Philly Fringe 2025: John Miller Giltner and Gene Farbe present Family Vacation

Through folk punk serenades and a meticulously timed slide show, John Miller Giltner brings the audience into the layered dynamics of time spent away with kin. The music, raw, jangly, and delivered with a wink, lands somewhere between earnest confession and basement singalong. The slide show, which only a few times becomes tedious, keeps the show lively, engaging, and tight.

There’s a lot to relate to on this odyssey (or so I imagine): drunk aunts, conservative uncles, cousins who have not found their purpose, and the backhanded ways they all talk about each other. These archetypes are comforting, but the show really shines as it leans into the specificity of Giltner’s family. Recurring threads of cursed ex-girlfriends, conspiracy theories, and Giltner’s relationship with anxiety deepen our connection to their family.

More than any other topic though, the show is a meditation on moving through grief. Giltner’s father passed away recently, and that loss is felt throughout the songs and stories of the vacation. Giltner does not shy away from the messiness of family relationships, especially as a queer person.

What elevates the piece is Giltner’s presence: equal parts folk singer, camp counselor, and sly anthropologist. They know when to lean into absurdity and when to let sincerity flicker through, hinting at the tenderness that often hides beneath family dysfunction. Giltner seemed to revel in sharing their family with the crowd, often smiling and taking in the laughter as if surprised and delighted by it. This modest affect belies the skill they clearly possess.

Family Vacation runs Wednesdays at 8:30pm at the Trestle Inn, immediately following another Fringe piece, 5 Stagehands Fall Out of a Closet (the goose crisis). The show, co-conceived, directed, and written by Giltner and Gene Farbe, feels tight and polished without losing its scrappy, DIY charm. Performed in the back room of a whiskey bar, it feels exactly like the sort of Fringe show you hope to stumble into: intimate, strange, and oddly moving. You might have so much fun, you stay for dancing.