Fringe-For-All 2008

Fringe-For-All was a pretty wild time, as usual: a packed house of enthusiastic theatregoers, and a rapid-fire smorgasboard of various categories of lunacy.

I was actually pretty anxious going in -- a lot of the success of my show last year is due to the fact that I killed at this showcase. As I recall, I came up with my performance the day of -- a punk-jazz CD that a friend had recommended to me arrived that day, I popped it in, and -- click. I knew what I was doing. I threw out the old idea, rehearsed it a couple of times, and hit the stage.

Used a pretty similar process with this one, in that I didn't figure out what we were doing until pretty much the last minute. I spent weeks on several false starts -- including one that memorably involved an American flag and a leaf-blower -- before one of my actors joked, "Why don't we just do all of the scenes at once?"

That idea wouldn't work -- but something like it might. I whipped together a script overnight and away we went. The result was successful, I think -- not a big hit that people will be talking about for a while, but entertaining and interesting enough that we probably sold a few tickets.

But why listen to me theorizing about it? Judge for yourself. The Fringe has taken the initiative to put all of the previews on YouTube, and ours can be found at this link.


(photo by Scott Pakudaitis)

An Idle Thought

I just finished the Chronicles of Narnia again. I continue to believe what I believed as a kid: that chapter twelve of "The Silver Chair" is one of the finest things ever written.

I'm repeatedly moved by how seductive the witch's enchantment is -- and that Puddleglum, the eternal cynic, is the only one who's resistant to it. The speech he gives -- claiming that, yes, we live in a fallen world, and that it's full of misery and degradation and bloodshed -- and that he still chooses to behave as though there was something better than that, in spite of evidence to the contrary -- is an intensely moving one to me.

So the reason I think that Puddleglum is Lewis' greatest creation is the same reason that I think that Angel is the greatest television show ever created -- that he espouses much the same philosophy in "Epiphany." And that philosophy is pretty much the centerpiece of "The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant" -- that in his final battle against the Despiser, his triumph emerges from the fact that, yes, he believes that everything that he loves is an illusion that he conjured in his own mind -- and it's still worth dying for.

So, yeah. Puddleglum, Angel, Thomas Covenant -- I don't know what it is about all three of them that makes them so heroic to me. But I note that they're all cynics, all skeptics, who unflinchingly confront the worst that reality has to offer -- and all three of them still choose to behave in a way that's heroic. Not in spite of that fact, but because of it.

Heroism without hope -- true bravery that emerges from despair. That's something that's very close to my core theology. And something that, ultimately, is the antithesis of everything that Barack Obama preaches, and that his followers believe.

Profane Political Parables

So I've been having a lot of conversations with one of the members of my cast lately (because we hang out entirely too much), and one issue that's come up is that "this isn't really sketch comedy." And she's right -- it's not. It's something a lot like sketch comedy, in that it consists of a compilation of short pieces, which are (hopefully) funny, intended to get people relaxed and laughing. But structurally? Not quite.

And I made the comment (drunk and high at the time, as I recall, the state from which all truly profound realizations emerge) that the pieces aren't sketch comedy. They're fables. Structurally, they have a lot more to do with Aesop than Lorne Michaels. They all consist of broad, cartoonish characters tumbling out, having absurd arguments with each other that play out in ludicrous ways, that generally culminate in some kind of political moral or thesis.

Another comment she made, that emerged from another similar session, is that "we don't want to be preachy."

This also got me thinking. Is that true? I know that conventional wisdom right now is that preachy is the worst thing that you can possibly be -- how dare you try to inundate your audience with a message, et cetera -- but the fact that something is unpopular doesn't necessarily make it wrong. I mean, A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court is my favorite Twain novel, one of my favorite novels of all time -- and it's probably the single preachiest book ever written. It's also fucking hilarious.

And I go down the list of artists who I truly love, who have really deeply affected me -- Aristophanes, Moliere, Charlie Chaplin -- and every single one of them is obnoxiously, unapologetically preachy. It's one thing my character even complains about the show (probably preaching, as it were) -- that the currently acceptable approach to theatre is to turn inwards, to pick apart psychological states; plays that try to deal with broader issues are dismissed as pretentious. And personally, I kind of think that that's a sign of a sickness.

I'll keep calling the play "sketch comedy," because that's the only way I know how to market it. I doubt I could sell "profane political parables" to anybody. But, y'know -- I hope they still find an audience. And one that's willing to laugh, even if there is a moral floating through the story.

July 4th, 2008

So I dutifully spent my Treason Day as every American should: seeing good theatre, drinking good beer, and watching shit blow up.

While I was waiting for my bus on Nicollet Mall, a cadre of naked bikers coasted past, singing The Star-Spangled Banner. Near me, an Old White Dude shook his head in disgust.

OWD: I like bicycles, but there's no excuse for that. That's why I live in the suburbs.

He notices me leaning against a pillar and reading City Pages.

OWD: Excuse me. Move that newspaper.

I do so, hesitantly. Now, note that I'm wearing a T-shirt with an image of the Tiananmen Square Massacre, with the caption "I'm from the government. I'm here to help."

OWD: So, that's Beijing?
ME: Yeah, man, Tiananmen Square.
OWD: Oh.

(pause)

OWD: China deserves to be fucking crushed.

(pause)

OWD: I'm going to go get a copy of The Onion.

(pause)

OWD: Thanks for talking to me.

(pause, then, walks away)

Now, I know I don't look Chinese -- my Hennepin County Jail wristband blandly identifies me as a "WHITE MALE". And it's not as though I disagree with the underlying sentiment. Although I wouldn't necessarily use the word "deserves." Or "crushed." And I might want to add a couple of qualifiers to "China." But "fucking" I'm totally on board with.

This exchange, edifying as it was, did get me to thinking. Even if China's current government could be easily, peaceably dismantled, would that be desirable? It's not even close to addressing the underlying problem of what China is, and has been for longer than any other country. The citizens of every nation are indoctrinated by their respective societies, but the Chinese people have been subjugated to a single monstrous intellect for two and a half thousand years. I'm not referring to Mao Zedong or Karl Marx, both of whom are fairly late comers to the party; I'm referring to Confucius, whose collectivist philosophy perhaps found its ultimate expression in Communist doctrine.

After all, isn't this one of the underlying problems of the occupation of Iraq? We tear down a secular dictatorship, only to find a significant body of people who want to set up a theocracy. Contrary to what The Rascals would like to believe, ask me my opinion, my opinion will be -- people everywhere don't want to be free. Certainly one of the many issues I struggle with within my own faith is the concept of one man dying for another's sins. Is it possible to pay for somebody else's sins? Isn't that something like what we're trying to do? And from whence does the moral authority come to make a sacrifice like that meaningful?

My understanding is that the most rational and moral course available to us is one of non-interventionism. It's certainly possible that that's a mistaken belief, based on a poor education. And it's certainly true that that understanding rejects me from the two major parties, both of whom seem to believe that overseas intervention and entangling alliances are necessary to our continued stability -- a fact making this November's election yet another no-win scenario for me.

But thinking about all of these ideological and geopolitical conflicts leaves me with one clear thought: that our own revolution, two-hundred and thirty-eight years ago, was nothing short of a miracle, in both a military and philosophical sense.

So thanks, Old White Dude. And a happy Treason Day to you, too.

It's Like the Inside of My Head Just Barfed Onto Your Screen

So one of the musicians for the show, in working on a song, compiled a list of topics covered by the text. It's too good not to share.

- underwear
- soldiers
- war
- killing
- cheesecake
- stripping your child
- "Why can't I stick that there?"
- verbal uncle abuse
- bloody spear
- desire for knowledge
- rotting corpse
- American television
- Green Party
- exposure
- hippies
- peace leagues
- pretentious peaceniks
- wannabe hippies
- the war machine
- government corruption
- "Give Peace a Chance"
- white guys
- shitty poems
- pacifists
- the KKK
- late night cable porn
- jerking off your brother
- zombies
- political debates
- politicians
- moderators
- soapbox speeches
- the electoral system
- "Christ on a minibike"
- homophobia
- boobs
- lesbians
- Max Verbosity
- chronic misanthropes
- Neil fucking Simon
- guns
- beer
- cheetos
- granola
- wine
- "the discipline box"
- rape scene
- bombs
- granola-crunching bleeding-heart liberal hippie bullshit
- Chinese ninja aliens
- confessions
- Catholic priests
- stabbing the baby Jesus
- Harry Potter
- Keira Knightley's nipples
- Michael Jackson
- suicidal tendencies
- rednecks
- Osama bin Laden
- Cinemax
- comic book discussions

He also compiled the following list of vulgarities, which, if read aloud, becomes almost poetic:

- fuck
- goddamn idiot
- shut the fuck up
- god
- you stupid fucking asshole
- bullshit
- fag
- faggot
- China baby
- bee-yatch
- half-retarded
- shit
- chinks
- ass
- fuckin' up
- fuckin' enough
- fuckin' the right people
- crips
- queers
- baby dispensers
- cock puppets
- niggers
- beaners
- honkeys
- colored people
- blacks
- whites
- bitch
- tits
- slut-whompers
- jew
- dick

All Rights Reserved: A Libertarian Rage! Opening July 21st in Kansas City!

The Best Defense Is Being Offended

So we've started rehearsals for our next show, All Rights Reserved: A Libertarian Rage, which is a rewrite and a remount of a show we did a couple of years back -- the show that initially got me into political writing. Like most of Maximum Verbosity's shows, one of its primary themes is language, in this case how it operates within the realm of politics. One of the ways this is represented is through the use of profanity and racial slurs throughout the script.

When I initially wrote those scenes, I recall sitting down and thinking through the implications very carefully. I recognize the fact that there are some people -- indeed, a significant portion of the population -- who can find the mere existence of a word to be offensive, even painful. Surely, I thought, I must be able to connect to that mentality on some level -- there must be at least one word, somewhere in the English lexicon, that fills me with rage.

But there isn't. As a student of language, I've always had the sense that words, by themselves, mean nothing -- they're complete abstractions of the concept they represent: an arbitrary collection of syllables; ink on paper. Their meaning is defined entirely by intent and context. I'm reminded of a quote by Larry Elder:

Hate crime legislation forces us to place greater value on some victims because of race. By all means, we should prosecute bad conduct. But if I'm standing at an ATM machine and a Ku Klux Klansman hits me in the back of the head with a brick, the operative word is not "Klansman." It is "brick."

I'm also conscious of individual words as bearing the weight of history. Am I being excessively semantic to point out that the word "nigger" ultimately emerged from the Latin "niger" -- a form of speech that hasn't been widely used in nearly 1600 years? That it has derivants in every Romance language? That it was a neutral descriptive in our own country until about 150 years ago? That 150 years from now, it will no doubt carry a completely different connotation?

Oprah's serene assertion that the word should be stricken from the dictionary (to full-house applause by an interracial audience) seems to me to be to be nothing less than an attempt to -- if you'll forgive the phrase -- whitewash history. Language isn't an absolute, but an evolving organism; and for someone fascinated with that process, witnessing the attempts of the black community to consciously reclaim the word has been compelling stuff.

These are all arguments I've been making for years. But picking up this project again, I find that my thinking has developed, and I think that my beef runs a little deeper than that.

I'm not prepared to say that I'm totally immune to being offended by something, but I think I certainly have a higher threshold than most. If someone says something I disagree with, I'm far more likely to laugh, shrug my shoulders, think "Wow, that dude is crazy," and go on my way. If I were to be physically attacked for my minority status, my emotional response would be fear for my life -- being "offended" on behalf of the race I was born into would, I imagine, be very far from my mind in that moment! A lot of my writing has been offensive to a lot of people, although that's never been my intention. And here, I think, is why it bothers me so much:

Ultimately, it's hard for me to read taking offense as anything other than attempt to seize control of the conversation. To be "offended" by something is to immediately put your opponent on the defensive. This is one of the reasons that polical correctness is subjected to much ridicule: that, for example, the appropriate term for an American of African descent has been, at various points, negro, nigger, colored person, person of color, black, African-American, Afro-American -- and none of them are an appropriate descriptive of the range of ethnicities it applies to! To use the wrong one in the wrong environment is to demonstrate how out of touch you are, to force you to apologize, to put you on the defensive.

This is perhaps more visible in the left -- but the right is, if anything, worse -- it's just that their sacred cows are differently placed. Try to say anything critical of America's recent military ventures, and, oh! The offense! The umbrage! And we have to twist ourselves into knots apologizing, affirming our patriotism, beating the nationalist drum. It's a dirty trick, and one that's killed dead just about any meaningful dialogue we could have about the war. Or race. Or language. Or any number of other issues.

None of this is new -- after all, it was just a few centuries ago in Britain where it was a stated crime, punishable by death, to think treason against the king. In a representative republic, we've organized our "forbidden language" around a different set of concepts. Could we at least stop being offended long enough to figure out where we all stand beneath this steadily-growing morass of forbidden words and phrases?

This Is Fucking Ridiculous

So this is what they mean when they said irony is dead.