One woman 08/09/2013 - 11:50am

The truth is my fringe haul yesterday is really best described with just those three words. I’ll elaborate, but it really isn’t necessary. Naked as a theme for the night didn’t come as a huge surprise as my first show was the 5:30PM ‘Fashion Risk or the Accidental Nudist’ at Mixed Blood. Although not exactly a solo show - it’s hard to ignore the stage cluttered with naked people - Natalie Wass certainly does all the talking. She gets naked too, which is brilliant, and follows a beautifully honest disclaimer. What I left thinking about was, I believe, at least part of the show’s intention; to reexamine nudity as something other than the required state for sex or bathing. To consider one’s existence as an animal on the earth who is, in their natural state, naked. The show doesn’t necessarily encourage a nudest existence for the audience, but invites them to be comfortable with nudity for awhile. Laugh with it, at the very least. Non-sexual nudity. Interesting. ‘Get Ready for the Vagina Fairy’ (which I saw on Sunday) suggested something similar when a fully nude Rebecca Kling explained that it is important for transgender people to be seen naked; outside of porn. Naked. No sex. Naked. No sex. Interesting...

Ironically, when Sex arrived - he was wearing a leather jacket.

'Elysium Blues' isn’t a solo show. In fact, the ensemble is incredible - all of them having a strong grasp on complicated language, music, and movement. Not one weak link in a fringe show with a big cast. So - I liked the show, everyone was good blah, blah, blah. But guys... when this Eric Mayson made his entrance... I don’t really have a specific type - but if a big drink of fucktown walks in... who can deny it? Holy shit, this guy Eric... *Dawn fans herself. Pure rock n’ roll, leather jacket, guitar slung over his back, on a mission to save his woman - and then he sings and it’s like... wha? I actually had to cover my mouth to stop the fluttering gasps and giggles. So I walk out of that show pondering the irony of having seen gads of naked people - dancing naked people - for an hour; and nary a tingle. Half a second with Mr. Leather Jacket and I’m a mess. I’m still chewing on this (and an emergency snickers bar from the vending machine in Rarig. I have NOT got my Fringe eating schedule handled yet) while in line to see ‘The Legend of White Woman Creek’. This one was on my radar from day-one; it has all my favorite things: history, music, one-woman. It was great, as expected, the reviews are right. Music, story, character - all top shelf. But, as if taking her cue from the previous two shows, at a critical moment in the play, performer Katie Hartman takes her contemporary dress off and slowly puts on the Civil War-era dress of the ghost of Anna Morgan Faber. Naked AGAIN*! No one, including me, is surprised by the disproportionately high number of naked people in the Fringe Festival. Still to be slapped by three shows in a row with alternating currents of nudity and sex... One needs a cookie. In the midst of all this skin I finally found fellow blogger Paul De Cordova. Together we headed to Fringe Central and ate one of those goddamn cookies. Now for a cold shower. *Nearly naked, to be accurate.