Fingers Crossed is more stand-up comedy show than a play, but Stacy Cancelarich is obviously comfortable in both worlds.  Fingers is a dark, comedic journey that Cancelarich faced with her father’s deteriorating health, and eventual death, and her mother’s narcissism, which seemed to increase as her father approached death.

Fingers is stories within a story. Tales of moments, all mentally trying, of her father dealing with injuries from a car accident, Alzheimer’s, and cancer and a wife hoping to hasten his demise. A mother being completely unhelpful while her husband needed 24hr hospice care. Both mother’s and father’s mental health issues supply plenty of fodder for Cancelarich’s tales. 

Fingers is very much in the same genre as Lucus Hnath’s Dana H. Both authors wish they could hate their mother but have not found a way to go that far as they maintain relations despite the stress those relationships cause and the unarticulated wish for the death of their parental nemesis.  They both quietly shout at the audience that mom is not a good person.

Michael Gardiner’s direction keeps Cancelarich’s stories coming in rapid succession. She physically embraces the problems she faced in providing care, keeping the audience laughing despite the exploration of several forbidden topics. The show is fun night out for anyone not triggered by the comedy of death or presence of parents intent on abusing and driving their children nuts.