by KYW's Karin Phillips

Philadelphia's annual festival of the avant garde, cutting edge, and sometimes downright strange kicks off Friday with hundreds of performances at venues all over the city.

It's the Live Arts Festival and Philly Fringe.

For example, "The European Lesson" (above) boasts a cast of well-known local actors teaming with Norwegian director Jo Stromgren, creating a funny piece about American and European stereotypes.
   
But Stromgren says also it's a perfect performance for turbulent times:

"People don't know what they're talking about, actually.  It's just a lot of bull going around.  So this performance is quite a lot of mocking this so-called 'people know exactly what's going on in the world' thing."

This show is being staged at one of the more important venues of this year's festival -- a  converted warehouse at 5th and Fairmount that will serve as performance space and also the site of the festival bar.  Producing director Nick Stuccio says it will be a very popular spot:

"We drink beer and we have some food.  You can hang out here and have fun with lots of creative people."

There's a decidedly international flavor to this year's festival, with performances from at least eight countries. 

The festival will include hundreds of performances in venues all over the city, through September 13th.  For more information go to www.livearts-fringe.org, or call 215-413-1318. 

(Photo by KYW's Karin Phillips)