Diapers and balloons fell from the ceiling of the Goode Theatre last weekend with the launch of VAF Fringe at ODU. For the first time, Virginia Arts Festival presented a series of Fringe shows on the ODU campus, including performances by an Americana group and local musician BJ Griffin, along with a silent disco. Virginia Arts Festival and ODU catapulted this new collaboration with the Neo-Futurists, a young, interactive, and risk-taking artistic collective that’s become one of the most successful experimental theatre troupes in the country.

Fringe festivals focus on art outside the mainstream. One of the most well-known festivals of this kind is the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, sprouted in 1947 as an alternative to the more traditional Edinburgh International Festival. From there Fringe shows grew into a genre of their own: unlimited to a single art form, affordable, accessible, and uncensored.

Promoting direct and honest communication between performers and audience members, the Neo-Futurists claim they never “act” or “perform” onstage; they merely are themselves. For this performance (which ran March 23-24 at the Goode Theatre), the troupe presented The Infinite Wrench, a series of 30 two-minute plays that vary in tone. No two renditions of The Infinite Wrench are the same, as the audience plays a key role in determining the course of the evening. Numbers 1 through 30 hang from the stage. The rules are simple: every time a cast member says, “curtain,” the audience yells the number of the play they want to see next.

All five “Neos” (Hilary, Mirsky, Kyra, Connor, and Rob) are energetic, engaging, and relatable. The plots of the mini-plays range from hilarious to melancholy: Connor is endearing in “Treating Connor how I treat literally every dead roach I have ever had to pick up off the ground and throw away,” in which he’s thrown in a trash can. Another play (called “FREEDOM”) features Hilary and Kyra removing their bras through their t-shirts. Music/theatre nerds rejoice during two plays that mimic Philip Glass and Stephen Sondheim.

Balancing out the bizarre bits are moments of insight and heartbreak: “Stand Up When You Believe Us” recounts experiences with sexual assault, and “The Sense That Links to Memory” touches on our perceptions of race, violence, memory and humanity. I hesitate to delve further, as much of the magic of The Infinite Wrench is in its surprises.

A timer dictates the end of the show (exactly sixty minutes), as you’re not guaranteed a glimpse of all 30 plays. The cast typically has an audience member roll dice at the end of every show with the number deciding which play is eliminated from future performances.

Virginia Arts Festival consistently produces polished and world class shows. Their Fringe offerings (new to ODU, but not new overall) are fitting vehicles for gaining new and younger audiences, but don’t always receive the exposure they should. I  wondered why more ODU students weren’t drawn to The Neo-Futurists the way they were to the trendy silent disco outside; the theatre only had about 40-60 people in attendance. Nevertheless, Virginia Arts Festival and ODU programmed the launch of this new collaboration impeccably – the Neo-Futurists are fun, ridiculous, and thoroughly entertaining. Most importantly, they challenge our definition of the word “theatre” and the ways we interact with it.

Interested in more Fringe performances? Virginia Arts Festival is bringing Fringe to the NEON District in May. They also have an abundance of other exciting productions happening over the next few months, including Bernstein at 100, April 13-14, Birmingham Royal Ballet, April 20-22, and the Virginia International Tattoo, April 26-29. Visit vafest.org for tickets and more information.