2025 ON THE EDGE Fringe Festival Lottery
Are you ready to experience the unexpected, and perform ON THE EDGE? You’d better be, because we are only accepting applications for our 2025 festival lottery from October 1 until November 30, 2024! To put your name in the hat, read the information below and follow the link to fill out the form. Yay, forms!
LOTTERY APPLICATION DEADLINE: November 30, 2024
To be eligible to participate in the lottery, you must submit the completed Lottery Application form along with a $25 CAD non-refundable lottery fee by the deadline date. There is a limit of one application per artist/company and the person designated as the Primary Contact on an application may not be the Primary Contact for more than one artist/company. Artists/Companies that submit more than one application will be disqualified from the lottery. Artist/Company and Primary Contact names cannot be changed once submitted. Lottery fees may be sent by mail or submitted electronically to info@ontheedgefringe.com.
ON THE EDGE Fringe operates in English, however we welcome applications from artists/companies working and presenting in other languages.
APPLICATION FORM
This year we will be collecting our lottery applications through Google Forms. The link to this year’s form is below. If you are unable to submit an application through the Google Form, you can request a PDF copy of our paper application by contacting info@ontheedgefringe.com.
LOTTERY PROCESS
The lottery will be held in December, and will be live streamed via Facebook. Our Fringe team members will take turns drawing names from the aforementioned hat for each lottery category (see below) until we have filled all of our venue slots. The remaining names in each category will then be drawn to form a waiting list in case some of the lottery winners are unable to participate in the festival. The lottery winners will be contacted following the draw to confirm their participation, and the results will be posted on our website and social media as soon as possible. Lottery winners may not transfer or sell their slots to other artists/companies.
LOTTERY CATEGORIES
For 2025, we have broken our lottery into 3 categories – IBPOC, Local to North Bay, and Non-Local. We will be drawing a total of 10 slots in three phases as follows:
Applicants that self-identify as IBPOC (Indigenous, Black, or People of Colour) on the application form will be included in the first phase of our lottery draw. The Primary Contact is considered the applicant and must be the one self-identifying as IBPOC. We also encourage applicants that self-identify in this category to have a creative and/or performance team that is comprised of 50% or more folks that also self-identify as IBPOC. We will draw names for two slots in this category. Once the slots are filled, the remaining IBPOC applicants will be added to the Local and Non-Local pools. IBPOC applicants on either waitlist will be offered the chance to take any IBPOC slots that become vacant in the order of their position on the waitlist starting with those in the Local to North Bay pool. If we are unable to fill the slots with IBPOC applicants either during the lottery or from the waitlist, the slots will be filled by non-IBPOC applicants from the other two pools.
The other two categories, Local to North Bay and Non-Local, will be determined by the address listed by the applicant on the application form. We will be drawing 4 slots for each of these categories, Local to North Bay in phase 2 and Non-Local in phase 3. If we are unable to fill the slots with applicants within one of those categories either during the lottery or from the waitlist, the remaining slots will be filled with applicants from the other category.
2025 FESTIVAL PARTICIPANTS
The winners of the venue slots will be contacted shortly after the lottery to confirm their participation in our 2025 festival, which will run from August 6 – August 10, 2025. Should any winner be unable to participate, their spot will be offered to the next lottery applicant on the waiting list. To participate in the festival, all venue slot holders will be required to pay a participation fee of $250 CAD by January 31, 2025. Participants may withdraw in writing from the festival at any time up until April 30, 2025 to receive a full refund of their participation fee. No refunds will be given for participants that withdraw after this date.
The maximum slot length for each performance is 60 minutes with a up to an additional 15 minutes before and after for set up and tear down. Festival participants are solely responsible for the creation and presentation of their work, and have full creative control over their performance in accordance with all applicable laws. The festival will not censor artists, however, performances with explicit, mature, or sensitive material are asked to inform the festival so we can include that information in our promotional materials.
The festival will provide a minimum of 1 technician per venue, as well as basic audio/visual equipment. Participants will be required to bring/obtain any additional equipment or materials necessary for their presentation. Participants are also responsible for securing the rights to perform works that are not their own and for paying appropriate fees and securing releases in accordance with any unions or associations they belong to. The festival attempts to find billeting and/or accommodations for out-of-town performers, however we cannot guarantee that we can provide this to every artist/company or even from year to year.
VENUES
The festival operates with four performance venues. Three are in the Capitol Centre (the WKP Kennedy Gallery and Betty Speers Theatre on the main floor, and the Basement in the basement), and the fourth, the Warehouse, is located across the street from the Capitol Centre in the old H.E. Brown building (150 McIntyre St. E). Each venue is wheelchair accessible and has a maximum seating capacity of 50 people. We do not currently offer BYOV slots.
TICKETING
All venue slot events are ticketed, with ticket prices set at $14 CAD. Audience members without valid tickets will not be admitted to the performances. The festival handles all ticketing through the Capitol Centre Box Office, and retains a $4 CAD administration fee to cover ticketing costs such as printing fees, debit & credit card processing fees, and CRF fees. All the rest of the money from ticket sales goes directly to the performer(s). For example, if your show sells 150 tickets at $14/ticket the festival keeps $600 to cover the ticketing expenses and you take home $1,500. Not bad for a week’s work!
In addition to single tickets, the ON THE EDGE fringe festival offers festival passes for sale to the general public that give access to all events and activities during the festival. The proceeds from the sale of the passes is divided equally among all of the artists/companies in the festival. ON THE EDGE fringe festival also reserves the right to distribute a limited number of festival passes/complimentary tickets to our volunteers, media representatives, and major festival supporters.
FESTIVAL PROMOTION
All participants will be required to submit information about their performance including the title and length of their show, the names of their performers and production team, a brief synopsis of what their performance is about, and promotional images. This information will be used to promote the performance online through the festival’s website and social media, in any advertising (print and online), through local media outlets (newspapers, television, and radio), flyer/poster distribution, and in the festival programme.
CHANGES TO THE FESTIVAL FORMAT
In the event that our festival activities are significantly restricted (e.g. in terms of audience size, travel, etc.) or a physical festival is not possible/feasible next summer for any reason, an alternative festival model will be implemented. This may include shifting to online programming (e.g. live streamed and/or pre-recorded material) as we did for our 2020 & 2021 festivals, or presenting a combination of in-person and digital events. Health, safety, and well-being are among our top priorities, and all artists/companies will be informed of any programming changes or considerations as soon as possible.
CONTACT
For more information about the ON THE EDGE Fringe Festival, please check out our Fringe page or contact our Artistic Director, Kelsey Ruhl, by email at kelsey@ontheedgefringe.com.