by Martin Dockery

The Rogue Festival will be here soon-it opens on March 1! Here is another Rogue Performer Preview article, with another one going up today as well, and more coming this week-you will be able to find them all in our Arts & Entertainment section. We also have a Rogue Festival event page with many of their press releases, and an article about this year’s Muse.

Okay, so first of all…Hi, thanks for being curious about You Belong Here. It’s a storytelling show. True stories. Funny and heartfelt. We can agree on that. I might be the one on stage, the one doing all the talking, but You Belong Here is actually a show that belongs to all of us, telling a story about trying to distract ourselves from reckoning with The Big Picture.

Specifically, it’s about traveling to The Forbidden City with the express purpose of doing a show about traveling to The Forbidden City. Have I lost you yet? Good. Because the thing is, it’s not really a show about The Forbidden City at all, and deep down — like, way deep down — we could’ve guessed that. Because what we’re really doing is focusing on doing a show about The Forbidden City to avoid focusing on The Big Picture. Problem is, there’s this faulty audio guide that is totally distracting us from the thing that’s supposed to be distracting us from The Big Picture. And we can feel it leading us into a sort of madness. This ridiculous malfunction. This poorly designed audio guide. This absurd descent into a comical neurosis. We’re all familiar with the unimportant madness, which of course, is why this is a live show, in a theater, with seats and lights and warmth. So that we might see that we’re not alone in the games our minds play with ourselves, and at the same time be comfortably seated while seeing it.

This is my one-millionth show at The Rogue Festival. Last year, my show was called Bursting Into Flames. The year before that it was Delirium, as well as a play called Moonlight After Midnight. And then there are 999,997 other shows that I don’t have the space here to mention.

Why this show now? In our age of ultimate distraction, from our phones, to our endless news cycles, to our celebrity politicians and political celebrities, The Big Picture has never been more eclipsed by the trivial frustrations that beset us even when we travel as far away as we can imagine traveling. As such, this is a show about The Forbidden City that’s about everything but The Forbidden City. It’s about something huge and momentous, and refusing to talk about it. It’s about coming to accept that You Belong Here.

For more on Martin Dockery, please visit www.MartinDockery.com.

Show info:
You Belong Here
Rogue Festival
Dianna’s Studio of Dance
826 N. Fulton St.
Fresno, California
Friday, March 1 @ 10:00
Saturday, March 2 @ 5:00
Sunday, March 3 @ 8:00
Friday, March 8 @ 5:30
Saturday, March 9 @ 6:30
www.fresnoroguefestival.com

If you love local theatre, be sure to check out our new Mysteryrat’s Maze Podcast, which features mysteries read by local actors. The first 12 episodes are now up! You can check the podcast out on iTunes and Google Play, and also on podbean.

If you are a Buffy the Vampire Slayer fan check out Nicholas Brendon’s (Xander) Meet and Greet Tour!