Martinez Tribune The website of the Martinez Tribune.
An unknown woman, tall, irresistible, dressed as a gypsy princess, sidles up to a complete stranger at an Orange County lunch counter. She says, with more than a hint of desperation, “Do me a favor: if anyone asks, tell them you’re my fiancé. I’ll explain later.”
Randall Nott is that complete stranger who again finds himself facing yet another random exit on his quest for partnership and the perfect landscape photograph. Nott’s poignant core story is one of romantic dilemmas, manipulative comics, a mystery woman, and sudden death. Random side-trips might include brushes with celebrity, childrens’ theater, studio history, photography lessons, philosophy, creepy stalkers, bad love songs, and the ultimate girl next door. All this is set against the illusions of the backlots of Hollywood, and the natural splendor of western landscapes.
It’s a convoluted adventure at best, and Nott needs our help sorting it out.
“Random Exits” is Nott’s soft-scripted monologue requiring concentrated audience engagement to help map out his journey for the night. Scheduled to begin at 7 p.m. Friday, Sept. 9, his show will inaugurate San Francisco’s 25th Annual Fringe Festival at PianoFight, which joins the festival as a venue this year.
PianoFight is a full-service restaurant/bar with two theaters and a cabaret stage dedicated to new work by new artists.
Nott is an East Bay artist of many talents – artistic and technical. A Theater Arts alumnus of UC Santa Cruz, he honed his improvisational theater and comedy writing skills through the Groundlings School in Los Angeles during the mid 1980s when that group was a sketch comedy breeding ground like Chicago’s Second City. He studied film acting with the renowned Film Industry Workshops at CBS Studio City where part of the story takes place.
An actor/writer/director/musician/theater designer/photographer, Nott earns his living as an IT Coordinator by day, and volunteers rigging and running Martinez Campbell Theater productions at night.
Each performance of “Random Exits” will be unique, as each show is driven by the random directions of that night’s audience. Four shows are scheduled at PianoFight Theater, 144 Taylor St., San Francisco: Friday, Sept. 9, and Saturday, Sept. 17 at 7 p.m.; Thursday, Sept. 15, and Friday, Sept. 23 at 8:30 p.m.
“Random Exits” plays in tandem each of the four evenings with Michael Patrick Gaffney’s “The Oldest Live Cater Waiter,” so you might want to arrive at PianoFight around 6 p.m., and enjoy dinner and both shows. Tickets for “Random Exits” are $11 (at the door, cash only – online tickets add a $2.99 service fee). The SF Fringe Fest does not allow late seating, and tickets are non-refundable Only 75 percent of seats are pre-sold online, allowing 25 percent of seats available at the door. Tickets are available at www.sffringe.org/tickets.
