Rachel Petrie’s (mostly) one-woman show, Fadeaway Girl, opens at Gabriel's Corner with an audio of the actor recording her notes for what she wants the evening’s experience to be. The plan is to create a performance based on her history with clinical depression and bipolar disorder, and she lists the clichés that she intends to avoid — not wanting the time spent onstage to be something that she wouldn’t sit through herself.
What follows is a frequently amiable and still serious set of anecdotes relating her observations about the conditions she deals with — while finding humor and insight throughout. The tone is conversational and breezy, an account that refuses to wallow and yet willingly acknowledges the emotional minefield of her illness.
The most serious segment of the show has Petrie standing on a chair in front of a video that displays a ledge above a river far below. While perched on this precarious and projected height, she mentions various things she has discovered about suicide from her own thoughts and online research. The most poignant of these comes from a TED talk that states those who have attempted and survived confess they regretted it as soon as they leapt.
In a more joyful section, she grabs a box of tissues and begins prancing around, tossing the floating paper into the air like confetti and then teaches the audience that a good cry is not only necessary, but that the convulsions used for both laughter and tears exert the exact same muscles of the face.
Pianist Cary Davenport appears for a segment late in the show, and he brings some additional wit and musical dexterity to the event.
The show, however, is missing a solid through-line. Her stories emerge as random memories or musings, but Petrie gives them coherence with healthy doses of understanding for both the audience and herself.
Fadeaway Girl doesn’t ask for your sympathy but, like a good friend, invites you to sit, listen and laugh a little while she riffs on all she’s seen and knows.
The Cincinnati Fringe Festival runs through June 10. Find showtimes, tickets and more info here.
