It's a bummer growing up. "We get to an age where we think we have to become adults and put the toys away," says Karim Muasher of Giant Bird, an internationally touring three-man troupe whose members ignored that impulse.  

Writer-performer Jim Loucks adapted recollections of his Southern Christian childhood into a multi-character, 75-minute drama requiring one actor and one bench. Jim, the 10-year-old storyteller, is as much fiction as biography.  

Writer-director Brad Cupples says he and Ornamental Messiah Productions use comedy to "wake people up" about Creationism, which he calls "an abomination to common sense."  

This solo performance by Kevin Thornton has strictly autobiographical roots, fusing music, spoken word and standup comedy into personal revelation.   

Taken from Richard Hague's collection Alive in Hard Country, this sequence of poems circles around the many sides of addiction, echoed by deep strains of Bluegrass and Gospel.   

From Iago to Salieri, theater has given us a roster of villains who, despite their evil, remain oddly compelling. For that reason, This Ain't Real Theatre Company set out to explore the concept of villainy.  

In this Native American fable retold by Gunstwork Puppet Mask Theatre of Boulder, Colo., four Abenaki tribesmen journey to the island of the great Gluskabe, who grants one wish to each. "It has to do with human desire," says Michael Gunst, the show's creator and solo performer. "We can all relate to that."  

Lyle Benjamin, artistic director of Queen City Off Broadway, is restaging this hit production from Chicago, calling it the "perfect show when you drink, look French and despair."  

Playwright Sarah Underwood has worked with the five women in ETC's intern company and intern/director Liz Maxwell on this series of scenes and monologues about those who have left this world and listen in on the remarks of those who remain.  

This production from Fringe fave True Body Project features actors and nonactors and gives the participants and those of us attending plenty to remember about body-consciousness in the gym class landscape. We've all been there.  

World traveler and Minneapolis writer Katherine Glover compiles her multicultural life experiences into this one-woman piece, saying it's only after stumbling into any number of awkward moments out in the world that one can appreciate a nice slice of humble pie.  

DIY Productions, which last year provided a surprising self-conducted Over-the-Rhine tour with 'Inner: City,' has cooked up a new way to rattle your expectations. The Fringe and the OTR neighborhood itself are part of the package, which you can experience alone or with a friend or two.  

What's one day you'll never forget? A person who changed everything? A color you'll carry forever? Cincinnati-based White Beard Productions blends those thoughts via interviews and fiction, text and movement, theater and visual art.  

A mother (Amy Warner) and daughter (Karen Wissel) meet on a Mediterranean cliff and struggle to connect. "The daughter won't speak to the mother. She dances," Warner explains, which means that CCM choreographer Judith Mikita had to create half the play's poetic "dialogue" from scratch.  

It wouldn't be a Fringe without some improv, arguably the fringiest of all theatrical endeavors. Performers put themselves out there, and producer Dave Powell is quick to point out that they can and do occasionally fail. Don't believe it? Don't be so incredulous, he says.