The Alliance for the Arts took a huge hit to their operating budget when Gov. Ron DeSantis vetoed all funding earmarked for Florida museums and culture organizations on June 12.
To help the Alliance replace the lost funding, local playwright and actor Frank Blocker is bringing his Fringe Fort Myers 2024 Best-in-Venue performance back to the Alliance for one night August 30.
Blocker will perform “Stabilized Not Controlled” and plays 17 different characters in the 60-minute comedic tour de force.
“There’s an evil landlord who’s taking on all of the tenants of his building to kick them out and raise the rent, and it becomes a fight to the death between the tenants and the landlord,” Blocker teased.
Blocker based the story on his experiences living in a five-story walk-up in Manhattan. He said that 40 percent of the lines in the show are direct quotes he collected by eavesdropping on fellow tenants in his and nearby buildings.
“It’s very New York, very funny,” Blocker promised. “You’re gonna hear some F-bombs because that’s the way they talk in New York.”
Blocker often performs at fringe festivals. Ironically, the reason Governor DeSantis gave for vetoing all arts funding in the state was because two fringe festivals, one in Tampa and the other in Orlando, included drag shows and LGBTQ+-themed programming. So Blocker is performing “Stabilized Not Controlled” as a benefit to help the Alliance make up some of its budget shortfall.
“I’m not going to sit by while somebody cuts the art funding,” Blocker added. “If I can perform and sell some tickets and get people in the door and have a good time and make some money to plug up those holes in the funding, I’ll do it.”
He hopes other fringe artists will follow suit.
He’s even willing to perform “Stabilized Not Controlled” or one of his other one-man plays for other arts organizations that were adversely affected by the DeSantis veto.
“Stabilized Not Controlled” performs in the Foulds Theatre at the Alliance from 7:30 to 8:30 p.m. on Friday, August 30.
THE BACKGROUND:
Tickets are $30 for non-members and $27 for members of the Alliance for the Arts.
The characters in “Stabilized Not Controlled” include:
- “Killer” Joe Tennent – the landlord
- Jackie O – sometime tenant in the basement
- Lorna B – Apt 2W, septuagenarian sex addict in recovery
- Thomas – Apt 3E
- JP Georges – Apt 3W
- Iona & Angelo – Apt 4E
- Chris – Apt 5E
- Roxy – City employee
- Father Ben – Priest at Immaculate Conception Church
- Saakaar – a cabbie
- Roveena LaGuidice – a lawyer and a rat
- Franklin – a subway busker of lore
- Lyle – the lazy panhandler
- Bernard – Killer Joe’s twin brother, meaner and uglier
- As well as random New Yorkers, 12-steppers & subway announcers.
Of the plot, Blocker said, “This is very common in New York. If you lived in a five-floor walk-up and understand that system at all, this goes on in almost every building in New York. There is some sort of legal battle going on pitting tenants versus the landlord.”
This biting comedy ran at Manhattan’s Stage Left Studio from December 2010 through December 2012.
Blocker is a NY Drama Desk Award-nominated playwright and monologist who’s been dubbed the “man of 100 voices.”
Blocker was performing at the Ottawa Fringe Festival when he heard the news that Gov. DeSantis had cut all arts funding in Florida. “He claimed [fringes] are sexualized festivals. Ottawa was my fifth fringe festival and I am not getting those invitations, so I have no idea what he’s talking about,” Blocker chided. “Yeah, there’s some weird stuff. There’s some crazy stuff. They’re uncensored, un-juried events, so you’re going to get all kinds of everything. But while I was in Ottawa, I saw two of the most wonderful children’s shows, and children’s shows are hard to get right. And if it isn’t for fringe festivals, those kind of shows don’t get out there.”
For years, the state of Florida has awarded grants to nonprofit arts and cultural organizations in four categories.
Museums and cultural organizations were eligible for up to $150,000 in grant funding from the state of Florida, but the Florida Legislature allocated only 47 percent of the amount eligible for the current fiscal year and Gov. DeSantis cut even that from the state budget. The Alliance for the Arts had applied for $131,000 in support. The Legislature approved $61,570 of that amount, which the Alliance lost due to the DeSantis veto.
For more on the impact that Gov. DeSantis’ veto is likely to have on Southwest Florida arts and culture organizations, listen to WGCU’s July 18, 2024, edition of Gulf Coast Life Arts Edition by John Davis. Listen here.