David J. Loehr. Artist in Residence.

Picking up on the theme of making merry of Mamet, here’s scene seven from my play The Rough Guide to the Underworld, featuring a more specific parody. It’s set in a bar in the Underworld, the Tenth Circle…

Sexual Perversity Inferno

The play itself started life as a series of monologues, then expanded into a set of sketches. That was the plan. A revue. Until the characters began to drift from sketch to sketch and interact with one another. Suddenly, there was a story, a throughline, several tales woven in and out of each other.

(left to right) Matthew Wilson, Kevin Pierson, Bob Rogerson, Laura C. Harris and Gillian Shelly in The Rough Guide to the Underworld, at the Capitol Hill Arts Workshop, Washington D.C., June/July 2009.

This particular thread involves a writer named Dante (no relation) and a film producer named Bobby. Of course, Mamet’s play Speed-the-Plow features a film producer named Bobby. What’s not as well known is his one-act follow-up, Bobby Gould in Hell. Add to that the fact that the first scene of Sexual Perversity in Chicago is a dialogue between Bernie and Danny. You can probably see where I connected the dots.

So the first minute of this scene is an almost direct parody of the first scene from Sexual Perversity in Chicago, except it goes off into film production instead of sexual conquests. From there, it spins into its own weird little story…

As for the scene title, all of the scenes in The Rough Guide to the Underworld have titles, which can be projected above/behind the action if so desired. In this case, the title isn’t so much a spoiler as a heads-up for Mamet jokes. There’s a different title in here that’s a spoiler. But I’m not going to spoil that part.

Here’s a lyric I wrote four years ago for my wife, who hates a certain Christmas song by Paul McCartney.

There’s not much to explain about this process, except for a wonderful discovery while writing. In the bridge sections of the song, I threw in a joke about John Lennon’s Happy Xmas (War is Over) as a throwaway gag. But the more I thought about it, the more I realized you could sing the two songs in counterpoint.

I’ll leave it to the musicologists to parse what that says about the respective songwriters. I’m just happy to have the extra joke…

(to the tune of Wonderful Christmastime by Paul McCartney)

The Moog is on,
The organs beep,
We hear some bells,
And I might weep

Simply hating repetitive Christmas tunes
Simply hating repetitive Christmas tunes

McCartney’s on,
The song is bland,
A melody
I cannot stand

Simply hating repetitive Christmas tunes
Simply hating repetitive Christmas tunes

The choir of children sing their song
Ding dong, King Kong,
Sing-song gone wrong…

(War is over,
No, it isn’t…
War is over,
No, it isn’t…)

Ohhhh
Ohhhhhhh

Simply hating repetitive Christmas tunes
Simply hating repetitive Christmas tunes

The words are short,
They seem to be
One syllable,
Simplicity

Simply hating repetitive Christmas tunes
Simply hating repetitive Christmas tunes

The choir of children repeat their words,
This song is for the birds
Sing song, sing song (War is over)
Ding dong, ding dong (No, it isn’t)
Ding dong, ding dong (That’s John Lennon)
(No, it’s a cover…)

The music’s played,
The spirits drunk,
Let’s hunt him down,
Man on the run…

Simply hating repetitive Christmas tunes
Simply hating repetitive Christmas tunes

The Moog is on,
The organs beep,
We hear Sir Paul,
And I might weep

Simply hating repetitive Christmas tunes (Song is over…)
Simply hating repetitive Christmas tunes (If you want it…)
Simply hating repetitive Christmas tunes (Song is over…)
Simply hating repetitive Christmas tunes (Now…)

Ohhhhhhhhh
Christmas tunes

This is one of my favorite pieces, bar none.

Years ago, when I was still doing their marketing designs, the Hanover College Theatre put on a revue of sketches, short plays and songs under the banner title, “I Have to Say I Love You.” The only caveat for the artwork: don’t use hearts, don’t do the cliches.

I tried design after design, I went to rehearsals and watched the show, but nothing was coming to me. Finally, I asked the director what his idea of the show was, because–aside from love and all the cliches–it was escaping me. “Well, I’d like to think it’s like an issue of the New Yorker.” Stories, cartoons, short pieces. The first image popped into my head. Within the week, there were approximately 40 faux New Yorker cartoons, all in various styles, from Thurber to Addams, Arno to Chast, Gorey to BEK.

This was before I had children or cats roaming my home at will.

Eventually, all of the cartoons wound up on posters, cards, even programs. There were four variant programs, each with unique artwork on the cover and throughout. We mixed and matched so that–hopefully–no two people sitting next to each other got the same artwork.

This poster is one that I’ve captioned Nightdogs. It’s Edward Hopper’s famous Nighthawks painting as James Thurber might have redrawn it, albeit with a lot more chiaroscuro than Thurber would’ve used. A lot more.

Of course, that was the challenge, balancing the Thurber dogs with the Hopper style and staying as true to each as possible.

There are a couple of small in-jokes, too. If you look at the sign over the window, you’ll see the phrase, “My Diner and Welcome to It,” which refers to the celebrated 1969 sitcom My World and Welcome To It, adapted from Thurber’s writing. (You can see some of the show here if you’re curious.)

There’s also a reference in the sign to Thurber and Hopper as well as Charles Schulz, who acknowledged Thurber as an influence. If you look really closely, you might even spot where that influence went…

What did this image have to do with the show? Not much by itself. But as part of a larger campaign–with twelve different poster designs, six different flyers and four different programs–it set the mood. You were going to see something like an issue of the New Yorker unfold on stage. Some of the cartoons had more to do with the specific theme of love than others–and I do plan to share some of those later.

But this one’s my favorite of all.

This is a piece written on a dare to share with some folks in the Boston area who are well acquainted with David Mamet. There was a good reason why it involved Othello, but that reason has been lost to the sands of time.

Sexual Perversity and Iago

All I know is, if it weren’t for actor Nick Newell, this little scene wouldn’t exist. For that, I think him.