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Students, faculty, and staff are invited to celebrate the arts and the unusual during College Theater’s Fringe XIV 8 p.m. Monday, Nov. 13 and Wednesday-Friday, Nov. 15-17 in the Williams Center for the Arts Black Box Theater.
All members of the Lafayette community are invited to participate. Admission is free.
Students interested in performing in Fringe XIV must submit a proposal by 5 p.m. Monday, Nov. 6 to Michael O’Neill, associate professor of English and director of theater, at the WilliamsCenter.
Fringe XIV is comprised of evenings supported by College Theater for performance pieces that push the boundaries of accepted ideas about what theater is or should be. It offers students a chance to perform, challenge themselves, see what their peers are up to, and try out ideas they might otherwise never have a chance to follow through on.
“The goal of the Fringe originally was to create alternative entertainment for students in the week leading up to the Lafayette-Lehigh football game,” O’Neill says. “In addition, College Theater wanted – and still wants – to encourage students to explore the arts in new and interesting ways.”
O’Neill recalls past performances of poetry readings, original plays, vocalists, scenes from plays, dance, electronic music, shadow puppets, improvisations, satire, and rap. Among his favorites were a woman who could catch grapes in her mouth that were thrown by her brother from a distance of 20 feet, and a wild version of Henry Fielding’s play Tom Thumb starring an Idaho potato.
“What students do with an opportunity such as this helps define the Fringe,” he says. “I want to have more of them. I would like every night of the Fringe crammed with student work, preferably original work.”
For more information, contact O’Neill at (610) 330-5326 or email.