Coffee shops are Tiffany Wentzell's muse.

When she has time, Wentzell said, she goes to downtown cafes and just watches people interact.

The lovers, friends and arguments she sees inspire her choreography, the artistic director and co-founder of the nonprofit dance theatre company Windsor Dance eXperience (WDX) said. "You can take raw emotion from every human being and put it into motion."

And emotion, Wentzell, 27, said, is the goal she sets for her dancers. "Our only goal as dancers is to make the audience feel."

So when WDX performs Wonderland next week at the Windsor International Fringe Festival, Wentzell said, the goal is to make the audience feel like kids again.

Wonderland is a production based on Lewis Carroll's works and influenced by Wentzell's own childhood memories of playing in the imaginary world that existed in her Nova Scotian backyard.

"It's basically about the inner child (that) you push aside as you grow up," Wentzell said.

Performing to electronic music such as Daft Punk, dancers use their bodies to become the stage props, 19-year-old dancer Joanna Coughlin said. "It's not as sugary as the original," Coughlin, who plays the Duchess and the White Queen, said. "The original was already kind of twisted. This one focuses on that twist."

Wonderland is playing at the Capitol Theatre July 22-24.

In 2003, Wentzell realized her high school dream of starting a dance theatre company and created WDX with Julia Galli and Jeff Bastien. Wentzell was only 22 at the time. Today, the organization has over 50 members.

It's still tough getting recognized as a dancer in a city where the arts are underground, Coughlin said. "Dance is the underground of underground in Windsor."

Yet the underground will be on display this weekend as the North American Fringe Summer Tour makes a 10-day stop in Windsor for the first time.

From July 18 to 27, the co-operative theatre and performing arts festival produced by the Actors' Theatre of Windsor will feature 26 theatre companies - half of them local - performing in downtown venues. The program also includes four outdoor associated festivals.

Fringe theatre started more than 50 years ago in Edinburgh, Scotland, when a group of theatre performers gathered to perform on the fringes of the city after being banned from the esteemed Edinburgh Theatre Festival.

This celebration of the alternative arts will come to Windsor, as the live performing arts can be seen at lower ticket fees and in informal settings. This year, many of these acts feature young artists.

One of them is 20-year-old David Weaver.

Weaver, a recent graduate from the Chatham-Kent Secondary School, is the playwright for Know People Like Show People, a two-man satirical comedy about the theatre business.

Weaver, who plays Tragedy, and Josh Reaume, 19, who plays Comedy, are performing at the Art Gallery of Windsor July 19-20, 22-23 and 25-26.

Both are attending Humber College in the fall.

Weaver wrote the original script in four hours during a high school improvisation workshop where he had to base an entire play on one word.

Fringe Benefits

Fringe Fest Spotlights Local & International Theatre

WAMM issue 4 July 2008

by Robb Tymec 

            Windsor is a town that loves its musicals. About 70 percent of our local theatre companies do nothing but musicals. It stands to reason that this particular style of performance will get some exposure in the Fringe. One of the strongest representations it’s receiving is from the immensely successful local dance company Windsor Dance Experience (or just “WDX” for those hipsters who like to use trendy abbreviated terms!). WDX will be re-mounting a show they recently did called Wonderland. The entire story of Wonderland is told through dance and modern music – so we’re still not quite getting true “music theatre”, instead we’re getting a dance show. It always makes for some very engaging live entertainment. You get to build your own subjective storyline from the choreography rather then relying on scripted dialogue to tell you what you’re seeing.

            Wonderland is loosely based on the stories of Alice in Wonderland and Alice Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll. It was the objective of the company to get as creative as possible. What Wonderland is really about is experimental choreography. The sequence involving the Red Queen and her court is performed in a burlesque style. The Caterpillar is executed with seven interlinked dancers rather than trying to create an elaborate, oversized costume. Dancers are used as set pieces in order to convey the growing and shrinking of Alice during certain scenes. It’s a very high-concept piece. It fits quite beautifully in the Fringe Festival. If you’ve had your fill of dialogue-driven stuff and would like a nice visual break, put this show on your list!