ANON – 24 October 2026

In ANON, a mother named Jeanie (Crystal Finn) gets caught up in the TikTok whirlwind phenomenon that is QAnon. Her daughter Delia (Izabel Mar) is disgusted. Her husband Michael (Andrew Garmen) is concerned. And her gay neighbors Adam (Jeff Biehl) and Will (Jeremy Shamos) are straight up terrified. Told through a mix of scenes, soliloquies, podcast audio, and daydream projections, ANON shows the world the human face of this frightening movement and evokes empathy for people who want to be liked so badly that they turn to fringe conspiracy theories to feel valued and needed. Jeanie’s story is not so different from many of us: she wants to be liked, she finds a community that values her, she learns about the things that are important in that community, she feels validated, she becomes a leader for a cause, and then she feels important. Though her cause was largely made up and didn’t have a factual basis, ANON speaks to Jeanie’s visceral, human needs and how this terrible thing fulfilled them when the people in her life would not. It is an important reminder of shared humanity and the importance of valuing one another before someone decides to seek that validation somewhere else in desperation.

I enjoyed the scenes and soliloquies in this play. I felt that the podcast moment and the daydream moment were both too long, and could have gotten their point across faster. In particular, Jeanie’s relationship with Michael was fascinating to me. There was a dinner scene in the second act where Michael tries to bring Jeanie back down to reality. He reminds her of the truth of the number of followers she has and how little difference she is making. Garmen speaks tenderly and lovingly despite the fact that his character is being critical. He shapes this moment as a lover, which prevents it from erupting into a fight. While Jeanie talks about how even one connection is enough to change the world, Michael remains calm and patient. This moment reminded me of love stories where someone in the relationship has a serious mental illness and their partner knows exactly how to handle the hallucinations without contradicting their loved one’s reality. The love we see Michael giving Jeanie does not go two ways. In the first act, we see Jeanie and Delia hiding a post about food from Michael because they know he will be disapproving, and Mar’s acting choices in this moment suggest some kind of abuse. Her character Delia is relatively sane, and is clearly protecting her mother from her father in this moment. It makes me wonder when Jeanie stopped feeling loved and why— perhaps that has something to do with the untold origin story of how Jeanie turned to strangers on the Internet over people in the room.

The experience of watching ANON is meaningful. There are lots of details crammed into every moment, including those as mundane as homework and explanations of meals. It is a well-written (Anne Washburn), tightly directed (Anne Kauffman) character study that posits an interesting question: how can someone so well-meaning be so very wrong? At the end of the show, Jeanie is standing by herself in a storm holding a pride flag she stole from the neighbors, screaming into the abyss about her importance, utterly alone. This is meant as the literal embodiment of what she does online— misinterprets history to demonize the wrong people and venerate the wrong side, feeling like she has a captive audience when she doesn’t. The only power Jeanie has to make people feel is to frighten them— her daughter, her husband, and her neighbors are all afraid for her and, at times, of her. That’s such a cruel form of existence; it’s no way to live.

Before I conclude this review, I’d like to take a moment to recognize a thematic trend in what shows are programmed at MCC Theater. I have deeply enjoyed recent efforts to humanize populations that mainstream society frequently writes off as crazy or less than. This show focused on QAnon; many do not want to humanize the January 6 insurrectionists and write the events of that day off as the mob mentality, when perhaps the most disturbing facet of the attack was the well meaning human beings who perpetrated it. Going back into what Birthright did for Israelis/Jews, what Cold War Choir Practice did for the Soviet Union, what Trophy Boys did for young male perpetrators of sexual assault, etc, MCC Theater has been working diligently to remind us that we cannot write off anyone, no matter how lost, complicated, messed up, or different they may seem— all people are people. This comes with a beauty and also an accountability for audiences to be less polarized and more aware of the blanket statements they carry as core beliefs. This mission is noble and notable, and it’s one that I, as someone who is concerned about where our world is going, admire and respect.

I attended this performance on a press pass from Print Shop PR.