EXIT Theatre presents the 28th San Francisco Fringe Festival

Fringe Festivals all around the world have been an essential proving ground for thousands of independent performers from a wide array of disciplines, since the very first Edinburgh Fringe in 1947. Many distinguished former participants of the San Francisco Fringe Festival have built theatre careers from Fringe foundations, including Mark Jackson, Beth Wilmurt, Cutting Ball Theater Company, Thrillpeddlers, Boxcar Theatre, The Kilbanes, and internationally-acclaimed Banana Bag & Bodice. From September 5-14, 2019, we'll be welcoming 21 local and national performing companies to our Tenderloin Theatreplex to perform their work at our 28th annual San Francisco Fringe Festival. Full schedule of showtimes will be released on www.sffringe.org by July, 2019.

What is FRINGE?

Fringe is CHANCE. 100% of our 21 performing companies are chosen by live lottery drawing. This year our drawing was held Saturday, Feb 16, in EXIT Café, where we drew 45 names to fill 21 spots plus a waitlist.

Fringe is RISK. Since we don't curate the content of the shows, performers are free to bring what they want, pushing the parameters of the possible. Past performers have brought every kind of production to Fringe stages, from drama to comedy, improv to clown, puppetry to dance, musical to experimental, solo show to large ensemble.

Fringe is DEMOCRACY. Unjuried and uncurated, the shows that tend to do well at Fringe are those that the audiences respond to directly, recommend to their friends and fellow fringers, and review online. This peer-based approval helps artists identify and build audiences for the future, as well as for the Fringe model at large.

Fringe is ACCESS. Inexpensive to participate in and inexpensive to attend, 100% of the box office proceeds go straight back to the performers, and ticket prices are never more that $13 ($16 online). Our theatres are ADA-accessible, and all are welcome.

This year's San Francisco Fringe Festival will include performances from repeat Fringers (and recipients of "Best of Fringe" awards) such as Nationally-acclaimed author and storyteller Jamie Brickhouse, in I Favor My Daddy, physical experimentalist James Sundquist in AEON, "slightly internationally-renowned lesbian playwright," Terry Baum in HICK: A Love Story, and Comedian Alicia Dattner, in Too Soon? We also welcome a slew of underground and under-the-radar talents, some of whom will be breakout stars in their own right. Who will those stars be? We won't know until they get here, which is part of the thrill of Fringe!

The San Francisco Fringe Festival is produced by EXIT Theatre and is the oldest grassroots theatre festival in the Bay Area, and the second-oldest Fringe Festival in the US. We're members of CAFF (Canadian Association of Fringe Festivals), and run our festival in accordance with CAFF principles, including non-curated, unjuried content and selection, and 100% of ticket sales going to the artists. Since 1992 the SF Fringe has presented over 5000 performances by over 1,000 independent theatre companies and theatre-makers on our stages.

EXIT Theatre has been operating since 1983, when Artistic Director, Christina Augello directed a group of retired vaudeville performers in the lobby of a Tenderloin residential hotel. Since then, we've expanded into five intimate venues ranging in size from 25 - 80 seats.

Our mission is to help develop theatre artists by providing opportunities to create, experiment, and grow by commissioning new works, providing production support and low-cost venue rental, and producing performance festivals for local and touring artists. In addition to providing a home for emerging and independent theatre artists and companies, the EXIT annually produces a full season of performances with resident artists and designers.

Photo credit: Sophia Alonzo

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