Pontine Theatre to Host 7th Annual WEST-FEST: New Vaudeville Festival, 12/26-30

For the eighth year, Pontine Theatre presents a host of New Vaudeville performers at its annual WEST-FEST: New Vaudeville Festival. Performances are scheduled for 2pm, 26-30 December at Pontine's West End Studio Theatre located at 959 Islington Street in Portsmouth. An additional show featuring Roderick Russell's Almost Psychic! and geared toward adult audiences will take place at 7pm on December 26th. WEST-FEST is modeled on the Phyzgig Festival which was founded in Portland Maine in 1997. It's a family-oriented festival that chases away the blues with performances featuring magic, mirth, and mayhem. Each of the featured performers are skilled in multiple forms: physical comedy, clowning, juggling, magic, and more. Schedule (subject to change): Dec 26 & 28 - Michael Trautman's King Pong, Dec 27 - Leland Faulkner's World of Wonders, Dec 29 & 30 - John & Rebecca Higby's The YoYo Show. Tickets are $15 and may be purchased online at www.pontine.org. Tickets may also be purchased at the door a half-hour prior to each show, based on availability. Contact: info@pontine.org / 603-436-6660.

26 & 28 December @2pm, Michael Trautman performs his original production, King Pong. Variously identified as a visual comic, performance artist, new vaudevillian, mime (gasp), physical comedian, storyteller, magician, and fool, he claims only to be a clown...and not a very traditional clown at that. He has appeared in such prestigious venues as the New York International Festival of Clown Theater, Festival D'Ete in Quebec, the General Jackson Showboat at Opryland USA, the Just For Laughs Festival in Montreal, and The Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.

26 December at 7pm, Roderick Russell performs his original show, Almost Psychic! Roderick is a professional mind reader, stage hypnotist and sword swallower who performs nationally and internationally. His work has been featured by the Discovery Channel, the Travel Channel, CNN, NPR, and Ripley's Believe It Or Not. Fun, irreverent, captivating and amazing, Roderick Russell gets into your head, rummages around and puts it all on stage for an evening of exceptional entertainment. This performance is geared toward an adult audience.

27 December at 2pm, Leland Faulkner performs his original production, World of Wonders. Leland charms audiences of all ages with the actor's imagination, the mime's skill, and the conjuror's craft. Beginning with the amazing and lost art of shadowgraphs or hand shadows, Leland conjures up an amazing menagerie of silhouettes using only his hands. Discover classical magic from the Far East as a Japanese magician lets folded paper butterflies fill the air with color in a beautiful homage to Old Japan.

28 & 29 December at 2pm, John & Rebecca Higby's The YoYo Show brings back that nostalgic toy, the Yo-yo, reminding audiences of old favorite tricks such as Walk the Dog and Rock the Baby, then amazing them with new and bizarre tricks, such as Boingy-Boingy and Iron Whip. Yo-yos attached to bouncy balls, yo-yos with 10-foot strings, and multiple yo-yos looping while unicycling are just some of his finely tuned feats. High skill and deft timing to swingin' music coupled with high energy and sarcastic humor make the Yo-Yo Show a favorite for every age. As seen on David Letterman, he holds a Guinness World Record, a Yo-Yo World Champion title, and has performed in over 20 countries.

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