From Fringe Stage To Everywhere

Eva Foote talks about her career in the arts and how it all started at Fringe.

Before she was performing at the Stratford Festival or filming scenes for the television adaptation of Margaret Atwood’s 2019 novel The Testaments, Eva Foote was a teenager at the Edmonton International Fringe Theatre Festival.  

She came for the atmosphere. For the snacks. The stilt walkers. The late-night energy that made every evening feel a little bit like Halloween.  

“I remember it being like this whole world,” Eva says. “There was such a vibe and energy. I was desperate to be a part of that community.”  

Not long after, she was. 

Eva volunteered at Fringe. She watched Artists she admired. And then, at just 18 years old, she stepped onto a Fringe stage herself in Dark Vanilla Jungle, a one-woman show tackling some of the most difficult material imaginable. 

The performance was a huge success. Critics called it “riveting” and a “virtuoso performance” that held the Audience for “75 horrifying, unstoppable minutes” (Liz Nicholls, 12thnight.ca).

Looking back now, Eva laughs.

“It’s actually kind of absurd that happened,” she says. “I was so young, and somehow, Fringe made space for that.”

And that’s the thing about Fringe.

It makes space.

Today, Eva’s career has taken her across the country and beyond. From theatre school to national stages to major television productions. You can now catch her in The Testaments, the highly anticipated sequel to The Handmaid’s Tale, streaming on Disney+ and Hulu. 

But like so many Artists, her story starts here. 

“So many Artists who go on to do this for the rest of their lives begin at Fringe,” she says. “It’s like a garden where seeds get planted.” 

At Fringe, Artists don’t wait to be chosen. They choose themselves. They write the work they want to see. They take risks on stories that might not fit anywhere else.

“Fringe is the opportunity where you actually have agency,” Eva says. “You get to submit the work you want to do. That’s really special.”

Theatre is expensive. Risk is difficult to fund. And for emerging Artists, the leap from idea to stage can feel impossibly wide. An 18-year-old actor carrying a complex, unflinching story alone on stage? That’s not a risk most theatres would take.

But Fringe did.

What makes Edmonton Fringe so powerful isn’t just the performances. It’s the community surrounding them.

“To this day, the Edmonton arts community is the most standout, supportive, interconnected arts community I’ve ever witnessed,” Eva says. “People support each other. They promote each other’s work. That’s not everywhere.”

That spirit of mentorship and generosity continues to ripple outward far beyond Edmonton.

“There’s so many people across the country who have been touched and guided and supported by that arts scene,” she says. “I’m marked by that forever.”

When you donate to Fringe Theatre, you help create space for the next generation of Artists to take risks, find their voice, and step onto a stage for the very first time.

Because every Artist has to start somewhere.

And for thousands of Artists, that place is Fringe.