Wolverhampton arts collective Poets, Prattlers, and Pandemonialists are delighted to announce the first Midlands Fringe festival will be taking place in the city in July this year.
Supported using public funding by the National Lottery through Arts Council England, the festival will run over the weekend of 25-27 July, and will put on fifteen Fringe shows across three city centre venues.
Supported using public funding by the National Lottery through Arts Council England, the festival will run over the weekend of 25-27 July, and will put on fifteen Fringe shows across three city centre venues.
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00:01So we're here outside the Lich Gate Tavern in Wolves and we're with...
00:05Introduce yourselves guys. I'm Steve Pottinger of Poets, Prattlers and Pandemonialists.
00:10And I'm Emma Pursehouse of Poets, Prattlers and Pandemonialists.
00:13Cool! And this is going to be a venue on a rather special event that's coming up.
00:18What's happening? Go on, tell us. What's happening? When's it happening?
00:21We've got some funding to put on the Midlands Fringe in Wolverhampton.
00:25And the dates are...
00:27The 5th to the 27th of July. Cool.
00:30And we're going to have it across three venues in the city centre.
00:33And there will be a total of 15 Fringe Shows.
00:36Awesome! So we're going to have the Lich Gate, we're going to have Katie's Cafe and Cafe Royale.
00:42And then a couple of special acts at the Arena Theatre. What's happening there?
00:46Not announced the acts yet, but they're going to be really high profile comedians.
00:50I can't tell you that much. They are taking themselves up to Edinburgh.
00:53So they're kind of doing a bit of a trial run of the show.
00:57Yeah, so you'll get to see what's going up to Edinburgh.
01:00And it will be one on the Friday night and one on the Saturday night.
01:03And somehow you've managed to pull the magic out of the bag and get some funding from the Arts Council.
01:09So they obviously were very impressed with what you've got planned.
01:13Because it's not that easy to get money out of the Arts Council.
01:16There's a lot of people looking for funding, but it's great to see some more funding coming in to Wolverhampton to put stuff on here.
01:24Because there's so many good little venues here and great talent in the area and the region as well.
01:33Yeah.
01:34And we just want to flag it up and give people something to enjoy over summer.
01:38And hopefully we'll get a real variety of artists wanting to take part.
01:41Yeah, so it's going to be like poetry, what bit of music theatre, a bit of everything going on?
01:47It could be one person shows generally, maybe two.
01:50But doing theatre, poetry, talk to one person.
01:54It might arrive by plane.
01:56Yeah, so it will be whatever people kind of want to.
02:01I'm trying to make sure that we give people a range of different stuff.
02:06So it's not 15 things that are all the same.
02:08Yeah, yeah.
02:09There will be a good range of stories and...
02:11Styles of performance.
02:12Yeah.
02:13So if people want to find out a bit more or get involved, even performers still?
02:17Yeah, still have options for that.
02:19How do they find out more guys?
02:21Well, we've got a website which is pandemonialists.co.uk
02:26Get in on there.
02:27There you go, nice bit of promo.
02:29And we'll have a page on there which will link then for performers.
02:34There's a form to fill in if they want to apply.
02:37And for everybody else, there'll be more information as we have it.
02:40So you guys, you're no stranger to Fringe when the Lit Fest is on you organise a Fringe event, don't you?
02:46Yeah, we do.
02:47And you both perform as well?
02:48Yeah.
02:49Yeah.
02:50So I can't think of anything like this in Wolves before.
02:55Is this kind of the first time we'd have a proper Wolves Fringe event?
02:59We think so, yeah.
03:00Yeah, as Fringe.
03:01I know they've had comedy festivals before, which Creative Black Country put on a few years ago now.
03:08Yeah.
03:09But I don't think there's been a kind of Fringe as such.
03:10Yeah.
03:11I can't think of one in the West Midlands, to be fair.
03:14Which felt like, you know, there's how many people live across the Greater West Mid.
03:19Yeah, yeah.
03:20And there should be something here.
03:21Yeah.
03:22So we thought, you know, because it's a long way to go to Edinburgh to go and watch something and the costs are high.
03:27So we thought, yeah, have something in the middle of the country.
03:29So would you love it to become an annual event then?
03:33In our dreams, yes.
03:34I mean, what we're hoping is that this year we'll put it on, it'll go well, it'll be a success, we'll learn what works, what we can develop, and we'll have more time to start thinking about doing the future.
03:50But yeah, it'd be lovely.
03:51So for this year, you're kind of more behind the scenes rather than on the stage doing performing.
03:56But it'd be great if, I've got to ask for a little performance just for me and our viewers.
04:02Have any of you got a little, a little something you can do?
04:05Well, you've got the first poet laureate at Wolverhampton here.
04:07Yeah, I was the first poet laureate at Wolverhampton.
04:08Yeah, I was the first poet laureate.
04:09Oh, wow.
04:10Okay.
04:11I'll step away and let you know.
04:12This is a poem that I wrote on a bus in Wolverhampton, and it's called Black Country Day Savers.
04:18The man with the gap-toothed smile is off back to his flat where he lives alone.
04:22See that tattoo?
04:23He says.
04:24Him proffering a forearm.
04:26Me fumbling for glasses.
04:28Cause the devil's in the detail.
04:3075 quid that was.
04:32Red heart, skirt, a woman's name.
04:34For a moment he looks lost.
04:36Done down Wensfield, one Friday.
04:39But I dumped me by Sunday.
04:41I joke he needs another wench.
04:43One who's called the same.
04:45Fah!
04:46He lets out a belly laugh.
04:48Forget that.
04:49When you're gonna be back?
04:50I ain't no homing pigeon.
04:52He's wrong of course.
04:54We all are.
04:55Heading home to roost in our respective city lots.
04:59I turn to wave when I get off.
05:01And he's there, looking out through the glass, waiting to wave back.
05:06Cause that's what we do here.
05:08We wave.
05:09We laugh.
05:10We count the cost.
05:11Cant on buzzies.
05:12Natter with strangers.
05:13Leak out these little bits of our marvellous, glorious lives.
05:18Not long.
05:21The blue out.
05:23Half pickings crosss itself.
05:26See szczepel 15's.
05:27Feel it to ask a few more.
05:28And these little bits
05:29of our marvellous, glorious lives.