The Fresh Fruit Festival is a New York summer arts festival featuring the work of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgendered (LGBT

LGBT

LGBT is an initialism that collectively refers to "lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender" people. In use since the 1990s, the term "LGBT" is an adaptation of the initialism "LGB", which itself started replacing the phrase "gay community" beginning in the mid-to-late 1980s, which many within the...

) artists. Held every July, the festival was founded by Carol Polcovar in 2003 and sponsored by All Out Arts and New Village Productions. It is currently a program of All Out Arts a 501c3 organization. It includes a wide range of plays, visual arts, dance, and film presentations. Along with the Hot! Festival, it is among the most prominent LGBT-themed festivals in the New York artistic community. Fresh Fruit Festival enters its 10th year in 2011. Carol Polcovar held the position of Artistic Director of the festival for the past seven year. Frank Calo a long time Off-Broadway and Off-Off Broadway producer is the current Artistic Director. Fresh Fruit Festival is the only grassroots multidiscipline LGBT Arts Festival in NYC, growing not from a theater group but from LGBT political activists seeking to fight homophobia through the arts.

Performing Fruits 2007

Special Events

Can't Prove It On Me:
A Benefit for Fresh Fruit and the Musicians of New Orleans, honoring LGBT Jazz Greats
Featuring Rome Neal, ButtaFly Soul, Linda Oh, Laraine Goodman, and Jolie Garrett.

Going Bananas II:
A Night with the funniest Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Comics
Hosted by Murray Hill

The Art Of Drag:
Hosted by Clover Honey
Featuring The Church Ladies For Choice, Samantha Richards, Jacqueline Jonee, Radical Faeries, Millie Shayntwrite, and Lady Maria Chaste Diva

Theatre

• Fading To Grey by Richarf A. Pettey
• Mentor by John S. Green
• Monroe Bound by Lucile Scott
• The Long Ride Home by Robert Gompers
• William & James by Robert Tsonos

Short Plays and Performance Art

• Love Scenes by David Pumo
• The Naked Dead Elephant In The Middle Of The Room by Larson Rose
• Lay Down and Love Me Again
• Striped & Teased by Kimberly Dark
  Kimberly Dark
  Kimberly Dark is an American performance artist, writer, and sociologist. Born in San Diego, California, she received a B.A. from University of Colorado, Colorado Springs in 1989, and an M.A. in Sociology from Cal State San Marcos in 1998. She began her work as a storyteller and performance artist...
  
  
• Debutantes Balls by Scott Turner Schofield
• A. Gender by Joey Hateley

Poetry/Spoken Word

• LeShaun Lovell
• Buttafly Soul
• Ainsley Drew

Visual Arts

• Mariette Pathy-Allen
• Isaiah Shackelford
• John Sages
• Daniel L. Malisky

Dance

• Agnes De Garon
• Buttafly Soul

Performing Fruits 2006

Special Events

CAVALCADE OF FRUITS at the Slipper Room:
SONGS FROM A FRUIT RICH SOUL:
Featuring a world of musical imagination with MC: ButtaFlySoul and David Brown, Lisa Jackson and Kathy Valentine with Anne Rebold.
FRUITS: PAST, PRESENT, FUTURE: Highlights from this year’s festival and a look at the best of past performances.

TWO SPIRIT EVENING:
Celebrating of the First LGBT People on our Continent
• Produced by Robert Urban
• Featuring Georgie Jessup, Roger Kuhn, John Birdsong, Maurice Kenny and honoring Kent Lebostock recipient of the Fresh Fruit Award for Service to Diversity

Theatre

• Why'd Ya Make Me Wear That, Joe? by Vanda
• To Whom It May Concern by Aurin Squire
  Aurin squire
  Aurin Squire is an American award-winning playwright, screenwriter, and reporter . He has written numerous plays, typically comedies and dramas, while his reporting has appeared in the Chicago Tribune, Miami Herald, and ESPN, among other publications....
  
  
• My Mother Told Me I Was Different by Carol Polcovar

Short Plays and Performance Art

• Tokyo Penguin
• Stories From the Big House by Robin Cloud
• Real Smiles by Jon Spano
• The Bottom Line: Sex Politics and Masturbation by JEN/ed and Jen De Wald

Poetry

• FRESH FRUIT and WE 3 PRODUCTIONS present PURE POETRY at the TELEPHONE BAR
  • Producer and Host: Robert Urban
  • Poets: baron, Tami Beyer, Angelina Lim, Thomas March, Richard Loringer, Amy Ouzoonian, Jack Sheeler, Chavisa Woods
    Chavisa Woods
    Chavisa Woods is a New York based fiction writer, poet and performance artist.-Biography:Chavisa Woods is the author of "Love Does Not Make Me Gentle or Kind." This work of full-length fiction was released in 2008 by Fly By Night Press...
    
    , Tamiko Beyer, Robert Urban, Chocolate Waters

Film and Video

OUT TO THE MOVIES

• Queer Duck: The Movie - created by Mike Riess and directed by Xieth Feinberg
• Bright Lights/Out City - produced and directed by Tony Sawicki and featuring Clover Honey

Dance

• Outsider Dancing pieces choreographed by Chelsea Ellis and Sean Dorsey

Development (Play Readings)

• The File on Ryan Carter by David Gaard
• ATA by Nick Mwaluko

Performing Fruits 2005

Musicals, Musical Revues, Cabaret Performance

• Ain't We Got Fun by Micheal McFaden
• What's Your Problem by Hector Coris and Paul L. Johnson
• Fresh Fruit Cocktail curated and directed by Bob Ost
• The Girl That I Marry, Elaine St. George

Plays

• Waafrika by Nanna Mwaluko
• Pen Pals by Barbara Kahn
• Somewhere in Between by Ronny Almog

Performance Pieces and Short Plays

• The Pamachene Belle by Carolyn Gage featuring Leslie Bernadini
• Calamity Jane Writes a Letter To Her Daughter by Carolyn Gage with Leslie Bernadini
• Diagnosis Jew Pain written and performed by Michael Feldman
• Tender Hooks written and performed by Paige Collette
• Low Brow written and performed by Pedro Angel Serrano

Poetry and Literature

• Fruit ala Mode curated by Vittoria repetto
• Donna Mikowitz reads from her new work

Multi-Media

• Somewhere in Between, Ronnie Almog
• From Brooklyn to Maui, Ayin Adams

Musical Performance (without book)

• Trans/Gender/ Rock/ Explosion curated by Robert Urban presented by Fresh Fruit and
• Urban Productions with Lisa Jackson and her band Girl Friday, Georgie Jessup, Temptress and Vibralux

Spoken Word

• Homo Hip Hop Poetry Jam 2 curated by baron, MC ButtaFlySoul

Video

• From Brooklyn to Maui, Ayin Adams

Visual Art

• Fresh Fruit installation at Blue Heron Arts Center’s Mainstage by Nick Curto

Performing Fruits 2004

PLAYS

• In the Shadow of a Dream by John Adams directed by Alec Harrington
• Getting It written and directed by Kevin Jones

PERFORMANCE AND SHORT PLAYS

• Tea and Torniquets written and performed by Keith Angora
• Albee Damned by Kevin Brofsky
• Cucumber Dreams written and performed by Michael Cross Burke
• Bad Habits (Lesbian Nun Tells All) written and performed by Kelli Duham
• Daring and Divine written and performed by Beth Smulyan
• Skinny Isn’t Sexy written and performed by Elizabeth Whitney
• TIMEBOMB written and performed by Derek Zasky

MUSICAL PERFORMANCE

• Justin Tranter, singer and songwriter
• Jenn Lindsay, singer and songwriter
• Nhojj, singer and songwriter
• sean360x, vocalist and performance artiste
• Deina McBryde, vocalist

POETRY

• Susan Sherman
• Rachel Guido deVries
• Jennifer Foltesor
• Beatrix Gates
• Gale Jackson
• Vittoria Repetto
• ButtaFlySoul
• Maurice Jamal
• sean360x
• Kyana Brindle
• Claudia Alick
• Prince Chulo
• Lorraine Sabine

COMEDY

• Pedro Angel Serrano

DANCE

• Experienca Dance Company, Jade Esteban Estrada
  Jade Esteban Estrada
  Jade Esteban Estrada is a successful Latin pop singer, comedian, choreographer, actor, political commentator, and human rights activist...
  
   choreographer

Performing Fruits 2003

PLAYS

• The Bald Diva! The Ionesco Parody your mother warned you about, by David Koteles conceived by Jason Jacobs with Jamee Freedus, directed by Jason Jacobs, Dramaturgy by Jamee Freedus
• Forbidden Fruit written and directed by Jeff Bedillion

PERFORMANCE and SHORT PLAYS

• Metamorphosex by Lissa Moira
• My Buddy, Pelleas and Me written and performed by Michael Cross Burke
• Mia Anderson's Drag Kings, Sluts & Goddesses
• R.A.W written by Dianna Son directed by Fides. E. Daruthayan
• Before there words (a poetic reclaiming) written and performed by Maiana Minahal
• Tight written and performed by Mary F. Unser directed by Marie-Louise Miller

MUSICAL PERFORMANCE

• Deian McBryde's, Mabel Dawn Davis: Woman on Stage
• Yolanda accompanied by Robert Urban
• sean360x
• An Evening With Out Music: Jeff Zuckerman, Danny Morita Katz, Jenn Lindsay, Corrine Curcio