Fledgling Festival Brings Smorgasbord to Perishable Theatre

Gay sock puppets Fat Nancy and Crisco return to Perishable Theatre this weekend to help usher in the fourth annual Fledgling Festival, a cultural smorgasbord of short plays, puppets, film, dance and performance art.

The festival, which gets under way tonight, features new work from writers and performers from around New England. Sixteen acts are included in the line-up. Show up on any given night and you’re likely to see seven or eight shows. Bring back your program a second night and get in for half-price, when you can see a new batch of plays and performances.

Highlights of this year’s festival include an appearance by Boston’s Evan O’Television, who will be using snippets from a film shown at last year’s festival as a jumping off point for a stand-up routine, said Peter Deffet, who is running the event.

Also Mike Truppi is back as a gluttonous gourmand, who this time is taking date Moira Brady out for dinner, and grossing her out.

Two teenaged brothers deal with the death of their father in Nancy Hoffman’s Launching. One of the boys takes objects belonging to his dad and fires them off into the woods with a slingshot.

RPMs, a new musical by Khym Carmichael, introduces us to a subatomic particle that breaks away from an atom and forms a new atom of its own.

"It’s all new work," said Deffet. "Some was made for the festival. Some was already started and the festival just provided a reason to finish it."

The festival runs through Aug. 17 at Perishable Theater, 95 Empire St., Providence. Shows take place Thursday through Saturday at 8 p.m. and Sunday at 3 p.m. Tickets are $10, and return tickets are $5.Call (401) 621-6123, or log on to www.arttixrri.com.

Meanwhile, two shows have opened in Warren and Matunuck. Theatre by the Sea is wrapping up its summer season with 12-time Tony Award- winning hit The Producers, and at 2nd Story Theatre in Warren, director Ed Shea is putting on Hannah Cowley’s rarely staged 18th- century romantic comedy, The Belle’s Stratagem, which finds the crafty Letetia plotting ways to win over her fiance, who seems indifferent to her.

The Belle’s Stratagem runs though Aug. 30 at 2nd Story, 28 Market St., Warren. Tickets are $25. Call (401) 247-4200.

There’s nothing obscure about The Producers, though. The show has made a couple of stops at the Providence Performing Arts Center and was twice made into a film. As most everyone knows, it’s a wacky look at a down-on-his-luck theatrical producer and his mousy accountant who figure they can make more money staging a flop than a hit. They’ll raise money for the show, and when it dies a quick death, they’ll pocket what’s left.

Jerome Vivona, who has directed several shows at Matunuck, returns to helm this production, and Brad Musgrove, who was the dance captain for the Broadway run, is the choreographer. He’s using the steps worked out for the Broadway show by choreographer- director Susan Stroman.

The Producers runs through Aug. 31 at Theatre by the Sea, 364 Cards Pond Rd., Matunuck. Tickets for tonight’s preview performance are $35, and $39-$49 for all other performances. Call (401) 782- 8587.

Peter Deffet and Amy Lynn Budd will perform at The Fledgling Festival. Ashley Mercado

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