Indy Theatre Habit

By 10:30 on the first Saturday night of the 2008 Indy Fringe Festival I was worn out.  Worn out, and therefore in danger of biting people’s heads off.  Even though the structure of the Fringe festival allows for a relaxed, just-right transistion time betweeen shows, six shows in one day, plus all of the enjoyable but information-rich conversations in between, is a LOT for this HSP to take in.

I probably should have just gone on home, but I really wanted to see and hear Loren Niemi’s opening show.  If you are a regular reader of my blog, you may remember that Niemi’s show was one of my five picks for what I would see if I only had $50 to spend at this year’s Fringe.

His “Alone and Testifying” show is actually a series of six shows, each focusing on a different period in his life as a storyteller, writer, teacher, political activist, etc. For some of them, he is joined by Howard Lieberman, another storyteller, writer, lawyer, and political activist.  They are both from Minnesota. 

They are also both what I would call “pure” storytellers.  They don’t use props, costumes, special lighting, or any sound effects except what they can make with their own voices.  They don’t use any special visuals except what they create with their own bodies. 

Personally, I love this form of performance art more than any other.  However, if you are expecting a lot of theatrical razzle-dazzle, you will be disappointed by this show. 

However, if you go just wanting to hear well-crafted stories that were written for thinking adults - personal stories that have global significance….If you go with your heart and mind open to helping make the stories come alive through your listening, then this show has a lot to offer.

“Alone and Testifying” is also more serious in terms of both content and delivery than any of the other Fringe shows I have seen so far this year.  I won’t lie to you:  this is a hard show to concentrate on if it’s late and you’re tired.  

However (and this is the final “however”), the things I have always loved about Niemi’s telling - his command of the English language and his powers of observation - are as powerful as ever.

I enjoyed meeting Lieberman, too.  He opened this particular show by saying he was a Republican doing mission work.  In other words, he was visiting Democrats in Indiana to answer their questions in the hopes of converting them.  He first asked how many Democrats there were in the room.  Most people raised their hands.  Then he invited questions.

I usually like to help out performers who invite audience participation, but I could not, at that moment, think of a question to ask a vulnerable Republican to save my life.

Fortunately, someone else asked, “How many houses do you have?”  Lieberman is not actually a Republican, of course.  I was impressed by his ability to riff about “only” having two or three houses, but “none of the live-in servants that people think we have.” 

After a few more questions, Niemi got up and told related stories from his travels in Belfast and Beijing.  Everwhere, people want to know, “Who are you and how do you fit in?…The truth is the only thing that matters.”

Then Lieberman told about a trip to Israel with an Orthodox Jewish rabbi who welcomed him into the group even though he (Lieberman) is a secular, atheist Jew; gay; and has tattoos on his arms.

Niemi closed with a story about a car accident he had been in on his 55th birthday.  After the accident, everyone kept telling him he should have just hit the deer rather than swerving to try and avoid it.   This deceptively simple story, too, was quite literary and filled with good food for thought.

After the show, Lieberman, Niemi, ,Ellen Munds (Executive Director of Storytelling Arts of Indiana) and Lou Ann Holman (a professional storyteller, writer, and teacher who is based in northern Indiana) and I went out for drinks at the Chatham Arch pub, which is down the street from TOTS.  It was incredibly noisy, and as I say, I was already wiped out, so I didn’t stay long, but I learned that Lieberman is on the board of the Minneapolis Fringe Festival, and that Pauline Moffat and the Indy Fringe board have picked the brains of the Minneapolis Fringe over the years to help make our Fringe as successful as it is. 

The idea of the Fringe backer buttons, for example, comes from the Minneapolis Fringe.

After the drinks arrived, the jokes started.  I laughed out loud at the “Luna and Ollie” (I think that was their names) stories that Niemi and Lieberman told.  They told me there is a whole folkloric world based on these two characters in Minnesota.

Some day I would like to hear all of them.  And, if I could, I would go back to this year’s Fringe to hear the other five segments of “Alone and Testifying.”

Hope Baugh - www.IndyTheatreHabit.com