‘Lost (and Found) in IKEA’ @ The Fleetwood Project
—Jan Farrington
I had never thought of IKEA—you know, the biggest-box store of them all (with meatballs!)—as a metaphor for modern human life. The wandering, the chaos, the inability to make decisions…or find the way out. But the more time I spent watching The Fleetwood Project’s livelyLost (and Found) in IKEA, the more I knew they were onto something.
Directed with a fine sense of playfulness and heart by Stevie Dawn Carter, Gary Ray Stapp’s down-to-earth comedy touches on serious issues (marriage, loss, finding who “you” are), but always lets the funny come first. No play that includes a ghost, a guy who lives in the store, a battle royal over a clock (there ate 80 more on the shelf), and a red-white-and-blue rant about IKEA’s useless directional arrows, could keep serious for long.
Fleetwood is performing in a new venue, a black box space inside MPM Studio Theater in Mansfield that has an intimate, up-close vibe that suits them. And from that up-close perspective, we get a good look at the 10 performers onstage who bring their characters to life. In general, the cast does a great job, with just a few moments when I wanted a bit more from-the-heart life in the dialogue.
But each different persona comes through vividly, from a recently-married couple (Lexie Conner Perry and Dillon Cannon; I remember him from Fleetwood’s Once Upon a Mattress) already seeming a bit on-the-rocks (I hate to take sides, but she’s just awful) to a brother (Aaron LeDay plays Steffan) who’s brought his single sister Winifred (Ashley Wagnon) to IKEA—to shop for a husband in the aisles. Lex (Andy Sloan, particularly real and touching) is shopping solo for the items on his deceased wife’s shopping list—but wife Mags (played by director Carter) won’t let him off the hook that easy.
Hard-luck Isaiah (Chris Berry) looks cosy in the IKEA display bedroom, and he and intense shopper Dot (April Bassett) both get very territorial about what’s “theirs.” A wise (and strangely omniscient) security guard named Oz (Frankie Whitaker makes a great anchor) sorts things out, directs lost humans, and seems to know their names and situations almost (?) immediately.
And then there’s Mrs. Peale (Nicole Howell), who is so strange she might be better off staying inside the store, where they’re used to her. She peers at everyone around corners, is obsessed by her petition to rid the place of the floor and wall arrows that pretend to “direct” people to IKEA’s faraway exits—and is working up to a patriotic rant and spectacle you’ll hardly believe.
I’d never heard of playwright Gary Stapp—but to my surprise, found he spent years with a small Kansas community theater (though he’s just relocated to Tyler!), and has oodles of plays that have been published and performed around the U.S. and in other countries.
He’s one of those thriving theater people who never get to New York, and apparently don’t give a hoot. What I especially appreciated about Lost (and Found) in IKEA was the surprisingly clever but believable dialogue: I always am delighted to find a show where I do NOT know already what people are about to say. This story goes every which-a-way, but at the same time, the people and situations feel very human (even the supernatural bits) and definitely relatable to emotions and dilemmas we’ve all had to face. And our laughter feels real, not forced.
A smart pick, Srevie Dawn Carter—and wishing all y’all Fleetwood folks good shows in the new venue!
WHEN: May 20-June 7, 2026
WHERE: 1802 Mansfield Webb Rd., Bldg. 300, Mansfield TX
WEB: thefleetwoodproject.org
