The Need to Know:

A Veteran's Journey from Fear to Freedom

by April Fitzsimmons

The Actors' Gang - September 19, 2009

Live Review by Adam McKibbin

Photograph of April Fitzsimmons courtesy of The Actors' Gang

Of all the types of live theatrical performance, the personal narrative via one-person show may be the toughest to pull off.  It’s just a long time to sit and listen to any one person, and the potential for cliché, overacting and self-aggrandizement is nearly unlimited.   

The simple antidote, of course, is to have a good story and to place it in the hands of a good storyteller.  Actors’ Gang company member April Fitzsimmons has had a number of years now to craft The Need to Know –the subject matter certainly isn’t becoming any less relevant (more on that in a minute) – and she succeeds on both counts.  There are some hiccups along the way, but Fitzsimmons ably threads together a story that is both painfully personal and pointedly political.

Over the course of 90 minutes, Fitzsimmons charts her evolution from a child with a strange fixation on Communism to a promising intelligence analyst in the Air Force to, after a few doses of personal tragedy and on-the-job disillusionment, an anti-war veteran.  The action unfolds on a spartan set, with Fitzsimmons relying on a small handful of props and costume changes.

Perhaps because of the time she’s had to refine her piece, she connects the dots of her transformation without beating the audience over the head with it; there’s a touching irony to a young volunteer in Basic Training being motivated by a kneejerk, deeply ingrained aversion to Communism, then realizing that the recipe for a successful platoon includes some of those very same tenets.  There’s no need to belabor the point, and Fitzsimmons doesn’t.  So it goes with many of the pivotal episodes of her life; they are dealt with honestly, not hysterically.  If you were to make a list of the necessary/obligatory dramatic moments in a one-person show, The Need to Know ticks off a few of the biggies.  But nothing is milked for pathos.

Where her story diverges from ordinary coming-of-age fare is when she enters the world of the military – more precisely, the mysterious world of the intelligence gathering community – and then is forced to grapple with some of her old questions, fears and frustrations in the wake of 9/11.  Fitzsimmons deciphers codes and transports top-secret briefcases, the perfect sorts of assignments for a sharp team player with an adventurous streak.  Once she’s a civilian – and using her military background to become a kick-ass PA on Hollywood film sets – she no longer has that need to know, which is a relief… until her loved ones are thrown into harm’s way for a war that doesn’t quite smell right.

Looking at her life from the outside-in, it’s tempting to want to spend a little more time here and a little less time in the formative years.  It’s the one noticeable structural problem in the production; it feels like the story takes a while to start, and then overcompensates by rushing through some opportunities to linger on and dig into the bigger picture.  But, then, this is also part of the charm of The Need to Know:  it’s more personal than philosophical or polemical. 

Her journeys bring a number of colorful characters into her life, playing roles both major (her first lover, a chain of lovably gruff superiors) and minor (a spacey Hollywood yoga instructor, an aspiring Italian sugar daddy).  They provide the comic relief and cause many of the dramatic turning points.  Fitzsimmons breathes affectionate, distinctive life into them, largely without resorting to broad caricature.  Strangely, the most stilted persona is when she’s playing herself as an airy-voiced young party girl or starry-eyed lover. Maybe it’s just because it’s hardest to play yourself.  Hopefully it’s not because it’s the person that now – after all that's happened – feels the farthest away. Credit to Fitzsimmons for being brave enough to open herself to such questions, even though in this case we surely don’t have the need to know.