I’ve spent the last three days in Adelaide, doing a lightning tour of Fringe Shows and generally being the bad kind of friend who doesn’t let anyone know that I was in town. Caught a total of six shows, ate a lot of great food, and hung out with the fam.
The fringe is an interesting experience when you’re a writer, because you really start seeing the difference between the “competent, polished, and dull” and the “flawed, but interesting and ambitious.”
We hit one of the former in a final night, and largely walked away angry–there was nothing technically wrong with the show, but it was centred around a gimmick and had nothing at it’s heart. Strip away the gimmick and we could have had a similar experience by wandering into a pub and making requests of a decent cover band.
I hit two of the latter–shows that were not good, but were interesting as heck–and my immediate response was to grab flyers so I could see what the folks who made them did next.
You can learn to do better when you’re flawed but interesting, but it’s way harder to teach ambition to folks who are focused on the polish.
