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Renaissance FairA Renaissance Fair (or Renaissance Faire) sometimes referred to as a Renaissance festival or Renfest, is an outdoor weekend gathering drawing on themes from pop culture perceptions of the Middle Ages and Renaissance, strongly mediated through the entertainment media and comics. In May 1963 schoolteacher Phyllis Patterson and her husband Ron put on the first Renaissance Pleasure Faire, an outgrowth of school projects. The Faire was held in North Hollywood, California and drew some 8000 people for the one-weekend event. For decades the Renaissance Pleasure Faire held an annual spring gathering in Agoura, and a fall event in Novato both in California. The event was run by a large ensemble of performers, fine arts and craftspeople and crew. These yearly events drew on the rich variety arts movement in Los Angeles, and the explosion of outdoor public events. Interactive environmental theatre and stage shows were overlaid with large scale processions featuring giant puppets and courtly displays. The London based Reduced Shakespeare Company, San Francisco's i Fratelli Bologna, Tutti Frutti, St Stupid and the Los Angeles Fools Guild all originated in improvisationally developed ensembles working together initially at Pleasure Faire. Th original Patterson event was based on a previous event staged in Santa Barbara, and since its inception many unrelated Renaissance Faires have sprung up all over North America. Other large notable gatherings are held in Arizona, Texas, New York and Florida. The Oregon Country Faire and Burningman festivals both shared many of the same crew and performers that originated the Pleasure Faire. In the late nineties the Faire was sold to Rennaisance Entertainment Corportation, a company already operating the Bristol and Colorado faires. Several years later Kevin Patterson, the son of Phyllis and Ron Patterson Incorporated with his wife Leslie Patterson as "As You Like It Productions", since re-organized as "Red Barn Productions". The festival has largely changed since the seventies and eighties when it rivaled Oktoberfest in Beer Sales and incorporated a vision of the emerging renaissance of the sixties into its colorful street scene. Face painters and cookiejesters, Flamenco performers and Pinwheels all portrayed both a historical and present renaissance. many of the workers also attended shows of the Grateful Dead, and the crafts were unrivaled in the state. Largely declining in the quality of crafts and intensity of theatrical experience the crew and cast have moved on to other ventures and the emphasis is no longer on interactive ensemble theatre. After Hal Taylor famed long-form improvisation performer and Faire employee passed the final link with a history steeped in performers from Second City and the Groundlings was eroded. The festival still includes music, dance and stage performances, scattered lightly through the open air facilities. Most Renaissance fairs portray a real or imagined village in England during the period of Elizabeth I. Outgrowths include fairs set in other time periods, such as Christmas fairs set in Charles Dickens' London. A Parade of Fools, plays in Shakespearean or commedia dell' arte tradition, dancers, singers and other performers entertain fairgoers, many of whom wear costume, on the stage and in the street. Meanwhile, strolling minstrels, mimes, jugglers and jesters mingle with the crowd. Actors (often called participants) portray historical figures and common people, from royalty and nobility to merchants and peasants, and are often organized into thematic "guilds" (such as the peasant guild, Scottish guild, or parade guild). Actors wear period costumes, some meticulously researched recreations and others more generic impressions, and speak using an approximation of the vocabulary and accents of the time. The accompanying bazaar features traditional crafts, from jewelry and stained glass to metal and woodwork, as well as traditional English foods like bangers and mash. For a time in the eighties in Agoura the Guinness Book of Records record for most beer sold at a single venue was held by a Renaissance Fair. The Renaissance Pleasure Faire of Southern California is hosted by the Corporation which purchased the Pleasure Faire from Living history Center. The annual event is now in Irwindale (formerly Devore, originating in Agoura) is currently the largest event of its kind in the United States. It is usually held in late spring for 7 to 8 weekends. External links
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