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Inquirer Q&A with ... Eric Blachunas, actor and director of IdRatherBeHere Productions

What was the biggest difficulty you had to resolve to get your festival piece - "Wawapalooza 2: Get Shorti" — from idea to performance?

Inquirer: What was the biggest difficulty you had to resolve to get your festival piece - Wawapalooza 2: Get Shorti - from idea to performance?

Eric Blachunas: The biggest difficulty for this year's show was getting interior shots of Ikea, for the short film "Owen vs. Ikea," without getting kicked out of the store.

Q: Do you expect your work to have legs? Is there life after Live Arts/Fringe, or is most of what is created for the festival destined to be seen only on the Fringe circuit?

A: Yes, I would like to merge Wawapalooza 1 and 2 into a 90-minute extravaganza-modern-life-satire with films, sketches and stand-up and show it in NYC, Atlantic City and maybe Scranton, Pa.

Q: What's the primary source of your concepts - music, literature, geopolitics, personal experience, global tragedies?

A: The primary source of the concepts in our show comes from conversations. When I'm talking to someone and making them laugh and they say, "Hey, that happened to me too!" then I know I have a decent idea for a short film or sketch.

Q: How much does funding influence your choice of subject? Do you find that fear of losing funding dampens the political choices you make in your work?

A: We are 100-percent self-funded at this time, so we film and stage whatever interests us. Having a limited budget also helps creatively - forces us to get out and hit the street and mix it up.

Q: Is having an edge of political, social or community-based change important to your work, or is your sole goal the artistic outcome?

A: Our show's only goal is to make you laugh and have fun. No agenda, political or otherwise. It's just not our style.

Q: How comfortable are you in expressing your work verbally - to audiences, media, friends?

A: Very comfortable these days. We are getting more confident in the material and in our judgment of what's good. I hope I didn't just jinx us with that last sentence.

Q: If you have performed in other Fringes festivals, tell us how Philly's compares.

A: We've only done the Philly Fringe. What a great concept the Fringe Festival is! Without the Fringe Festival, the psyche wards of many local hospitals would be a lot more crowded.

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Show details:

Wawapalooza 2: Get Shorti

7 p.m. Aug. 29 and Sept. 1; p.m.; 9 p.m. Aug. 30 and Sept. 4; 4 p.m. Aug. 31.

2nd Stage at the Adrienne

2030 Sansom St.

Web Links:

Festival show page: http://livearts-fringe.org/2008/details.cfm?id=5105

Artist website: http://www.idratherbehere.com