the middle of a zombie apocalypse himself. We've seen him "rewrite" Pulp Fiction, Star Wars, and The Godfather. I've seen shows about comic book collections and musicals about supervillian henchmen. And I want love 'em. I want more. Being a geek means being passionate about a subject (it also means biting the heads off of chickens in a carnival sideshow, but that's more of a pre-production discussion, don't you think?), and that passion is one of the best things about a Fringe show. Most of the awful Fringe shows I've been awful because whoever was in charge decided it was about showing how deep they could be, how cool. And they've fallen flat on their faces. But the weird, the odd, the obsessed, that's where I want a seat. To paraphrase an old theater maxim, you can pretend to be serious, but you can't pretend to be geeky. So this year I'm taking on the geek fringe. Not just the archtypical sci-fi/fantasy genres (of which I am squarely a fan), but other weird passions. A show about a killer font? I am so there. A show about mermaids that's based on real and fake facts? Done. Time traveling Victorians examining American culture? Sure! But beyond the shows, I hope to examine why Fringe producers chose their shows, and the stranger, the better. Why they were driven to plunk down the application fee and spend several weeks hastily putting together a 55 minute show about some strange topic for audiences. What makes the theater geek put his obsession on display?