Remaining Performances:
Friday, July 25 @ 10:30 PM; Saturday, July 26 @ 11 PM; Sunday, July 27 @ 2:30 PM

They say: “A hot new play that gives an intimate and honest look at exactly how much there is to lose when you decide to reveal yourself. The Naked Party takes nine students and strips them of their costumes, armor (and inhibitions) in order to fully see themselves for the first time.”

Brian’s take: All right, I’ll admit it. I may have been to a naked party or two. Ok, fine, and by “two” I mean two dozen. And maybe, just maybe a handful of those were held in my living room. So what? I’m not ashamed. We nibbled sashimi and rhapsodized about Kant, you know, normal Saturday night stuff. Hell, the New York Times covered a naked party I helped host–that’s gotta lend a guy some credibility, right?

Maybe not. However, I do feel particularly qualified to offer my opinion of The Naked Party, which has been selling out the Shop at Fort Fringe. There are elements of the show that work very nicely, such as a conceit by which every party-goer gets time in a closet to undress while airing their inner feelings. Likewise with the staging–maneuvering 9 actors around a space as small as the Shop with quite a few set pieces is no easy task, and playwright-director Jason Schlafstein manages to minimize traffic jams while keeping the picture dynamic and balanced. And I have to give a shout-out to Guitar Guy, a character that might have been forgettable had not Rob Shand done such a superb job engaging (and, at all the appropriate times, blissfully disengaging) with the silliness around him. Plus he reminds me of about 15 of my buddies rolled into one.

It’s actually quite remarkable how Guitar Guy, who has very few lines and integration with the main action, emerges more fully than some of the more prominent characters. My first thought upon leaving the theater was that Schlafstein should excise a character or two–Julie, perhaps, or Jordan, who both seem to represent the same moral conundrum. But the concept for this play poses a logistical dilemma: it requires a quorum in order to put the party in “naked party,” and each member of this quorum, if the play is to reach its potential, must be more fully fleshed out.

Not that there isn’t plenty of flesh. This ensemble delivers on all the scrotal and mammarian promises of its show’s title. In my real world experience, naked parties are great equalizers: that hottie you normally drool over looks a bit more average sans clothes, and that untouchable you thought might make you queasy strikes you as a little better-looking than expected. That seems to be an unspoken lesson here. But what I find most interesting about nudity on stage is that it is one of the few instances in which an actor’s action is completely unified with that of his or her character. At the outset of this play, both Budman and AJ Cooke, the actor who plays him, have the same objective–to get naked in front of an audience–and that self-conscious synchronicity makes for a unique electricity in the theater. (Although I can’t be sure, I think both character and actor got synchronously wasted in the theater as well.)

The acting is uneven–but everyone in the ensemble is at least competent, if not strong. And whatever, you’ve got to give credit to anyone who is willing to run around naked for an hour in front of a roomful of judgmental strangers (and critics, no less!) Adlerian training or not, that cast has serious balls–at least half of them real and jangly, the remainder metaphoric.

I had a lot of fun at this show, but I will say this: I’ve had a lot of fun at a lot of shows. To all those people who stood for 75 minutes in the oppressive heat of the shop at 11 o’clock at night, the smell of sweat indigenous to very specific bodily crevices wafting through the rafters, I am impressed by your dedication. Now take that dedication and go see another production that, while it may feature performers in full dress, still deserves at least as many audience members as The Naked Party. I’ll let you know when I’m holding the next real one in my living room. Maybe this time we can invite the Post.

See it if: You believe that, like your own naked ass, theater can be endearing in its imperfections.

Skip it if: Butt hair makes you squeamish.

So it’s been a while since I did anything other than write up a show, eh? And surely you all, no matter how high-minded your approach to Fringe, expect a certain amount of trash-talking here at Fringe & Purge. 

(I’ve got an excuse, involving my sister, my nephews, and a beach house on the Isle of Palms. Hope y’all had a similarly good week.)

But I’m back in the Fringe groove now, so let’s address that dish deficit. 

Speaking of which, we’ll get all up in Julianne’s business in a minute. But before we throw stones, a note about our own glass house: 

Performance-Us Interruptus - One of Fringe & Purge’s guest bloggers ducked out partway through a show earlier this week, then panned it royally here on the blog. A certain number of the commentariat was outraged — as was one of the show’s cast, who sent me a tart e-mail.

Among the bullet-point complaints (certain paraphrasal liberties have been taken) in that note:

• Ditching mid-show is disrespectful to the cast, the crew, the Fringe Ideal, and anyone who sat dutifully through Hot Feet.
• Other festivals insist that reviewers/judges ”stay until the bitter end of any assigned show — no matter how bad.” 
• Dude complained in his review that the show had no story — but he had left before the story “really had a chance to begin.”
• Y’all should really send somebody else to re-review. And maybe fire the putz.

Now, while we’re sometimes flippant here at Fringe & Purge, we do take this stuff seriously. The City Paper once dismissed a contributing writer who filed a review without telling either her readers or her editor that she’d left the show at intermission. I don’t see why a similar standard ought not to obtain here.

But our contributor did disclose that he’d bailed — disclosed in the review itself, in fact. 

And while I’m open to argument about whether it’s kosher to complain about the weakness of a show’s bones when you haven’t stuck around to assess every last metatarsal, our blogger reports that he stayed for 40 minutes of a show that runs an hour and ten. Which doesn’t strike me as outrageous.

Also: I’m of the belief that respect for the artists or no, it’s within the pale for a critic to leave a show that’s not going well. It’s hard to say when it’s justified, and it’s not something I’d do every week. But bottom line, if you’re convinced that no amount of basting is gonna save a turkey, it’s OK to hit the Eject button. (Not to mix a metaphor, or anything.)

Should our guest blogger not have filed a review at all? Not entirely my call. Blog editor Brian Reed has this to say: 

“I thought it was a very funny and particularly honest review (that he discloses his early departure both earns him all this flack but also espouses a certain integrity), and therefore didn’t worry too much about posting it.  Since then, as you know, several people have responded either with outrage or their own appraisals of the show.”

Indeed: By my estimation, Power House has now gotten more attention on this blog than 9/10ths of the other Fringe shows. And you know what they say about publicity, no-such-thing-as-bad department.

As for the re-reviewing: Without wishing to suggest that the show was owed a second look, I draw your attention to the comments section of the original post. Brett Abelman, who’s one of our other guest bloggers, also took in a performance, and he’s offered up his thoughts in a longish comment.  Which we hope the show’s other partisans will also feel free to do.

One last pair of observations: Dan Owen, the offending guest blogger, strikes me as a smart, funny guy. Works for a big honkin’ international-development organization, has traveled the world, seems like a no-bullshit sort.

But I also know that Shawn Northrip and Shirley Serotsky, the writer and director of Power House, aren’t just f–cking about. They’ve been Fringe heavies since Year One, and between Titus! The Musical, Lunch, The Musical and The Many Adventures of Trixie Tickles, they’ve done their share of entertaining, button-pushing, balls-to-the-wall work.

So I’m inclined to chalk this one up to chacun à son goût – and to point out that taking a chance on shows that may not appeal to your taste is, after all, what Fringe is all about. 

Rehearsalus Interruptus – Heard a hilarious story one night under the Baldacchino: Apparently the Fine Wine Players were rehearsing in a vacant Capitol Hill townhouse, and something about their enthusiasm alarmed the neighbors. Who called the cops. Who — according to the version I heard — arrived with guns drawn, thinking they were responding to a domestic-violence incident.

Fine Wine’s Charlene James-Duguid didn’t mention unholstered weaponry (of any sort) when she called me back to confirm the incident. But she did commend the MPD on their diligence.

And she said that when she explained to the boys in blue that her troops were prepping a show for Fringe, the centurions didn’t miss a beat: “Well, we’ll have to see that,” the officer reportedly said. 

Naked-ness Interruptus - As you may have heard, one early performance of The Naked Party ran a touch long. So long that Fringe staff turned up the house lights and shooed everyone out.

As one Fringe-goer tells us:

“So now you have these actors, on stage, nude. And they immediately break character. The women covered themselves with their hands and then ran for their clothes …. The men stood a little like a “deer in the headlights” …. 

Ironic, that, in a show that uses nudity as a metaphor for vulnerability — and that seems to be at least partly about overcoming shyness.

I got a call that night from an outraged audience member — a DC lawyer friend, whose response was along the lines of: “Dammit, we were just getting to the denouement, and I want to know what happened.” That Fringe-goer, who titled her e-mail “Best Fringe Incident Yet,” alerted CP arts editor Mark Athitakis a couple of days later.

I’d have blogged about all this earlier, but y’know, beach house and all.  

Still, I checked in with Julianne, who pointed out that based on the show’s tech-rehearsal timings, they were on target to run over by about 20 minutes — and that other shows were lined up to load in at that venue.

“Think of the poor venue manager,” Julianne pleaded. “The show after this we would have had to hold, and the one after that. That would have made more people pretty pissed.”

Then she noted that all Fringe fests have similar don’t-blow-your-time-slot rules, chiefly to keep the trains from running completely off the tracks.  And she noted in LARGE letters that that night’s audiences were offered refunds. 

For his part, Naked Party writer-director Jason Schlafstein did a double-back mea culpa with a half twist. 

He and his cast had rehearsed with an invited audience, he said, but never with a real one — and crowd reaction added time. And there was apparently a miscommunication with Fringe: the festival staff had booked x minutes of time, and the Naked partiers were under the impression that they had x-plus-five.

(Forgive the algebra, he was talking fast.)

Schlafstein stresses that he takes full responsibility, that he was mortified, and that he and his gang aren’t sticking any pins in their Julianne doll. 

(Anymore. No, no — I said that, not him.) 

That very night, he says, “I went home and sent out a bunch of cuts to the actors.” Took 10 minutes out of the show. And since then, they’ve been playing to ”pretty much universally positive reviews.” 

And near-sold-out houses, Schlafstein says — so if you’d like to see it, you might want to book your seats now. 

Happy Fringing,

Trey