Back home in Adelaide, Cobham-Hervey appreciated the small moments of human contact that were possible again.
“I wanted to make something that celebrated that connection,” she says.
The festival includes theatre, music, comedy, dance, visual art, circus and cabaret in venues across the city, including festival gardens at the Entertainment Quarter and Darling Harbour, a Queer Hub at Qtopia Sydney, a First Nations Hub in Erskineville and a Dance Hub at Walsh Bay.
“It’s about new work and also about experiencing places in a different way”: Sydney Fringe Festival director Kerri Glasscock with Tilda Cobham-Hervey.Credit: Dion Georgopoulos
The line-up includes the Grammy-winning Soweto Gospel Choir performing freedom songs, R&B and future soul singer Ngaiire collaborating with pastry chef Anna Polyviou for a night of music and dessert, the Hunger Games spoof Definitely Not A Hungry Game: A Parody Musical, and Aboriginal rock band Coloured Stone.
While the Fringe is not yet back to the pre-COVID level of more than 500 shows, festival director Kerri Glasscock says it will feature 2000 artists from first-time performers to touring stars.
“It’s about new work and also about experiencing places in a different way,” she says. “We build a lot of spaces in empty buildings and we pop up across the city.”
New venues include a terrace house in the Rocks, a car park in North Sydney and an office building foyer in the Sydney CBD.
