Weddings, anniversaries, holidays: the family reunion is a dramatic gift that keeps on giving on both screen and stage. Crystal Finn’s new work, “Find Me Here,” at the Wild Project, falls into a subcategory of the funeral subgenre: the unsealing of a will. In this case, a patriarch’s dying will is uncovered by his three daughters and their families. Truths and conflicts emerge cautiously, almost hesitantly, because Finn is less interested in confrontation than in gentle nudges and shoves.
Unfortunately, “Find Me Here,” the third and final installment of Clubbed Thumb’s Summerworks 2024, is also unwilling to commit to any particular point. The cast, however, which includes Constance Shulman, Miriam Silverman and Frank Wood, is so good that the production feels like the theatrical equivalent of handing the keys to a cheap sedan to a Formula 1 driver. The actors are experienced, but the vehicle he can’t do much.
The story centers on siblings Nancy (Lizbeth Mackay), Dee-Dee (Shulman), and Deborah (Kathleen Tolan), whose ages range from mid-60s to early 70s. Deborah is the eldest and has spent the last 30 years on an island, where she has followed a guru. Tolan gives her the blissful look of someone who can see a light invisible to others, which contrasts nicely with the acerbic Dee-Dee and the stressed-out Nancy.
The will’s most important revelation is that Deborah is left with nothing, an outcome of which she shrugs. When Nancy tells Deborah that their father loved her, Dee-Dee says, “Well, that’s… we don’t know… she loved him, Deborah.”