Lightup Shoebox carries the banner for genderqueer theater this weekend at Timucua

They say that you can't make a rainbow without some rain, but as Orlando's arts community wraps up its Pride Month celebrations this weekend, we're seeing that when it rains, it pours — literally. This week, I was hoping to tell you about Orlando Fringe's first-ever Orlando Out Fest (OOF), which was scheduled for June 27-30 at ArtSpace. Unfortunately, a succession of ruptured chiller pipes severely flooded the Church Street venue, forcing the relocation of last week's Latin American Festival of Performing Arts (FLAE) to Trinity Prep, as well as the indefinite postponement of OOF.

"Although we are very sad that we have to postpone this festival until a later date, trust me that we are coming back better than ever," says OOF producer Ciara Hannon. "After all, it's 'Mamma Mia, here we go again,' not 'Mamma Mia, here we go once.'"

Despair not, because producer-director Clark Levi's Lightup Shoebox is still carrying the banner for genderqueer theater this weekend with their production of Moira Buffini's rarely-seen dramedy Silence at Timucua Arts Foundation June 28-30. Levi first caught my attention early on as one of Beth Marshall Presents' Top Teens, and since graduating from Flagler College and returning home, he's quickly grown into one of our theater community's most passionate voices.

Named after the shoebox-sized stage in a friend's high school gymnasium and inspired by Peter Brook's theatrical theory of the "empty space," Lightup Shoebox began by producing DIY art videos during the pandemic, and launched live productions as COVID eased. "I went with this idea of, we can make artistic magic anywhere, with any budget, without having to depend on gigantic production values," says Levi. "We can just make magic in a light-up shoe box."

Among the magic Levi's Lightup Shoebox has helped make thus far were the well-received Fringe Festival shows Leviticus and Carmilla: An American Gothic. Levi and Ashley Alonso are also continuing the "Play Date" series started by Monica Tamborello and Robin Olson, which are free sessions for creatives to paint, write and "experiment with different artistic methods and mediums in a low-stress, no-stakes way," Levi explains. "We get away from the grind culture and gig economy to just play."

Earlier this season, Lightup Shoebox launched their first full season with the world premieres of The Audience Will Choose the Title of This Show, a participatory piece devised by a diverse group of eight interdisciplinary artists, and Ink Addicted, tattoo artist Chris Trovador's autobiographical one-man multimedia stand-up.

"I was always artistically attracted to his energy and how he conducted himself," Levi says of Trovador, a fellow Orlando Fringe employee who was awarded a United Arts grant to take his show on tour. "He has that very same mindset of why I started Lightup Shoebox: 'Let's just make it. Let's just get it together and do what we can with what we have.'"

While it will still be a technically bare-bones affair, Silence is by far the biggest production Levi has tackled to date as a director and producer. Levi describes the 1999 farce — about the Norman princess Ymma (Billie Jane) being forced by England's King Ethelred (Bennett Morgan) to wed the crossgender Viking Lord Silence (fight director Hayley Sanz) — as "Monty Python meets Shakespeare meets Bridgerton meets queer sitcom."

He discovered the script in college and produced a staged reading shortly before the COVID lockdown, and says he's returning to it now because "it's a very light comedy, but at the same time, it does have these themes about the doom and gloom of the Apocalypse. ... It just feels increasingly relevant to where we are right now."

Levi says he's especially excited that Silence's cast includes a mix of local veterans and new-to-Orlando faces, who are "people that have been ready to take on roles of this size and this dramatic heft, and haven't always gotten the opportunity."

Billie Jane, a trans actress and repeat winner of Orlando Fringe Critics' Choice awards, wrote that "as a kid, I would see these strong, beautiful, princesses on television or in movies and I would become so enraptured by them. Until I learned it wasn't societally acceptable, I would always pretend to be them when playing with my friends on the playground, before ultimately having to sink back into the reality of being a prince instead. ... I think especially now, all of the roles I accept and play will be significant, because I'm FINALLY getting to be the women I've always wanted to be."

Finally, as producer of a nomadic theater company in a city squeezed for affordable stage space, Levi recognizes his privilege to have established relationships with venues like Oviedo's Imagine Performing Arts Center, College Park Gallery and Timucua Arts Foundation — relationships he inherited from Jeremy Seghers. In turn, he's passing it forward with affordable (and even free) tickets to his performances.

"I hope that more people in Central Florida are able to take those risks on going to art that might be a bit different than what they expect, [and] that there are still people that are willing to band together around supporting queer art and institutions," Levi concludes. "I hope that we're able to all work together and support each other, as we figure out how to do this in the new age."

Event Details

"Silence" by Moira Buffini

Sun., June 30, 2:30 p.m.

Timucua Arts Foundation 2000 S. Summerlin Ave., Orlando South