Way Off Broadway
This weekend I saw the political satire "I'm going to kill the president: A federal offense." It looks like it's been running around the country for a couple of years now, but you have to call a hotline to get the meeting place and showtime.
Per the instructions, we arrived at the designated intersection 30 minutes before showtime. About 20 people are gathered on a street corner in a mostly warehouse area when a guy in his late twenties shows up and leads us away with a chin flip and an curt, "follow me, please." We follow him a few blocks and are directed to line up against a wall in an alley, where we provide our names and assurances that we're not affiliated with a law enforcement agency to a video camera. We walk a few more blocks and enter a little theater through the back gate.
We pay in cash.
The show I caught started at 11PM, and we were asked not to tell anyone the names of the performers were we to recognize them. The playbill had the names of the actors and crew blacked out. I believe the cast is associated with those who brought Abu Ghraib torture reenactments to the RNC last year.
Some elements of the show reek of a low budget endeavor produced by a bunch of stoners. Other parts, on the other hand, are extremely authentic and compelling. Overall, it's a pretty good show to catch if you have the chance, if only for the arousal/fright aspect of considering what life could be like if the far right drove progressive liberal thinking underground. As is common for all productions in America, I advocate not volunteering when the actors ask for one from the audience. My Swedish date, however, was not hip on this tradition of wizened, American reluctance in such situations and shot his hand up immediately. This wasn't his first misstep of the evening, but that is another story altogether.
Per the instructions, we arrived at the designated intersection 30 minutes before showtime. About 20 people are gathered on a street corner in a mostly warehouse area when a guy in his late twenties shows up and leads us away with a chin flip and an curt, "follow me, please." We follow him a few blocks and are directed to line up against a wall in an alley, where we provide our names and assurances that we're not affiliated with a law enforcement agency to a video camera. We walk a few more blocks and enter a little theater through the back gate.
We pay in cash.
The show I caught started at 11PM, and we were asked not to tell anyone the names of the performers were we to recognize them. The playbill had the names of the actors and crew blacked out. I believe the cast is associated with those who brought Abu Ghraib torture reenactments to the RNC last year.
Some elements of the show reek of a low budget endeavor produced by a bunch of stoners. Other parts, on the other hand, are extremely authentic and compelling. Overall, it's a pretty good show to catch if you have the chance, if only for the arousal/fright aspect of considering what life could be like if the far right drove progressive liberal thinking underground. As is common for all productions in America, I advocate not volunteering when the actors ask for one from the audience. My Swedish date, however, was not hip on this tradition of wizened, American reluctance in such situations and shot his hand up immediately. This wasn't his first misstep of the evening, but that is another story altogether.
posted by kelly at 1:54 PM
1 Comments:
Oh I'm jealous, that sounds so cool with all the "cloak-and-dagger" sort of stuff going on. I think I might need to research this a little and see if I can find it running in Houston anywhere.
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