‘Find Me’ shows what Orlando Fringe’s Collective can do
It’s tricky to define “Find Me,” Without Fear Theatre‘s original musical onstage at Fringe ArtSpace, which is exactly what makes it a good choice for ArtSpace, in downtown Orlando.
Central Florida can use theater that shakes things up, and that’s what ArtSpace is helping to do. In this case, Without Fear Theatre is the first participant in Orlando Fringe’s The Collective program to mount a full-on production.
You may recall The Collective is an incubator program, designed to give up-and-coming organizations the support and training they need to reach the next level of development. Mentoring such organizations was partly why the city of Orlando turned over the downtown ArtSpace venue to Fringe in 2022.
“Find Me” is an auspicious debut for The Collective, at least in terms of show quality and production. It’s subtitled “A modern rock opera,” and those familiar with that genre will know that indicates an album of songs all telling a singular story — Pink Floyd’s “The Wall” comes to mind.
What sets “Find Me” apart, however, is that usually when a rock opera takes the stage — as in the case of The Who’s “Tommy” or Andrew Lloyd Webber’s “Jesus Christ Superstar” — the story’s characters sing the songs. Not so here. In “Find Me,” composer and lyricist Dan Drnach also sings the show’s dozen or so original songs, accompanied by his band. The two actors don’t have to sing a note.
This proves to be both a pro and a con to the storytelling.
On the pro side, it can be fascinating to watch the onstage actors during the musical numbers as their actions reflect the tone of the songs. On the other hand, the point the actors are making is usually understood within a minute … leaving two more minutes of repetition until the song ends. Over the length of the show, this starts to feel like an old MTV music video stretched out to fill time.
Drnach also gave the music to “Cross Country,” a 2021 Fringe Critics’ Choice award winner, and his guitar-driven pop-rock here is equally hummable. His lyrics occasionally skate to the edge of trite but far more often provide smiles of recognition and smartly offer specifics to latch onto — Froot Loops, Christine McVie.
I do wonder if there would be a more powerful connection between the music and onstage story if the vocalist were a woman. “Find Me,” after all, is a very intimate story about a woman’s most personal relationship: The one with herself.
In Amanda Scheirer’s neurodiversity-affirming story, Allie receives a surprise visitor, who paradoxically also seems to be expected.
The young woman who shows up at Allie’s door acts with childlike glee and communicates primarily through clicking sounds and laughter. Allie welcomes her, but also asks, “Who are you?”
It’s a question left ambiguous by the playwright — though clues are given by the use of the word “neurodiversity” in the playbill notes, and the theater company’s support of ARRE Foundation, which pursues research into rare, genetically caused ASXL syndromes.
The combination of the band’s meta presence onstage and Scheirer’s stylized direction means you don’t have to take the character interaction literally, but rather think about what it could mean. “Find Me” is a show that asks a lot of its audience; I think a smidge more concreteness to the proceedings would help some from getting frustrated. But the actors go a long way toward keeping the audience involved.
As Allie, Laura Swindoll maintains an instantly sympathetic mix of frustration, compassion and cheer. Jenny Ornstein, the visitor at my performance (the role is shared with Cat Cutenese), beautifully keeps her character from being cutesy, and without words makes her a compelling flesh-andblood being — necessary for the audience to believe in her, even if maybe the character isn’t quite that corporeal.
“The brain never gets a break,” Allie muses at one point. In this intriguingly crafted show, she’s absolutely right.