Brian Horrigan

Exhibit curator at Minnesota Historical Society

At the very certain risk of sounding clichéd, this year's schedule does appear to offer something for everyone, including shows for those of us who were offered AARP memberships in the last few years, as well as riskier and edgier offerings for the Twin Cities' exceedingly large "hip-oisie." One of the things I'm looking forward to is seeing shows in oddball venues—the Cities have an enormous number of places where theater art happens, and I've seen a lot, I think—but I also suspect I've only scatched the surface!

Lot o' Shakespeare and
Rape of Lucrece

I am a devoted Shakespeare addict, dropping everything to see just about any production of any of the plays, so I had a hard time choosing from the half-dozen or so Shakespeare-inspired Fringe offerings. These two sound great—the first because (as the title promises) there will be a lot of familiar Shakespeare crammed into an evening and the second because "The Rape" is such a great poem and it's rarely performed.

Aunt Dicey Channels Moms Mabley

Two reasons this jumps out: two African-American women, Mabley and Zulu, have made a huge difference in American cultural history. Once upon a time—the 1940s and ’50s—she was one of the most popular black entertainers in the country and appealed to both white and black audiences. She was incredibly, transgressively vulgar—and very funny.

The Sins of the Mothers

I am looking forward to this because I think I know one of the children that Paula Reed Nancarrow will be telling stories about. And with Loren Niemi involved, it should be a great night of engrossing storytelling.

Vampire Lesbians of Sodom and
Your Responsibility for Sex Failure

One of the great Fringe traditions is the provocative title. Charles Busch's off-off-Broadway play has one of the great titles of all time, and the play has gone way beyond cult status. I can't wait to see it. The second headliner sounds terrific—and also very smart historically, using 1960s women's magazines sex advice as the "raw" material. The pill hits the market in the US in 1960, and "women's lib" activists picket the Miss America pageant in 1968—but throughout the decade, women are still getting bombarded with traditional messages.