Q: What does it take to get a show into the Fringe? Do the organizers pay you to participate? And how do you pull it all off?
A: No, no, there are no subsidies! In fact, it's expensive to participate. You have to pay a festival fee. You pay to get a picture with your listing in the guidebook. You have to get insurance, to be bonded.
If you want marketing - say a sandwich board outside the venue, or any kind of flier or cards, you pay. And of course, you have to pay the actors. We got a break from Actors Equity to be able to work with Joilet Harris, but only within limits.
I've been working with the owner of the Arts Garage, Ola Solanke, for several years, originally doing some poetry readings. It's in a gentrifying neighborhood, become a popular place with students and cutting-edge artists from the universities and the Northern Liberties area.
But I also couldn't have gotten this show on without Chetachi Dunkley, owner of a residential services company [Casmir Care Services] that works with people who have disabilities or mental health issues. I am doing some consulting for her [he holds the title of executive director], and she raised the issue of wanting to do something for the arts. I said, hell, you can donate to me!
Well, I didn't say it quite like that, but that's how it all got going. And her daughter [Chioma] wound up in the show, alternating in the part of the young Ansonia. But Chioma has experience - she just finished working on an independent film at Temple - and had to pass our audition.
"A Separate Sun" by Joe Blake and Bill Jolly, directed by Lenny Daniels, starring Joilet Harris with Chioma Dunkley, Harum Ulmer Jr. and Jamara Griffin. The Arts Garage, 1533 Ridge Ave., 7 p.m. Saturday, 4 p.m. Sunday (sold out), 7 p.m. Tuesday through Sept. 10, and 4 and 7 p.m. Sept. 11, 215-413-1318, www.livearts-fringe.org.
