Rapp and Folsom Bring The Fully Immersive Lenny Bruce Experience to The Fort Worth Fringe Festival

Producers Bren Rapp and Joey Folsom are going to give 2017 Fort Worth Fringe audiences their money's worth as anchor of the 2nd annual festival on its Friday and Saturday nights at The Scott Theater with their production of Sam Bobrick and Julie Stein's Lenny Bruce is Back. The two are combining all the performance elements of the fully immersive experiences they have designed for their major market tour of the show to Comedy Clubs and burlesque houses in cities like Dallas, Chicago, Los Angeles and New York enabling Fringe audiences to experience both approaches to creating an authentic evening with Lenny Bruce. This unique entertainment event, centered around a one man show about the father of counterculture comedy, blends the art forms of burlesque, stand-up comedy and theatre with even the venue getting in on the act providing a specialty cocktail at the bar and letting audiences take their drinks with them into the theatre to give a hint of a club vibe. The 2017 Fort Worth Fringe gets the show direct from its first national tour dates in Chicago at the world famous Second City and festival audiences will see this look at the notoriously iconic comic before its performances at other nationally known venues such as iO West in Los Angeles and The United Solo Festival in New York City, the largest solo theatre festival in the world.

The impressive line up of talent accompanying Folsom, who portrays Lenny Bruce, will appear at both the primetime and late night performances. Nationally know stand-up comic Paul Varghese (Comedy Central, NBC, tour dates with Dave Chappelle and Joan Rivers) provides the opening stand-up comedy set at all shows, with the wildly popular burlesque entertainers Vivienne Vermuth on Friday night and Scarlet Peach on Saturday night performing classic burlesque reminiscent of the venues Lenny Bruce got his start in and of his wife, famous burlesque entertainer, Honey Harlow. The entire entertainment event will be hosted by regionally acclaimed actor and funny man, James Chandler.

The Show: Today's political climate in America has again brought the issues surrounding free speech, comedy as civil disobedience and satire as a vehicle for social change to the forefront of our cultural conversation.This makes the story of controversial comic and satirist Lenny Bruce not only remarkably relevant but one of timely historical precedent to be noted. Joey Folsom stars in this one man piece, that, while primarily comedic in design, profiles stand-up comedy's most infamous figure who challenged the perceptions of the purpose of comedy and is thought of by many as the satirical equivalent of a martyr, vilified in life and sainted in death for the path he paved for comedians and individuals alike regarding the freedom of speech. Written in the bluntly honest voice and provocatively notorious style of Lenny Bruce, Sam Bobrick and Julie Stein's Lenny Bruce is Back is based on the premise of Bruce coming back from the dead to deliver the stand-up set he never had the opportunity to give in life. Staged to capture the format and feel of stand-up comedy, the show is biographical as well as culturally insightful, mixing the funny, with the poignant and the obscenely relevant in an entertaining hybrid uniquely suited for both comedy and theatrical audiences.

Production Information

Lenny Bruce is Back

Written by Sam Bobrick and Julie Stein

Produced by Bren Rapp and Joey Folsom

Directed by Nathan Autrey

Featuring Joey Folsom as Lenny Bruce

Also appearing: Paul Varghese, Vivienne Vermuth, Scarlet Peach and James Chandler

Show Times

7:15pm Friday, September 1

10:15pm Friday, September 1

7:00pm Saturday, September 2

10:15pm Saturday, September 2

All performances take place at The Scott Theater

Festival Passes: $105 for all access, $85 for a 10-show pass, $50 for a five-show pass available at https://buy.ticketstothecity.com/venue.php?org_id=138.

Single show tickets available at the venue on show days

Adults only 18 and up.

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