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The 29th Philly Fringe Festival of alternative and underground theater will utilize the former Macy’s, which vacated the downtown Wanamaker Building in March.
Festival regular the Bearded Ladies Cabaret, which has staged the popular Late Night Snacks program in the past, will stage a trimmed-down version called “The Layaway,” featuring a rotating lineup of queer-centric cabaret and performance artists for three consecutive weekends, Sept. 13 to 28.
“It is such a gift to be able to play here,” said Sally Ollove, the Bearded Ladies’ associate artistic director, in a statement. “We hope audiences come ready to put their feet up and wrap themselves in queer joy and gorgeous performance.”
When the Fringe Festival lineup was announced last month, it did not include the Bearded Ladies or Late Night Snacks. The Bearded Ladies produced Late Night Snacks in 2019, 2022 and 2023. They skipped it last year, instead popping up as a run of “Late Night Snacks: Leftovers” at the FringeArts building in January 2025.
FringeArts CEO and producing director Nell Bang-Jensen said she had been working to revive Late Night Snacks at the festival this year, utilizing the Bearded Ladies’ own stage built onto the back of a truck, the Beardmobile. But those plans were thwarted when the truck was stolen last April.
“I’ll be honest, we were looking at a wide variety of locations,” Bang-Jensen said. “None of them felt like the right fit.”