“OPENING REMARKS to “An Evening of Intense MADNESS & INSANITY!” (a comic revue by KPKeelan)

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(This is from the script to an original comic review I wrote, produced and directed with a very large cast of crazy people, in late summer of 1978. Enjoy!)

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(OPENING REMARKS TO)

THE MOST WONDERFUL PANDEMONIUM THEARE COMPANY

PROUDLY PRESENTS:

AN EVENING OF INTENSE MADNESS AND INSANITY

(a vaudeville review assembled by Dr. Karemeos Z. Similkemeen)

(The audience is intentionally kept waiting in line in front of the venue to accommodate the PRESHOW. During this period, several AUDIENCE PLANTS intermingle with the audience in character, but not obviously so. A RELIGIOUS FANATIC pickets the show with a sign saying “MADNESS AND INSANITY ARE SATAN’S WORK!” trying to engage people in dialogue. A STONER DUDE watches, visibly unimpressed, making occasional snide, derisive comments under his breath. There is a LOCAL NEWSMAN accompanied by a CAMERA CREW consisting of a CAMERAMAN and a LIGHTING DIRECTOR holding a big reflective panel. They interview the audience, claiming to be gathering footage for a story about the theater company. Also present are a PYROMANIAC who keeps fiddling with his lighter and an odd MAN HOLDING A POTTED PLANT. The audience is let in just before curtain, unaware that in effect the show has already started. Calm classical MUSIC plays, as the audience takes their seats. The stage is mostly bare. Colorful wooden boxes of various sizes are piled about onstage- modular units that serve as furniture or risers in the different sequences. MUSIC suddenly stops, followed by a brief burst of FEEDBACK.)

(RECORDED OPENING REMARKS are played, HOUSELIGHTS still UP FULL.)

“…on’t think it’ll fit…

Hey, cut that out!

Are they coming in yet?

I said CUT THAT OUT!

SHUT IT, man! They’ve been here for a while now. We’re just waitin’ for the cue to…

Terri, have you seen my red thingie?

SORRY.  Sorry…

Your “thingie”?

I have got to take such a piss, I don’t think it’ll wait!

Yeah. The red one- you know?

Goddamnit! I know I left it on the table…

Will you zip me up please?

Naw I don’t think so…

Why are the damn props never there when you need them?

Well that’s what happens when you put you-know-who on props!

Ouch!

She can be such a bitch to people!

Hey you shut up about her!

Excuse me…

She’s doing the best she knows how.

Anybody got a copy of the new script?  I think he changed my first line… again!

You are telling me to shut up?  You?!

You call her a bitch but everybody knows you’re a two-faced hypocrite!

Well you have some nerve…

And a liar.  Everyone knows you lied about Jimbo.

Alright- who’s the clown who…

That’s it. I’m done.  I’m not going on with you!

LADIES!  Ladies- take it outside.

Would you check and see if my family is here yet?

I mean it! This bitch has just gone too far this time!  I…

Here’s a photo of them…

Just a sec.

(The curtains part and the JANITOR takes a quick survey of the audience before withdrawing.)

I can’t be in a play with her!

Yep.

One shoe?

You sure?

Oh yeah. Pretty weird-looking people, your family.

Forget the Drama Queen shit! You have a responsibility to us all to…

Where IS that other shoe?!?

Someone better let the tyrant know about this…

Screw that!  This show is going to be the worst turkey I’ve ever been in!

You look like you need some eyeliner…

Hey guys…

I mean it.  This dud will bomb!

Guys…

The whole audience’ll be petrified with boredom before the first act’s even half over!

GUYS! Why is this red light on?

Huh?

Doesn’t that mean…

I pity them all!

Off.  OFF.  Turn it OFF!

Oh shit! You mean someone left the P.A. …”

(There is a CLICKING SOUND, followed by silence.)

(Houselights hastily FADE TO BLACK. RECORDED AUDIO: a bugle blows, off-key, followed by the beginning of “Procession” by The Moody Blues. Music FADES OUT. Elaborate FANFARE sounds as SPOTLIGHT RISES on large wooden BOX, center stage. There is an uncomfortably long SILENCE, during which nothing happens. The audience can be heard to shift in their seats, and eventually whisper and twitter. Then, without warning pandemonium erupts all around them: a motley parade of bizarre characters enters from every possible place, including from among their own ranks, when the PYROMANIAC stands up and begins to throw lit flash-paper into the crowd, with devilish glee, becoming a babbling madman alternately laughing, screaming and crying as he shouts nonsensical prophecies. When he runs out of flash-paper, he begins using firecrackers. Everyone is clad in gaudy costumes, wearing elaborate makeup or obscured by grotesque masks. Most, brandish various props assaulting the playgoer with a kind of carefully orchestrated splendid anarchy.)

(The parade is led by a gritty tattooed BIKER astride a rumbling chopper, followed by a ragtag musical BAND, composed of a highly unlikely combination of musical instruments, [Kazoo, mouth-harp, castanets, didgeridoo, tuba…] who continually tune up but never seem to play anything. Among the procession: a HOUSEWIFE in greasy apron gripping a large frying pan, a MATRON in a dry poncho cowering under an open umbrella, a diapered BABY NEW YEAR carrying an oversized hourglass, a BEEKEEPER wielding a baseball bat, two CLOWNS spraying everyone in sight with water from squirt guns, a PERVERT clutching an anatomically-correct blow-up doll, and a classically-trained THESPIAN reciting Shakespeare to a human skull. Each gets a brief turn in the spotlight, as TUMBLERS tumble, JUGGLERS juggle, a HOST and HOSTESS with serving platters greet individual audiences warmly, offering assorted treats like Twinkies, dice and condoms. Meanwhile, the arrogant tyrant NEWSMAN throws tantrums as he directs his harried crew who continue to film the whole event.  Altogether, they produce a great cacophony and delirious chaos. All is indeed, madness and insanity. Finally congregating around the BOX they crescendo in silent tableau, chanting:)

ALL:  Mouska, mouska musketeers! Time for this one to appear!

(There is an EXPLOSIVE NOISE. A LARGE PUFF OF SMOKE engulfs the stage. The RINGMASTER who had been hiding inside, throws aside the lid of the box and pops out with a flourish.  Cracking his whip, he toots his whistle and thumps his walking stick, addressing the bewildered assembly.)

RINGMASTER: Terrible, wonderful ladies and alleged gents! We, the youth represented here under the stolen pseudonym of “The Most Wonderful Pandemonium Theatre Company”, wish to seize this horribly opportune moment to extend a most hearty and superfluous welcome to you- our naively unsuspecting victims, and to heartlessly communicate our sincere but meaningless hopes that you will enjoy- and at the same time regrets that you will loathe this evenings ostentatious presentation of a most traumatic and richly comic piece of great art that has been painstakingly carved out of the minds, souls, and yes- bowels of our fetchingly charming yet strangely repulsive players. This delicate text is calculated to tantalize and titillate all pleasure centers in the celestial minds of the very, shall we say- “special” people who comprise our equally special audiences. Prepare to be amazed, disgusted, delighted, demeaned, confused, confounded, astonished, reflected, dejected, oppressed, repressed, repossessed and mystified indeed! We stand prepared to satisfy every craven desire an ignorant modern American audience could want! Behold! We have SEX! (A couple of naked STREAKERS bound across the stage.) Violence!!  (The whole CAST begins to beat each other senseless.)  And Lawrence Welk!!! (CUE Champagne MUSIC. Fighters pose in mid brawl. Anything but enthused, the laconic JANITOR slowly crosses the stage pushing a trash barrel on wheels. He stops for a moment and blows some soap bubbles, before exiting, in no great hurry.)  You are about to experience a thrilling exhibition that sprang forth from complete and utter chaos, and evolved into the highly controlled and hopelessly random vision you will view here tonight: TOTAL and COMPLETE CHAOS, CONFUSION AND MADNESS!!  (There is another outburst of general pandemonium and mayhem, as CAST cheers and writhes ecstatically, kissing and kicking each other. Then, all suddenly fall SILENT, and turn their heads to face audience directly.)  And to think you could have stayed home tonight and watched that rerun of I Love Lucy… God help you all!

(BLACKOUT.  The procession recedes.)

(August 1978)

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