Minnesota Fringe Festival — Local services in Minneapolis

Relationship: I've been either an audience member or a fringe artist consistently since 2015.

The Minnesota Fringe Festival is how community, passion, and art should be joined: polished and rough, hilarious and horrifying, great and terrible, but always risky and beautiful.

From professional artists sharing their craft to community members bubbling with a message to share, you'll never see a broader span of styles, themes, and energies in a year than you might see during one Fringe day.

Fringe and risk-taking are one in the same. As an audience member, especially during the first weekend, you have little to go on but a short show description. While you can play it safe by waiting until later during the Festival to go to shows well-reviewed, but the sheer pleasure of the unknown and talking with your friends afterwords about what you saw ("That was such a beautiful moment!" Or "Seriously, I have no idea what just happened) is what makes Fringe so unique.

Do yourself a favor. Go see Fringe, even for only one show. Be willing to gamble an hour of your time; no matter what, you'll come out the other side with a story...

Recently watched the play "Your Hello to My Goodbye" at the Mixed Blood theatre and words cannot describe how beautiful a performance it was. The actors brought such raw emotion to their roles that I found myself completely immersed in their world from the very first scene. Unfortunately, I attended the last performance but I'm so glad I did. Even as an audience member, I was struck by how well crafted every detail was. The characters' outfits and set choices created an immersive world that felt both intimate and expansive. It was very evident that every element was created with deep thought and genuine love for the story being told. I sincerely hope this production returns in the future as I would jump at the chance to...

They make us wait outside until the 10 min prep time, which we don't argue about because we agree that it is part of the rules and it will make all the shows to be enjoyable for every, but then email us saying we were going in there too early when it was the staff themselves who let us in. It will be nice if the staff place themselves in our shoes as well. Other than that, it was definitely a great experience, aside from the sung backstage and the...