How I Learned (NOT) To Drive
Written by Jesse Bradley-Amore; Directed by Padraic Lillis
Presented by the New York City Fringe Festival
UNDER St. Marks | 94 St Marks Pl, New York, NY 10009
Fri April 10 at 8:10pm, Sat April 11 at 2pm, Sun April 12 at 3:40pm, Fri April 17 at 9:50pm & Sat April 18 at 8:40pm
Whenever I learn someone doesn’t have a driver’s license, I don’t give it much thought. Living in New York City, you don’t need one. You can get around anywhere because we have a robust transit system in addition to multiple ways to get from point A to point B to point C. Sometimes those points are in different boroughs or even beyond our state’s borders.
However, learning that Bradley-Amore lived in Orlando and doesn’t drive… at all… makes you wonder what happened.
And so it unfolds.
This solo debut begins with an eight-year-old Bradley-Amore in the backseat on the way to McDonald’s when an El Camino crashes into the driver’s side of his family’s Datsun. They survive, but what follows is a childhood shaped by addiction, neglect, and the expectation that he figure things out on his own.
He paints his world in specific, lived-in details. A chain-smoking mother who once lived a punk life at CBGB, now transformed into a self-described Republican feminist. A school meant to toughen him up for the “real world.” There’s humor in the edges, but it never softens what’s underneath.
As a teenager, while everyone else chased opportunities tied to Orlando’s theme parks, Bradley-Amore worked at McDonald’s. Not out of passion, but practicality. It was a job he could get to on his own. Bus routes instead of dependence. Even then, the pattern is clear: mobility without asking for help.
That instinct follows him into adulthood. After another accident, his mother offers to teach him to drive. Later, his wife does too. But when she has to drive herself to the doctor and learns she’s miscarrying, alone, the cost of that independence becomes undeniable.
He eventually gets his license. But the question the piece leaves us with isn’t whether he can drive. It’s whether he’s learned how to show up.
How I Learned (NOT) To Drive is ultimately about the quiet ways we learn to navigate the world alone, and what it takes to unlearn that.
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Review by Malini Singh McDonald..
Published by Theatre Beyond Broadway on April 19, 2026. All rights reserved.
