What if everyone in the world had a switch around their neck that could be flipped at anytime to end that person’s life, would you try and flip someone’s switch? What would it take in this world to make you flip your own? These are the questions Adam McCabe asks in his Fringe show “Flip.”
The concept for the show —which McCabe lays out in the show’s program — came from a real life experience McCabe had with a friend in college who went missing. When he turned back up a few weeks later, McCabe found out his friend tried to commit suicide because he concluded that the world was meaningless.
“Flip” focuses on a family of four — a woman (Jeanine, played by Janice Fisher) who feels like a terrible mother and wife, her two kids (Malory, played by Chelsea Talmadge, and Caleb, played by Indigo Frost) and their stepfather (Noah, played by Daniel Cooksley) — set in an alternate present that seems too much for them to handle. When Jeanine’s father flips himself, the family is forced to deal with life and death while still dealing with everything else weighing on their daily lives.
“Flip” plays like a cross between “American Beauty” and “The Purge,” taking on heavy subjects like rape, bullying, domestic abuse and suicide and places this family in the middle of it all. Even though at times the show is difficult and uncomfortable to watch, you can’t help but stare at the stage as tragedy upon tragedy falls on this family, and wonder if at any moment one of these people are about to flip.
“Flip” plays in the Blue Venue through May 27. For more information visit OrlandoFringe.org.
