Seattle Fringe Fest producers call it quits

The board of directors of Seattle Fringe Theater Productions, presenter of the annual Seattle Fringe Festival, has voted to declare bankruptcy and end its operations as of Jan. 31.

The move was not unexpected. Last November, SFTP announced that it needed $120,000 to pay off debts from the September 2003 Fringe Festival and continue to survive, but had only about $21,000 in cash assets.

After a few months of largely futile attempts to raise more money, the nonprofit organization issued a statement Sunday, saying it was "ultimately unable to raise the funds to pay outstanding debts, support the artists or produce future festivals."

A dissenter in the decision was SFTP's board president, r. david persson, who issued his own statement Monday saying he had resigned from the board because he "did not fully agree" with its decision to close shop.

With the 13-year-old Seattle Fringe Festival's future in doubt, a new volunteer theater community task force, the Fringe Artists Fund, has sprung up. The volunteer group is meeting regularly, and in a recent posting on the Web site of Theatre Puget Sound (a local service organization), said its goals were to ensure the $63,000 that SFTP owes to local stage artists is paid through donations and other means, do a full review of why SFTP faltered and explore ways of continuing the Seattle Fringe Festival under new management.

SFTP says it will offer any assistance it can to the new group, and "pay out as much as possible" of its remaining assets to vendors and theater artists who are owed money from the 2003 Fringe Fest.

SFTP's other major program, the FringeACT Festival of new plays, has been taken over by its co-producer, ACT Theatre, and will be presented again this spring.

Misha Berson: mberson@seattletimes.com