The Dark Side of the Mime at Brighton Fringe
When: 4th May – 3rd June 2018
Where: Brighton, East Sussex
£: Ticket prices vary, depending on the event. Some events are free
What is it?
Brighton Fringe 2018 will take place from Friday 4th May to Sunday 3rd June, with more than 4000 performances at 155 venues across the city.
This year’s fringe will feature bold and ground-breaking work from Finland, the Netherlands and Belgium, as well as a variety of performances from local and national artists. Highlights will include grotesque mime, circus feats, ballroom dancing in a swimming pool and a nocturnal trail where audiences turn into wolves.
Brighton Fringe has grown to include a vast range of international talent, with a new Finnish Season for 2018, promising to be anything but the norm. Visitors should expect originality, peculiarity and the downright outrageous.
Comprised of ten shows, the Finnish Season will explore a variety of themes, including the quirks of gender in Gender Euphoria, the dark underbelly of humanity in Dark Side of the Mime, and polyamory in Queer Homo; told through dance, mime, comedy, circus and art.
Take a Wolf Safari at the Fringe
A striking tribute to the natural world, within the urban sphere, will be made by Jussi TwoSeven’s All City Movement, in a series of street paintings displayed around the city; and the wandering performance Wolf Safari by Other Species, similarly looking at the cityscape through new eyes, those of a wolf.
The Dutch and Flemish Season will return to this year’s fringe and will feature seven shows and three workshops, showcasing a programme of critically-acclaimed and award-winning work from the Amsterdam Fringe.
The workshops will take a personal stance, with autobiographical storytelling, an exploration of unconscious thoughts and music composition; while entertaining performance topics range from a tutorial of how to channel Beyoncé, to Marius Mensink’s attempt to exorcise Mick Jagger out of his body.
Darker subject matters will be conveyed through Watching: Ceci N’est Pas De Deux, a mix of puppetry, theatre and dance, carving a tender, entrancing performance of horror and humour; while winner of the International Award 2017, Du Fuut, will tell a Lolita-like story, a monologue of a charming persona with improper, obscure desires.
In contrast, Not Somewhere Else by Monki Business, will conjure up a uniquely personal universe combining double pole acrobatics with spoken word, live music, video and a touch of madness; while the Dutch performers will bring prototypes for their upcoming funfair, Abstractionpark 7090 in the Spiegeltent.
All pieces in the International Seasons will either be in English or be non-language based musical, physical or visual performance; so there is no requirement to speak Finnish, Dutch or Flemish in order to embrace and enjoy them.
Elsewhere at the fringe, there will be a free Fringe City which will take place in New Road every weekend in May. There will also be music, film, club nights, spoken word and children’s events at the eclectic festival.
More info: www.brightonfringe.org