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In a tiny black-box theater in Greenwich Village, up two flights of ancient steps, six members of an addiction support group assemble. Among them, all in one big circle, sits the intimate audience.
Charlie, the group’s regular leader, is absent today for unknown reasons and has tapped longtime member Richard to lead the session. Untrained as a facilitator, nervous Richard arrives early to put out the cookies and coffee and psych himself up. One by one the recovering addicts appear.
The rich society woman. The volatile EMT, who has seen too much. The swaggering, foul-mouthed stockbroker. The willowy nightclub bartender, nursing a dwindling acting and modeling career. The forlorn one, pining over a long-gone partner. And the shadowy one who has never spoken at all.
They could be the characters in an old-fashioned murder mystery. But no one’s solving a crime; they’re here to support each other as they try to solve themselves.
Some seem caricatures at first, only to reveal the viscera that lie behind their carefully constructed personae. Electric performances and well-crafted drama play out around and within the same circle we sit in, helping make Anonymous a riveting experience.
As the characters’ gritty situations unfold through monologues and interactions, there are a few bumpy passages where they seem a little too articulate – a bit self-consciously literary, let’s say. But that’s a minor quibble, if even that. What we leave with are the revelations of shame and guilt, petty frustrations and profound sadnesses, generous solidarity and violent threats, that have both led to and emanated from substance abuse, the elephant in the room.
The show is so intimate that one doesn’t want to say too much about what happens. So it’s enough to say that it’s likely to make something happen inside you. Anonymous by Nick Thomas, directed by Sara Fellini, is at spit&vigor’s tiny baby blackbox theatre through February 28, 2026. Get tickets online.
