ORLANDO, Fla. – The Orlando International Fringe Theatre Festival is returning once again to Loch Haven Park.
Theater officials announced the theme for the 32nd annual arts event is Festival Beautiful. The 14-day Orlando Fringe Festival will run from May 16-29.
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“This year’s theme, Festival Beautiful, is in honor of our beautiful City of Orlando,” Orlando Fringe Executive Director Alauna Friskics said in a statement. “As we enter into our 32nd year, we reflect on how far we’ve come. We began Downtown in empty storefronts and on Church Street, and here we are again – full circle – back on Church Street decades later with the recently celebrated opening of our year-round venue Fringe ArtSpace, expanding our programming from Loch Haven Park with more shows, more activities and more art than ever before.”
The largest and longest-running Fringe Festival in the U.S. will also include free events, like an outdoor music festival, Visual Fringe, with pieces of art on display, and Kids Fringe, which provides weekend play and entertainment for young audience members.
“There’s nothing like Orlando Fringe,” Friskics said. “I hope everyone sees lots of shows, meets lots of new people, reconnects with lots of old friends and are moved by something they experience.”
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The lawn at the festival will have interactive games, Outdoor Stage theme nights and cabanas, which guests can purchase for all-day seating, complimentary drinks and bar service.
Festival venues anchored at Loch Haven Park include Lowndes Shakespeare Center, Orlando Repertory Theatre and the Orlando Museum of Art. Bring Your Own Venues include The Abbey, Renaissance Theatre Company, Hamburger Mary’s and The Starlite Room at Savoy, along with site-specific locations chosen by artists.
This festival will also feature the new Fringe ArtSpace, which debuted in January for the Winter Mini-Fest. The art space, based in downtown Orlando, occupies the same building Mad Cow Theatre once did and serves as a haven where emerging and seasoned artists can meet and learn from one another.
“We are able to offer programming throughout the year and really like amplify artists’ voices and give them a space to work and produce and learn and teach each other,” Genevieve Bernard, program manager at the Orlando Fringe Festival, said in a previous interview with News 6.
The 9,100-square-foot building’s two theaters — a mainstage with 166 seats and a black box with 40-60 seats — will serve as a nucleus for staging both productions and studio series that give artists opportunities they may not have had prior and will play a part in the upcoming Orlando Fringe Festival.
A shuttle service between festival venues will be available.
Tickets for the festival will go on sale starting April 17. For more information, click here.
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