click to enlarge
Longtime Fringe-favorite writer/performer Martin Dockery is back in Orlando again with another brain-bending dramedydirected by Vanessa Quesnelle, whichwill linger in your mind long after its chilling final fadeout.
"The Stakeout" sees two suit-and-tie wearing FBI agents — Dockery as a veteran of the can-and-string era on the eve of retirement, and Andrew Broaddus asa rookie on his first day out of the academy — sitting in a surveillance van, surveilling another van that’s surveilling them right back.After eavesdropping on a distressing domestic conversation, the younger one becomes vulnerable and verbose, triggering an increasingly surreal avalanche of circular conversations centered around cyclically repeated phrases.
In this knockoff noir universe where cop show clichés are made concrete, the rapid-fire rat-tat-tat dialogue sounds like Sam Spade as written by Samuel Beckett, performed by Abbott & Costello and produced by Dick Wolf. Dockery still has an evocatively absurdist way with words ("Relationships are dune buggies driven by monkeys who have lost their keys"), but scratch that nonsensical surface and you'll find a distressingly personal parable about absent fathers, abandoned children and the pressures that can tear apart a loving home.
Like many of Dockery's plays, "The Stakeout" starts out deceptively pedestrian, then metamorphosizes into a metaphysical parable that would make Rod Serling proud. I might not have become quite as emotionally invested as I was in his elegiac "Moonlight After Midnight," and it wasn't as cathartic to intellectually unpack as "Inescapable" (which he's been reprising as a 24-hour marathon). But as always, there are few things at Fringe more mesmerizing than Martin Dockery’s haunting imagination.
Orlando Fringe: Tickets and times for "The Stakeout by Martin Dockery"
Location Details
Orlando Fringe Gold Venue
Orlando Museum of Art, 2416 N. Mills Ave. Mills 50
Event Details
The 33rd Annual Orlando International Fringe Theatre Festival
Through May 27
Lowndes Shakespeare Center 812 E. Rollins St., Orlando Mills 50
') let lineHeight = jQuery('[line-height-check]').get(0).clientHeight; jQuery('[line-height-check]').remove() if (jQuery(element).prop('tagName').match(/HIDDEN/i) !== null) { jQuery(element).children('div').last().css({ marginBottom: `${lineHeight*2}px` }); } else { jQuery(element).css({ marginTop: `${lineHeight*2}px`, marginBottom: `${lineHeight}px` }); } // const insertionBlockClass = `fdn-paragraph-insertion-block`; const styleElementHook = `fdn-paragraph-insertion-styles`; jQuery(element).addClass(insertionBlockClass); if (jQuery(`[${styleElementHook}]`).length === 0) { jQuery('div.fdn-content-body, div #storyBody').append('
') const paragraphLineHeight = jQuery('[line-height-check]').get(0).clientHeight; jQuery('[line-height-check]').remove() const styleElement = jQuery(`
`); const styleText = ` div.fdn-content-body br+.${insertionBlockClass}:not([hidden]), div #storyBody br+.${insertionBlockClass}:not([hidden]) { margin-top: ${paragraphLineHeight*2}px; margin-bottom: ${paragraphLineHeight}px; } div.fdn-content-body br+.${insertionBlockClass}[hidden] > div:last-of-type, div #storyBody br+.${insertionBlockClass}[hidden] > div:last-of-type { margin-bottom: ${paragraphLineHeight*2}px; } ` styleElement.text(styleText); jQuery('head').append(styleElement); } // } } jQuery(element).insertBefore(this.paragraphEndNodes[index]); } else { console.warn('Foundation.ParagraphTool.insertElemenAt: invalid insertion index', index); } } this.insertElemenAtEnd = function (element) { if (this.paragraphEndNodes.length) { let lastNode = this.getNodeAtIndex(this.paragraphEndNodes.length -1); if (this.isDoubleBrParagraphBreak(lastNode) || this.isBrParagraphBreakBeforeBlockElement(lastNode)) { if (jQuery(element).get(0).tagName.match(/SCRIPT/i) !== null) { jQuery('
').insertAfter(this.paragraphEndNodes[index]); jQuery('
').insertAfter(this.paragraphEndNodes[index]); } else { jQuery('div.fdn-content-body, div #storyBody').append('
') let lineHeight = jQuery('[line-height-check]').get(0).clientHeight; jQuery('[line-height-check]').remove() if (jQuery(element).prop('tagName').match(/HIDDEN/i) !== null) { jQuery(element).children('div').last().css({ marginBottom: `${lineHeight*2}px` }); } else { jQuery(element).css({ marginTop: `${lineHeight*2}px`, marginBottom: `${lineHeight}px` }); } } } } this.bodyContainer.append(element); } this.getNodeAtIndex = function (index) { return this.paragraphEndNodes[index]; } }
`); } var paragraphCount = myParagraphTool.getParagraphEndNodeCount(); // No need to insert if there aren't enough paragaphs if (paragraphCount >= parseInt(item.requiredCountToDisplay)) { // Matches specific paragraph insertion indexes if (item.insertPoint.match(/^\d+$/) !== null) { var insertIndex = parseInt(item.insertPoint) - 1; // Insert within content if (insertIndex < paragraphCount) { myParagraphTool.insertElemenAtIndex(componentElement, insertIndex); } // Append to the end if the insert point is beyond the paragraph count else { myParagraphTool.insertElemenAtEnd(componentElement) } } // Matches for 1/2, 1/4, 2/3, 5/6, etc else if (item.insertPoint.match(/^[1223456]\/[23456]$/) !== null) { var fractionMatch = new RegExp(/^([123456])(?:\/)([23456]$)/); var fractionPart = parseInt(item.insertPoint.match(fractionMatch)[1]); var fractionWhole = parseInt(item.insertPoint.match(fractionMatch)[2]); var fractionValue = fractionPart / fractionWhole; var fractionIndex = Math.floor(myParagraphTool.paragraphEndNodes.length * fractionValue) - 1; myParagraphTool.insertElemenAtIndex(componentElement, fractionIndex); } // Matches for every Nth insertion point else if (item.insertPoint.match(/^\d*th$/i) !== null) { var intervalIndex = parseInt(item.insertPoint.match(/^(\d*)th$/i)[1]); var startingIndex = parseInt(item.startingPoint) - 1; var insertionMax = parseInt(item.maxInsertions) || 100; var insertionCount = 0; for (var i = startingIndex; i < myParagraphTool.paragraphEndNodes.length && insertionCount < insertionMax; i++) { if ((i - startingIndex) % intervalIndex === 0) { let currentNode = myParagraphTool.getNodeAtIndex(i); const clonedComponent = componentElement.clone(); myParagraphTool.insertElemenAtIndex(clonedComponent, i); insertionCount++; } } } } }); Foundation.Content['36873041'].setupInlineComponents = function () { return true; }; if (typeof callback === 'function') { callback(); } }, 200); } Foundation.Content['36873041'].previewInsertionPoints = function () { var myParagraphTool = Foundation.Content['36873041'].paragraphTool myParagraphTool.paragraphEndNodes.each((index, item) => { const insertionPointPlaceholder = jQuery(`
`) myParagraphTool.insertElemenAtIndex(insertionPointPlaceholder, index); }); return 'Paragraph insertion placeholders applied.'; }
