Tour Whore, April 1, 2012

The Sweet Shit of Fringe

Phone sex. Food service. Fringe festival. In all of those environments, I learned to move fast

by Cameryn Moore

Fringe, man. It’s hard. Every day it’s get to the venue and wait, warm up in the alley, 15 minutes to set up, where’s my prop mug, lipstick, don’t forget the lipstick. And afterward…. oh, MAN, I killed that show, the audience was eating it from my tits, or, where did that crowd of zombies come from, Christ, it was like playing to a pile of compost. And then 15 minutes to pack my shit up and get the fuck out. And then do it all over again tomorrow. 

Yeah, Fringing is hard. (Deep breath. Nine weeks to first Fringe. Exhale.) But Fringing is also easy, because nine-tenths of the time I spend out on the Fringe is doing street promo, and that shit is SWEET.

And flirting is easy for me. SO FUCKING EASY.

Street promo is the part where I stroll around with a stack of flyers and talk to bemused strangers in lines and beer tents and awkward clumps in front of the master schedule board. On the bigger Fringes I might wind up wandering around in a loop from venue to venue for 8 hours at a stretch, but I don’t care. It’s one of my favorite things about Fringing. Is that weird? I don’t think of it as work, per se, or even promo. It’s just… flirting. With professionally printed postcards instead of hastily scrawled numbers on cocktail napkins. And flirting is easy for me. SO FUCKING EASY. 

I’ve been flirting professionally for a long, long time. Chatting people up—showing a casual, friendly interest in them, with the promise or hopes or hint of something more—is something I do all day long on the phone lines. And when I was a waitress, you better believe I flirted. Those appetizers didn’t sell themselves, and a short-sleeved, light blue Oxford shirt with a faint patina of grease certainly didn’t help the cause. No, I had to push it. 

And before anyone says it, I’m going to rebut: this isn’t fake. I’m an intensely social creature.

Phone sex. Food service. Fringe festival. In all of those environments, I learned to move fast, find the customer’s energy and match it, hit that note of friendly intimacy, smiling always, even over the phone, they can hear it in my voice. I have to find the connection, find that one link between what I have, who I am, what I’m selling or performing—whether it’s a virtual blowjob, a piece of cheesecake, or an hour-long storytelling show—and what I think they might want, and make them remember, make them want it, make them ask about it and take three cards for some friends.

And before anyone says it, I’m going to rebut: this isn’t fake. I’m an intensely social creature. Always have been. I actually enjoy friendly banter for its own sake. I enjoy making people laugh or smile. I like to get them to play along. When I’m promoting my show at a Fringe I get to give strangers a jolt of sexy conversation at 2pm on a Tuesday afternoon. (I don’t know about you, but my Tuesday afternoons tend to be pretty dry.)

Now, just because I love it doesn’t mean I don’t have to psyche myself up for it sometimes. The first card of the day is always the hardest. I have to remember that I have something they want, that they’re going to enjoy this encounter with me, this brief conversation, and if not, that’s okay, too. Then I just take a deep breath, make a snap judgment about what I think they can handle, and go for it. 

“She’s just using sex to push her show.” Well, yes.

 After the first card, I’ve primed the pump and then it really starts feeling good. I touch people on the shoulder, lean in and murmur asides in passing, admire their hat or their hotdog or their system of tabbing the program book with color-coded post-its. I might ask what shows they’ve seen that they’ve liked, or shield them from the sun with my parasol and say something about thanking me later. I tease people at loud volume across alleys, hell, I will tug down at my t-shirt to show even more cleavage (how is that even possible?) and then ask strangers in line, “There, is that better?” And then… I give them my card, or maybe they ask for it, and all that flirting and banter and play makes it an easy transaction somehow.

I imagine a few people are cynical about my approach. “She’s just using sex to push her show.” Well, yes. The fact that my shows are about sex makes it almost impossible to promote any other way.

But I’m not just, or even primarily, using sex. At the heart of it I’m creating relationship, however brief and silly, to get them on my side. Eye contact, smiling, showing interest in the other person, keeping the pressure off… I do these things with everybody, from the barista at the coffeeshop to the person in line in front of me at the post office. It’s a charming way to go through life. And at the Fringe, I find it essential: leave them happy and wanting more.

www.camerynmoore.com