For the second consecutive year, the Toronto Fringe Festival will be showcasing its performances digitally to accommodate the limited in-person gathering numbers during Ontario's Phase 3 of reopening.

The festival serves as an additional season for theatre goers each year, especially since most companies end their annual seasons of shows before June, according to Toronto Fringe Executive Director Lucy Eveleigh.

"Most of the companies in the theatre ecology usually take a break during the summer," she said. "It was really helpful to have these opportunities for companies to come in and perform in their spaces because their seasons would usually finish before we started."

Eveleigh said this allowed companies to become acquainted with theatre spaces in Toronto, as well as give the city's theatre goers more opportunities to learn about other artists and acts.

"It [the festival] really found its space here in the summer time where there was not much going on," she said. "It has become its own special thing - there are people that come to Fringe, but don't come to any other theatre. It is a very specific experience."

The festival uses a lottery system, rather than a curation process, to select acts for the annual lineups. Eveleigh said 50 per cent of acts are reserved for BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, Persons of Colour) submissions. She said increasing diversity and inclusion continue to be part of the organization's mandate, and have consulted with experts and communities to ensure the festival meets its goals.

In addition to 2020 acts deferring to this year with initial hope for in-person shows, the festival received about 230 submissions, all of which were pre-recorded for digital streaming.

Moving forward, Eveleigh hopes Toronto Fringe's future events will be hybrid, providing both in-person acts and streaming.

"We started this campaign with 'Fringe where you are,' and this kind of global connection and some people are really careful about their thoughts on travel and how far they want to go in the climate we live in," said Eveleigh. "So this gives people the opportunity to see works in Toronto even if they are not in Toronto."

The Fringe festival dates back to 1989 when it was started by a small group of artists outside of the mainstream theatre scene.

During normal seasons, the festival gathers more than 100 theatre companies to rent out approximately 30 venues in Toronto.

The festival runs from July 21 to 31.