The Boiler Room at Marrickville’s Factory Theatre will become a hothouse of theatrical experiment and innovation for six Australian playwrights during The Sydney Fringe, which runs from 10-26 September.

The Sydney Fringe @ The Boiler Room umbrella covers works ranging from a noir detective thriller masquerading as a live radio play to an eccentric comedy that mixes science and business. All six of the shows run for under an hour.

A Thing of Beauty, written and directed by Paul Gilchrist

Naomi and Ruth are travelling together, but constant change is such a challenge and all those people can be just too difficult. Ruth craves simplicity. She finds it in the uncomplicated beauty of the mannequin. She’s taken to photographing them. Naomi’s taken about enough! And when Naomi finally does have her “dummy spit”, their trip turns into one you won’t find in any travel brochure.

Jo Richards, who trained at the prestigious Jacques Lecoq theatre school in Paris, creates two hilarious characters in A Thing of Beauty, which is a hilarious mix of movement, multi-media and razor-sharp comedy about chaos and order.

Written and directed by Paul Gilchrist (Catherine at Avignon, Before the Embrace, Two Gates), the production was designed as a “pop-up” theatre experiment, able to bump in and out of non-traditional venues in under an hour. MORE INFORMATION

Dates & Times:

Friday 10 September 8:00pm

Saturday 11 September 9:30pm

Sunday 12 September 8:00pm

Thursday 16 September 9:30pm

Saturday 18 September 5:00pm

Combat Fatigue, written by Alison Rooke, directed by Ian Zammit

Come down, come down to the strawberry patch ... A dark incantation, a letter that shouldn’t be read, a blood sacrifice. A golden couple in a toxic city on Valentine’s Day. A husband, an artist, a girl, a murderer with a poet’s heart. The battle for possession of a woman’s soul. Love, art, sex, poetry, death. What happens when the honeymoon ends and you begin to play with fire?

Workshopped at Fraser Studio’s Off The Shelf, Combat Fatigue will premiere at The Sydney Fringe, exploring how dangerous it can be when fantasies overtake your life. MORE INFORMATION

Dates & Times:

Monday 13 September 8:00pm

Friday 17 September 9:30pm

Saturday 18 September 1:00pm

Sunday 19 September 8:00pm

Thursday 23 September 8:00pm

Cuckoo, written by Margot Politis

The haunting and beautiful tale of a woman doll trapped in a deconstructed cuckoo clock. The man doll with whom she was created has gone missing, but how? Did she destroy him? Did he leave? Was he ever actually there?

As she pushes through the hour, we see her amuse herself with daily ritual, drench herself in stillness and inertia, and dance with the pain of absence. Poignant, engaging and endearing, we follow this woman’s brave journey towards an ultimate pursuit of strength and clarity, as she clings to her steadfast belief in love.

Margot Politis wrote and developed Cuckoo, a one-woman show that is premiering at The Sydney Fringe, under the mentorship of US choreographer Tricia Brouk in New York last year. MORE INFORMATION

Dates & Times:

Tuesday 21 September 8:00pm

Thursday 23 September 6:30pm

Friday 24 September 9:30pm

Saturday 25 September 6:30pm

Sunday 26 September 8:00pm

Sexy Tales Of Paleontology, written by Patrick Lenton with Daniel East & Bridget Lutherborrow, directed by Anne-Maree Magi

When an innocent group of scientists are taken over by an unselfconsciously evil corporation, a clash of ethics and robots ensue. Audiences can expect hysterical geologists in pit fights with paleontologists, flamboyant glam-pop mercenaries breaking out in song and the world’s worst narrator.

Premiering at The Sydney Fringe, Sexy Tales Of Paleontology is Patrick Lenton’s hilariously eccentric new feature play created during Fraser Studio’s Off The Shelf hothouse theatre residency. It is a hysterical, flamboyant and ethically dubious meeting of science and business. With robots. And puppets! MORE INFORMATION

Dates & Times:

Thursday 16 September 8:00pm

Friday 17 September 6:30pm

Saturday 18 September 9:30pm

Sunday 19 September 6:30pm

Friday 24 September 8:00pm

Starry Comet Night, written & directed by Con Nats

Four housemates discover a comet is about to rock their world, the pizzaman wants more than a tip and the streets are ablaze. The CIA is stopping the word getting out, people are mysteriously disappearing and the world is in danger. They debate whether the human race should know or if they should just join the silence. Should they tell the world or party like it’s 2099?

This radiant comedy asks the hard questions and occasionally tries to answer them. MORE INFORMATION

Dates & Times:

Sunday 12 September 6:30pm

Friday 17 September 8:00pm

Saturday 18 September 8:00pm

Sunday 19 September 9:30pm

Friday 24 September 6:30pm

The Hideous Demise Of Detective Slate, written by Alli Sebastian Wolf, directed by Jane Grimley

The Hideous Demise Of Detective Slate is a live production masquerading as a radio play, with a brilliant live band and a set halfway between a 1930s recording studio and a noir production. The actors stand before microphones but toss them away for passionate embraces, with the band and foley artist as characters in their own right, interacting with the cast and adding to the self-referential layer cake Slate has become.

It’s a fast, sexy and hilariously funny new form of theatre, turning archetypes on their head and using them for yoyos. MORE INFORMATION

Dates & Times:

Tuesday 14 September 8:00pm

Sunday 19 September 5:00pm

Wednesday 22 September 8:00pm

Thursday 23 September 9:30pm

Saturday 25 September 9:30pm

*Based on media release issued by The Sydney Fringe.

Jo Richards ... creates two hilarious characters in A Thing of Beauty.