IN THE WORKS
Texarkana Waltz
the movie
Plays adapted for the screen are wordy, there's no way around it. But as Sidney Lumet once said "Dialog is not uncinematic." Some plays are cinematic to begin with. Shakespeare's, for example. Texarkana Waltz waltzes in and out of Dallas, Morgan, and Houston's road trip in the present, Eddie's prison drama in the near past, and Houston's imaginary Western in the distant past, stories that are informed by movie genres and imagery, with a hint of Hamlet and a bit of Brecht backed up by Texas Swing.
THE PLAY
During the 2nd term of an authoritarian US president's attempt to establish a fascist federal government, NY playwright Earnest Marx writes a play so anti-fascist, raw, cut throat, and controversial, his long-time agent, Sam, and his wife, Katherine, an English teacher who gets death threats daily after losing her job for assigning Huckleberry Finn to 9th-graders, are certain that if it ever sees the light of day it will get him killed. Determined to get his play out into the world to empower the Resistance, Katherine and Earnest decide to mail it, USPS, to the top 100 theaters in the US with no return address and "by Anonymous."
Lillian Trimble, Artistic Director of NY's Peoples Theater, is done with directing dead playwrights. She makes a rash decision to direct the next new play that lands on her desk which, as it happens, is a brilliant work of cutting-edge theater by Anonymous. She's convinced the play will put her and her lover, Tyler Van Zandt, a wanna be Resistance leader, in the national spotlight. To sweeten the pot, Tyler agrees to take credit for writing the play.
Meanwhile... A newly formed fascist militia, the Knights of Liberty, operating out of No Man's Land, a bar in the Oklahoma panhandle, through an unlikely set of circumstances get their hands on Earnest's play and are so triggered by it they decide to assassinate the playwright who, according the internet, is Tyler Van Zandt. At the same time, a NYT reporter, convinced Tyler couldn't write a postcard, starts an investigation to identify the real playwright.
Inspired by current events, the movie Network, and the plays of Jules Feiffer, The Play, a satirical comedy, explores artists confronting the rise of fascism.
My thoughts be bloody (working title)
Check out the Astor Place riot. If you think that's crazy, this ten-part TV series following the life of an actor in the 1800s will blow your mind. Think Kenneth Branagh performs Julius Caesar for Gangs of New York from Deadwood to Broadway.
The viola
In this tale of cultural revenge, a Banksy-like artist outbids at auction one of the richest guys in the world (Rich Guy's minions drop the ball) for a fantastically rare viola. Rich Guy uses the full force of his wealth and power to try to wrest the viola from the Artist. Bring it on, says the Artist, who is playing the Rich Guy while creating a controversial new work that sells for many times the cost of the viola. Making art can get nasty. Sometimes things break, people get hurt, points are made. Does the viola survive? Does Rich Guy survive? Is it art?
satellite of love (Working title)
Mismatched lovers join the Knights of Planet Foo to save Earth from power-hungry religious fanatic aliens known as The Hellion in this B movie, sci-fi adventure for the stage! Androids! Mistaken identities! Death rays! Flying saucers! You won't believe your eyes!!!!
A trick or treat
Hades, King of the Underworld, hates it when his Queen, the goddess Persephone, leaves the Underworld to usher in spring and summer. So he decides to take a lover, the beautiful Eirene, Zeus's youngest daughter. As soon as Persephone leaves, Hades has his henchmen kidnap Eirene, who has run away from Olympus to party with mortals. Hades right hand man, Phaevian, sees this as an opportunity to redeem himself. Phaevian was a god serving Zeus until he started the Trojan war. Outraged, Zeus turned Phaevian into a mortal and sent him to serve Hades as punishment. Phaevian hatches a plan to rescue Eirene, return her to Zeus, and to regain his powers as a reward. With a little help from Furies, Sibyls, Hyperion, the mysterious Dream Lords, and the Psychopomp Charon, the ferryman of the dead, Phaevian sets out to return Eirene to Olympus. When Eris, goddess of chaos, tells Persephone what Hades is up to, they go after Phaevian and Eriene with a vengeance. As they make their escape from the Underworld, Phaevian and Eirene find themselves falling in love. Can he rescue her and return her to Zeus, or will Hades' passion prove too powerful? Will Eris and Persephone turn them into pigs? Can a dead man get the girl?
GOING TO PRINT
Dazzling Lunacy is publishing a newly improved Texarkana Waltz--the definitive, authorized, and absolutely final draft--and four one-act plays: Roll Away the Stone, The Reckoning, Lost, and The Sad Lament of Eddie Wickett on the Night of his Execution. The book cover will not feature this photograph of four-year-old Cowboy Louis.