Love is complicated in 50 Ways to Date Your Aubrey…and in life. (Photo courtesy of Capital Fringe)

Reminds us of: A particularly heart-wrenching episode of the meta NBC sitcom Community, crossed with a WTF with Marc Maron-style deep dive into a person’s inner monologue.

Flop, Fine or Fringe-tastic?: Fine.

If you were to leave 50 Ways to Date Your Aubrey after three minutes or 30 minutes, you’d have a very hard time discussing it with someone who sat through all 70 minutes. The show is actually several shows layered on top of each other like the rings of an onion. There’s a lively one-woman show in which the title character (Aubri O’Connor) tells funny, poignant stories about her romantic and sexual travails. There’s a wickedly amusing dismantling of the fourth wall as O’Connor keeps getting “interrupted” by “last-minute” script changes delivered by crew members (actually the show’s supporting cast members) and “malfunctioning” sound equipment. There’s an unexpectedly somber interrogation of buried trauma and (sort of) demonic possession.

It’s a lot. Toggling between these different modes, and drawing connections between them, is fun and often rewarding. But I wasn’t sure, walking out, whether everything came together. Each part has compelling and memorable moments, whether it’s O’Connor recounting a first date that went wrong in cartoonish ways, or an “unsuspecting audience member” proving surprisingly adept at mime. Towards the end, a flurry of important information comes spewing from the characters’ mouths so quickly that my feeble brain struggled to keep up. The closing minutes put perhaps too fine a point on the show’s storytelling and thematic goals. And yet, the show pulses with the energy of creative people who have a lot to say and want to share it all. I can imagine few nobler pursuits. Execution, as the characters find out, comes with practice.

(Note: At the Saturday afternoon show I attended, an understudy who had learned her lines only 24 hours earlier played the role of the show’s playwright, Danny. The cast apologized at the end for stumbles and delays, but I didn’t notice any. Mistakes seem smaller when you’re not the one making them.)

Where to See It: Caos on F, 923 F St. NW.

When to See It: 8 p.m. on Wednesday, July 25 and Thursday, July 26. 1 p.m. on Saturday, July 28. 2 p.m. on Saturday, July 29.