June is here and “Women on the Fringe” are again onstage!
There is nothing quite like the buzz that’s created during the Hollywood Fringe. It is a time filled with risk-taking, courage, hope and independent artists creating new work by any means necessary. Each year, I ask women writers a new series of questions influenced by the Proust Questionnaire and Bernard Pivot’s French series, “Bouillon de Culture.” The goal is to understand the artist’s work and their full nature while allowing them a space to reveal their authentic self. It is a great gift and a true honor to introduce women who will be presenting work in myriad genres, exploring a wide range of topics that allow us to examine who we are as individuals and as a society.
Introducing Sunita Param and her show, “Sunita: Back To Me.”
Constance: What do you hope audience members take away after experiencing your show?
Sunita: My hope is that the audience walks away from my show inspired and having experienced a true emotional journey. Laughter, tears, joy and ultimately spiritually uplifted.
Constance: What’s been your biggest challenge in terms of your development/creation process?
Sunita: Initially, when I chose the stories from my life that I wanted to tell, it was important for me to create a real beginning, middle and end. In addition, I had to choose songs that spoke to me but that also illuminated or supported the stories I was telling.
Constance: What are you enjoying most as you create your show?
Sunita: At this point, I’ve done the show quite a bit over the last few years, but in this incarnation, I’m actually on a stage without being married to a standing microphone. I absolutely love the freedom, in all capacities, that it has provided me as an actor.
Constance: What has been the most surprising discovery?
Sunita: Not necessarily a surprise, but more of a gratified awareness, that I am capable of performing a 75-minute show – singing 14 songs and holding an audience’s attention.
Constance: The work will be given away soon. How does that feel?
Sunita: It’s incredibly empowering to have written my personal story. I will have shared myself completely and allowed myself to be vulnerable. That is powerful.
Constance: How long have you been sitting with this work?
Sunita: I have been wanting to do a show like this for over 15 years. And finally in early 2020, I began writing the show and making song choices. I’ve performed it several times all over CA and on the East Coast in the last 4 years – most recently in February at the Whitefire Theatre’s Solofest. So when I heard about the Fringe this year, I thought, “Why not?” Especially since I had just performed it. It was fresh. I also was attracted to the fact that it wouldn’t be a one-off performance. Having 3 performances over the span of 2 weeks gives me the opportunity to tweak, adjust, or just plain make it better than the last performance.
For info and tickets visit https://www.hollywoodfringe.org/projects/10819
