The Fine Art of Storytelling

Acclaimed Storyteller and Author Chris Andoe to Headline STLFringe Fest 2023

by Grayling Holmes / Photos courtesy of Chris Andoe and STLFringe

While attending a preview event of the upcoming St. Lou Fringe Fest, Chris Andoe stepped to the podium. In a booming voice, he began telling a story.  I had known Andoe as a prolific writer, but was unaware that his true talent lie in storytelling. To tell a tale verbally is a craft as old as humankind. In fact, it predates written storytelling. While attending the 12th Annual STLFringe FEST at .ZACH, one of the Kranzberg Theaters, you will get the chance to experience Andoe’s art of storytelling.

His love of storytelling began by listening to his grandmother during family gatherings in his native Tulsa. Recently, I sat down with Andoe and a little-known, yet familiar world was revealed to me. After all, we are all told stories and become novice storytellers. Yet few of us become professionals, perhaps because we were not taught by Grandma Andoe.

"It was on the north side of Tulsa, under the big old tree in Grandma Andoe’s backyard, bordering the train tracks, where our family’s best stories were told, and Grandma's stories were rich, soulful, and often hilarious. I inherited her passion for storytelling, but as the youngest of my generation, I was competing with stories of my artist brother’s success in New York City, my uncle’s tales of flying oil executives around on a private jet, and updates on the filming of The Outsiders, which was taking place right around the block in the house my dad was born in. Grandma was always over there monitoring the set.”

The Andoes' stories are more succinct than the typical southern style because you needed to get to the point before a train came through. So, the formula is to throw out something good to see if you've got everyone's attention, if so, reel them in, but get wrapped up before the freight train completely resets the yard."

Robert Locooco in his living room / photo St. Louis Magazine

In later years, Andoe relocated to his now home in St. Louis.  He has become a fixture here and is well known in the community as a prolific writer and masterful storyteller.  Sometimes referred to as “the Armistead Maupin of St. Louis,” Andoe has a keen ability to understand what makes the region and its characters interesting, and to write and tell compelling stories about his adopted home of St. Louis. He says that the foundation of that is a keen understanding of the town. His journey to that understanding originated from a tour and tutorial that famed art dealer/art publisher Robert Lococo gave him upon his first visit. 

The year was 1997, and the 22-year-old Chris Andoe found himself sitting beside his boyfriend in Lococo’s airy and symmetrical Ladue living room. When Andoe told his oldest brother Joe Andoe — an artist whose work is now in the permanent collections of the Whitney and The Metropolitan Museum of Art — that he planned to leave his native Oklahoma for St. Louis in search of adventure, Joe asked friend Lococo to take him under his wing. 

The housekeeper had shown the young men in, and as they awaited Lococo they observed the posh surroundings from the 20-ft windows overlooking the pool and towering Trova sculpture. Andoe’s wide-eyed boyfriend pointed at the wall and excitedly whispered, “That’s a Basquiat!” 

“We were just two broke kids from Oklahoma, but Robert and Mark [Niesman] gave us the VIP treatment, including lunch at Balaban's in the Central West End, and a fascinating tour of the city as it was in 1997. Robert had such insight into the cultural nuances of each neighborhood, and his anecdotes from that first tour informed my understanding of this city to this day,” Andoe says. 

Robert Lococo / photo The Business Journals

Few have a more profound understanding of local culture than Andoe, who writes for St. Louis Magazine (Senior Editor Nicholas Phillips calls Andoe "One of our city's best talkers". Andoe also has a regular society column in the Riverfront Times. When Senatorial candidate Lucas Kunce wanted to announce his surprise wedding, he did so over brunch with Andoe. He authored two books, overflowing with local characters, Delusions of Grandeur and House of Villadiva. 

Andoe became a household name in LGBTQ St. Louis soon after Darin Slyman gave him a regular column in the glossy Vital Voice Magazine in 2010. His column, in which he constantly upset the apple cart by diving into community controversies, established his reputation. That reputation spills over into his verbal storytelling skills and builds his reputation even futher. This made him numerous enemies, including Dustin Mitchell, the prolific conman who served time for posing as an attorney in St. Louis County. In House of Villadiva, Andoe recounts a time Mitchell framed him for a hostage crisis, and chronicles a trip to Dallas where he interviewed Mitchell's victims there. The latter story was also a viral Out in STL feature titled, "Dustin Does Dallas." 

Not long after Andoe’s St. Louis on the Air interview with Sarah Fenske, Matthew Kerns, executive director of St. Lou Fringe Fest, arranged a meeting at Uncle Julio's Frontenac where he proposed producing a one-man show and having Andoe headline the festival. 

Kerns says, "They broke the mold when Chris Andoe was created, and his story is a rollercoaster of love, loss, triumph and community. This St Louis transplant's heart became an artery for the LGBTQIA+ Community!"

The Final Performance of Midnight Annie is about Andoe’s life and characters. It’s hilarious, heartfelt, and adult-oriented.  Just weeks ago, while attending Joan Lipkin’s storytelling event Queer Writes, at the Missouri History Museum’s Lee Auditorium, Andoe stepped up to the podium and mesmerized a capacity crowd of 300. He told his tale of Midnight Annie — a drag queen whose cremated remains were interred into the brick wall of the now defunct of Clementine’s, an historic but now defunct Soulard gay bar. 

In that moment at the museum, after he got the attention of the audience, he was greeted with disarmed laughter, much like Grandma Andoe did when she got everyone’s attention in the back yard. One could feel even the room relax as everyone settled in to listen.  Even if train tracks, or the cacophony of traffic from nearby Lindell Blvd. crept into the auditorium, nothing could seemingly distract the captive audience.  Had the Grandma Andoe, a storytelling queen, been at the Missouri History Museum that night, she would surely be proud that her progeny was keeping the art of communicating a tale in words and gestures alive.  The scepter had been passed to a worthy recipient.

Chris Andoe storytelling at Missouri History Museum to capacity audience.

In a TikTok culture devoid of the history of plain old storytelling, the 48-year-old Andoe continues to lure readers and audiences alike with his mastery of the lost art of storytelling. I can attest to this. At a recent dinner party at my home, not only did the animated Andoe take on numerous personas when recounting the fascinating and often-outrageous characters he’s chronicled, but at one point, he crawled on the floor and acted out a scene on his back.

Perhaps one of you reading this might want to invite Andoe into your living room at a gathering of friends to delight them with his storytelling acumen.  In the meantime, catch his performance at the .Zack, a Kranzberg Theater, on Friday, August 18 or Saturday, August 19. Tickets are on sale at stlfringe.org.

Headline Series Performances at the 12th Annual St. Lou Fringe Fest are:

BARE: A Pop Opera by Damon Intrabartolo, lyrics by Jon Hartmere, and a book by Hartmere and Intrabartolo and presented by Gateway Center for the Performing Arts. Bare is a coming-of-age rock musical that focuses on a group of high school students and their struggles at their private Catholic boarding school.

The Marcelle Theatre August 17 – 20, 2023. Tickets $35.00.

The Final Performance of Midnight Annie – (World Premiere): Inspired by the life, times, and works of Chris Andoe and adapted for the stage by St Lou Fringe President and Artistic Director Matthew R. Kerns, MFA. A chronicle of the life and times of this award-winning writer Chris Andoe. There will be shade as the “T” is spilled!

.ZACK Theatre August 18 – 19. Tickets are $25.00.

The Oreo Complex by Lillian C. Brown : A multi-disciplinary solo performance. iInspired by WEB DuBois’ concept of double consciousness chronicles the experience of OREO Girl, a black female, navigating predominately white institutions. It is an exploration of internalized segregation, a celebration of resilience, a practice of rigorous patience, and veneration of ancestors. The Oreo Complex is a poetry and mixed media work.

.ZACK Theater August 15 – 16, 2023. Tickets are $25.00.

The FEST will also feature Katie Rodriguez in How It Feels to Be on Wheels, a show about Katie’s time with the St. Louis “DisAbility Project” that led to her play Roll With It!. Also,  a new work by Kevin Bowman titled, Heretic: The Eulogy of a Christian Expat: Join us for the funeral of pastor, church leader, and rising star Kevin Bowman led today by Heretic Kevin Bowman.