Patrick's Cabaret, the onetime firehouse that flies the rainbow flag near the intersection of Lake and Minnehaha in Minneapolis, showcases the edgy and innovative in performance, from dance to standup comedy, hip-hop spoken word to drag, experimental theater to solo performance art.

Its Open Call Cabaret nights are a terrific opportunity for newcomers to the scene to spread their wings and try new material, but Patrick's is also a home for some of our most experienced and accomplished off-the-mainstream performers--and this weekend and next we've got a chance to see eight of them in what promises to be a definitive showcase of what makes the Twin Cities just so damn cool sometimes, you know?

"Not Guilty! (Your Honor, It's the Laws that Are Wrong)" comes at a time when the "culture wars" seem to be heating up again, and I absolutely guarantee that the "Not Guilty!" performers will turn our current politico-sexual, religio-cultural traumas into something rich, strange, and as sharp as bright red fingernails.

--Heidi Arneson, the brilliant solo performer and playwright who can find the demonic subtext in a preteen slumber party and somehow fuse it with apocalyptic hope for a better America, will premiere her new show, Eat Dirt!, a naked celebration of the tiger worm.

--Venus DeMars, our sexiest A-list male-to-female-and-sometimes-back-again gender outlaw, painter, filmmaker, and leader of All the Pretty Horses--a band that can leave seen-it-all New Yorkers slack-jawed with amazement--will stage a solo piece about dreams.

--Kohl Miner, an engaging gay Native American poet-storyteller-performance artist, offers "The Round-up at the Reedsburg Butter Fest," which he describes as "the whacked-out tale of my beginning. Set to the music of the Suburbs & The Dandy Warhols. I was born under a dark cloud of melted butter."

--Cabaret founder Patrick Scully, a dancer and choreographer with an international reputation, will probably be onstage for a duet with Kevin Kortan. I say "probably" because Scully has a March 26 court date to face charges for--get ready for it--swimming nude in Twin Lake in Vadnais Heights.

These  performers I've had the pleasure of seeing on Patrick's stage and elsewhere; the others are new to me: choregrapher Denise Armstead will lead a quartet of dancers in excerpts from "Ignition," a work in progress; veteran singer-songwriter Mari Harris will be presenting songs from a new collection, and Farheen Hakeem, her hair modestly covered and her tongue unleashed, will grab the mike for radical Muslim feminist standup comedy. (Actually, Hakeem is a radical Muslim feminist comic politician--she was a Green Party candidate for Minneapolis mayor and state senate. So her political material may go a little deeper than what you'll hear at the comedy club in the mall.)

Fridays and Saturdays, March 23, 24, 30, and 31
8:00 PM at Patrick's Cabaret
$8 in advance from the artists or $10 at the door (cash or check only)


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