For the past three years, I have taken an almost empty space, and turned it into a place for socializing, drinking, networking and anything in between. Hi, I am David Offner, and I am the scenic designer for Fringe Central.

My first design in the Hollywood Fringe Festival, was back in 2013. I was working with my longtime collaborator and very dear friend, Brandon Baruch, on a Fringe show that he had written. Then in 2015, Dave McKeever had asked me about designing a “bar space” at the Dragonfly. This would become our first year here. We walked into the smaller side of a very dark, dingy space, which had a TON of potential. We didn’t have a lot of money for budget, but when do we ever have a lot of money in theater?!?! That first year at the Dragonfly, we hung paper parasols upside down, and Brandon lit the hell out of them! It was a simple, cheap, and colorful design. 

The way the designs come together is a pretty simple story. Usually around February or March, Dave, Brandon, and I meet at the Holloway Bar in Echo Park (free publicity for the Holloway Bar), and we start riffing on design ideas. For the past 3 years, we have sat down in a bar and have come up with Fringe Central concepts over a pint of beer. Thanks for paying, Dave! From there, I get to start laying out the design that eventually becomes Fringe Central. I’ll start with research ideas, and then turn those into sketches, renderings, and plans. There are always a few key points that the Central space needs to address. The bar, the concierge space, and the ability to promote your show. These are all VERY different challenges than we normally have to deal with in theater. Instead of designing for a 99 seat house, where scenery has to travel in or out; I need to worry about foot traffic, if there is room to get to the bar, space for posters…or how the smoking porch will look. 

Designing Fringe Central is a wonderful time in my year, because I get to break the fourth wall. The audience actually interacts with the set…whether I like it or not. I might have a vision in mind for how it should look in its purest form, but the minute post cards, posters, and beer bottles arrive, it becomes a completely different space. I think over the last 3 Fringe’s, I have embraced these changes, and built that idea into the design. 

One of the most important aspects of the Fringe Festival, is that I work with incredibly talented people. We are basically glued to the space for 2 weeks, and take it from a building that is under construction, as it was this year, to a full functioning theater/bar. I believe that you are only as talented as the people that work with you. A HUGE SHOUT OUT to the scenic crew that makes the space look as good as it does. For the last three years, I have worked closely with Miles Robinson, Sara Paquette, and Brad Bentz (please hire them), plus many other interns and volunteers who bring their skills and artistic sensibilities to the project. It takes a village to make a Fringe. 

I hope you all enjoy drinking at Fringe Central!!!

Thank you to everyone who participated in the Fringe Runway event at Fringe Central on June 14th. Twenty-five different #hff17 productions showed off costumes (and walked with style, grace and glitter) for our three celebrity judges. Congratulations to the winners!

First Place: Do You: Migration of the Monarchs

Second Place: Comic-Con The Musical

Third Place: Nosferatu, A Symphony in Terror.

Honorable Mention: The Rising

You may notice a few new freaks running around the Hollywood Fringe this year. No, I’m not talking about the countless thespians and their patrons that descend on Santa Monica Blvd. every June — I’m talking about the Fringe Freaks — the official mascots of the Hollywood Fringe Festival!

Allow me to introduce myself — I’m Steve Troop, one of the creators and creature builder of the award-winning Fringe Show, “Alien vs. Musical.” That must be how the Fringe staff first became aware of my work… or maybe because I’ve been begging Fringe staff to rebuild the Freak costumes for the last several years!

Earlier this year, we finally struck a deal for me to rebuild five of the six heads for the 2017 festival. One of the things that Ben Hill wanted for the new Freaks was for me to do my own “spin” on the characters. Also, they should be light, durable and cheap.

Before I was a puppet builder, I was a cartoonist, so I decided that I wanted to make all of the characters a lot more cartoony. I did a series of sketches of the Freaks making weird faces. As luck would have it, the Hollywood Fringe was also running their contest for the Guide Cover, so I was able to further refine the characters while working on my submission. In a perfect world, I would have had my cover on the Guide, my Freaks running around and a show in production this year. Something to look forward to in 2018, I guess!

Anyway, after I figured out what the new heads were going to look like (and ran out of time), I started roughing out the shapes using the cheapest foam I could find. I use flat 1/2” thick foam clued together with contact cement to the majority of my builds. I start with cheap upholstery foam ($8-10 a sheet) until I have something resembling what I’m going for, and then take the whole thing apart to make patterns so I can rebuild it using the more expensive L200 foam ($35-55 a sheet). The more expensive stuff is more durable, holds its shape better and is — most importantly — lighter than the cheap stuff.

I usually try to make heads more-or-less symmetrical. During the pattern-making process, it’s possible to “true up” the patterns by tracing each half of the pattern on butcher paper, then averaging out the two sides. Then, you transfer the paper patterns to the expensive foam and glue everything together. Unfortunately, I didn’t take any pictures of this process for the Fringe heads, but my Instagram feed is full of pictures of the process on other projects.

After I had the final head built on top of a baseball helmet, I repeated the process with the “Skin” by covering it with cheap fabric, marking all the seams with a Sharpie, and then transferring it to butcher paper, truing it up and then tracing that shape onto the expensive fabric. While I was building the Freaks, my puppet shop was closing so I got a ton of free “Muppet” fleece (also called Antron Fleece). This was a considerable upgrade that should give the new heads a lot longer lifespan. Everybody wins! (except me, who now has to work out of my kitchen). 

The only drawback to using Antron Fleece is that it only comes in white, so I had to dye all six colors from scratch. I did my best to match the colors, despite being color blind. Did I mention that I’m color blind? Let me tell you, it’s done wonders for both my cartooning and puppet building careers.

The last part of the process is sewing everything together. At first, I started by machine sewing what I could, but it’s much easier to hide the seams if you hand sew Antron Fleece — so aside from a few seams here and there, just about all of the heads ended up hand-sewn. 

I had originally estimated 10 hours for all of the heads together, but by the time I finished, the entire process took approximately 102 hours: 26 hours for Green, 24 hours for Orange, 4 hours for Blue, 21 hours for Red, 18 hours for Purple and 9 hours for Brown. Also, I spent about 8 hours dying all the fabric. Whew!

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is why I’m not a millionaire. But — like all things Fringe, these new Freaks are a labor of love — and hopefully will entertain theatre-goes for years to come! I can’t wait to see them running around the Festival and showing up in everyone’s Instagram Accounts!

Steve’s puppet work can be seen at Puppet Design Studio.

Steve’s cartooning work can be seen at Melonpool.

Follow Steve’s latest puppet builds on instagram @melonpool

Hi folks, my name is Corwin; you’ll usually see me fixing some technical thing somewhere, or telling longwinded stories that go nowhere. I wandered into the first Hollywood Fringe Festival with Theatre Unleashed, the first company I worked with in Los Angeles. I was doing sound design for “Friends Like These,” a piece which has since gone on all over the place.

Showcase select costumes from your production at Fringe Runway, the Hollywood Fringe fashion show on Wed., June 14th at 9pm. Any Fringe Production may enter by filling out this form. 
 
The deadline to enter Fringe Runway is Thursday, June 8th by 11:59pm.
 
25 participants will be chosen by completely random lottery to participate in the event. While we wish we could feature all applicants, we must cap the participation for time. 
 
Guest judges will review each look and award prizes to three favorites.