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Men In Tights

It's time for the annual Bay Area Renaissance Festival.

Bay Area Renaissance Festival

All manner of Medieval folk will be here when the festival returns for seven weekends at MOSI.

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By WALT BELCHER | The Tampa Tribune

Published: February 19, 2009

Here ye. Here ye. M'lords and m'ladies, it's time to step back in time.

Wenches and fair maidens, knights and knaves, trolls and fairies, musicians, belly dancers, swordsmen and all manner of Medieval folk will be wandering through the forest town of Fittleworth when the Bay Area Renaissance Festival returns to Tampa for seven weekends.

The wooded area behind the Museum of Science and Industry on Fowler Avenue will be transformed into the Tudor era of King Henry VIII and Queen Catherine Parr (the last of his six wives) for feasting, fantasy, fun, jousting, dancing, singing and merriment.

It's the thrill, charm and romance of the 15th and 16th centuries without the pestilence, poverty or injustice.

The Bay Area Renaissance Festival started in 1980 and many Tampa area residents return each year for the new and the familiar. More than 45,000 are expected to attend.

There is food (smoked turkey leg, anyone?) and grog (come for the home brew beer competition on March 13, 14 and 15).

There will be more than 250 vendors, selling everything from fairy wings and wooden flutes to wooden swords and shields. Spread over the 20-acre site will be more than 100 characters — from Christophe the Insulter to Emrys Fleet the Rat catcher.

Specialty acts fill eight stages and there's daily jousting on horseback, a human chess match, Medieval-themed kiddies' rides, and mud fights with the Washing Well Wenches.

You can have tea with the Queen or cigars with the King.

Each weekend has a different theme beginning with the Scottish Highland Fling (games and bagpipes) on Saturday and Sunday. Wine, chocolate and song are on tap for the romantic on Feb. 28 and March 1.

The Florida State Belly Dancing Championships are March 7 and 8, but the Demzarah Gypsies from Safety Harbor are there every weekend.

Other weekends are devoted to the Irish "Shamrocks & Shenanigans" on March 13, 14 and 15; Italian Renaissance on March 21 and 22; Pirates (and bikers) on March 28 and 29; and the Spanish (flower festival and longbow competition) on April 4 and 5.

THEY'VE GONE MEDIEVAL

The Insulter

At what other festival are insults so valued? Christophe the Insultor roams the Renaissance Festival grounds, hurling put downs better than Gordon Ramsey or that crazy doctor on "House."

For a few coins, Christophe will regale you with lines that would make a pirate blush. Christophe is the alter-ego of Christopher Buehlman, 40, a playwright, comedian, actor and poet based in St. Petersburg. You will find him strolling the grounds of the Renaissance Festival with a pint of grog in one hand and a smirk on his face. Check out his "insult generator" at www.insultor.com/about-the-insult-generator/.

Gypsies, Tramps and Thieves

There has been a gypsy troupe performing at the Bay Area Renaissance Festival since it started in Largo 30 years ago. This year, it will again be the Demzarah Gypsies. The group hails from Safety Harbor and features Darlene Trieste, aka Tirzah, her husband Tom and daughter Jennifer (known as Sereena). Sereena and Tirzah swirl, twirl, jiggle and dance, and sometimes play with swords, snakes and fire. "It's a mix of dancing, music and comedy," Darlene says. "We like to get the audience involved."

Surely You Joust

The New Riders of the Golden Age from War Horse Farm in Sarasota, have been jousting professionally since 1982 and have appeared at Renaissance Festivals, state and county fairs and other events across the United States and Canada. They bring their noble steeds and brave knights to Tampa for daily demonstrations of martial competition between mounted knights using a variety of weapons (titling with a lance, blows with the battle axe, strokes with a sword). Kelly Bailey, director and trainer at War Horse Farm, says the jousters are the rock stars of the festival and children enjoy the horses decked out in period-design 16th Century tilting armor.

Aw, Rats to You, Buddy

Jim Greene, a former St. Petersburg businessman, chucked the city life years ago to go on the road as Emrys Fleet the Rat Catcher. Now he resides in Ithaca, N.Y., when he's not entertaining folks with his "trained rat" named Pesky (a stuffed sock).

Chances are many his audience know Greene's jokes and can recite his introduction:

"I'm the Rat Catcher Emrys Fleet,

Two Parts of the Rat doth I eat.

The Body and Head

'Twixt two Pieces of Bread,

There's no meat in the Tail

or the Feet!"

Wassail This?

In addition to dozens of food and drink vendors, the fair features vendors of all things medieval from toy wooden swords to real steel swords. You can get hammered on grog (beer) or get a hammered dulcimer. There are objects that seem perfectly natural at a Renaissance Festival that are out of place in the real world. Take wassail horns, for example. Made from real cow horns, the wassails come in two kinds. There's one for blowing (take it to a Rays game and challenge the cow bell ringers) and one for drinking. Other items include fairy wings, belly dance costumes, harps, flutes, gnomes, gargoyles, walking canes, magic wands, crystal jewelry, period costumes, woven baskets, Medieval lawn art and breast plates.

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