FringeNYC

FringeNYC stands for Fringe New York City. My wife and I took a trip down to Greenwich Village to see something called "Dark Deceptions, The Seance Experience," a one man show put on by self proclaimed "deceptionist" Todd Robbins. The show was in a tiny theatre (capacity 240) called Player's Theater on MacDougal street between West 3rd and Bleeker. We were in the 4th row for the 75 minute show which was a lot of fun, especially the last 15 minutes held in total darkness. Robbins puts on a good show; I don't remember the last time I laughed so much.

The theme was a demonstration by Robbins of the tricks of the trade foisted upon a gullible public during the hey days of spiritualism. Robbins starts by giving a little backround, pointing out that this is all slight of hand and other trickery and then goes into comic character playing a "Reverend" of a fictitious spiritualist church. There was more than a little audience participation including the selection of four victims to take part in the on-stage seance.

The show was a part of FringeNYC which runs through the month of August and apparently consists of some 190 arts presentations in and around Greenwich Village. We passed "Fringe Central" on West 3rd street on the way to the theater. It turns out that if you're a little short of cash, but want to take in a show, two hours of volunteer work gets you free tickets. Not a bad deal at all. It may not be Broadway (or even OFF Broadway, heck Greenwich village is WAY off Broadway), but still appears to have some interesting and worthwhile stuff.

I read about Robbin's show on James Randi's web site (http://www.randi.org), that led me to the information about FringeNYC. Unfortunately it was a bit late to take in more than the one show. Maybe I'll try more next year.