In Search of Family and Magic ...
"The phenomenon of alternative circus performance can be seen as the theatrical dimension to one generation's wholesale rediscovery of the concept of the tribe. Their position is reminiscent of the strolling players in Ingmar Bergman's The Seventh Seal. In the film, the traveling circus performers, with their innocence and play, are the only survivors of the plague, represented as a sort of disease of the human spirit incarnate in the Crusades. Circus, the tribal entertainment, eludes the modern world with its malaises and plagues."
-J. Dee Hill, Freaks and Fire (2004)
We awoke in the new millenium to find ourselves mired in a culture of inanity. The greatest tragedy of which is that most poor suckers don't feel the quicksand rising around them. The
corpocracy has so successfully made consumers out of us that we're now doing the dirty work of advertising for them, endorsing their brands across our social networks hoping to be the exception that wins a month's free service or the latest electronic gadget. We hate that we are willing to spam our friends if it means winning a new macbook, but we do it anyway. We know that our energy consuption is endangering the planet, but we can't bear to give up long, hot showers or the convienence of our private commute. We are the children who were given cotton candy and gummi bears for breakfast because we asked for it. Our parents are the media we now curse because they've failed to fortify our minds to fight the temptation. OUr goverment has failed to protect us. We digest pleasures like an insatable PacMan racing through the maze with no idea who's operating the joystick.
"I don't believe that the public knows what it wants;
this is the conclusion that I have drawn from my career."
- Charlie Chaplin
Some of us, however, are acutely aware of this transformation. And we are suffering from a collective crisis of faith; dangerous levels of cynicism. Considering monikers of past generations- the lost generation, the beat generation- such a crisis is not unprecedented. But we know more now than we ever did before. Everything is known and the most obscure kernels of information can be summoned before us with a couple of keystrokes.
We long for mystery. We'd rather not know about the man behind the curtain. We want to trust, blindly, even if it hurts us in the end. We wander like gypsies in search of the unknown, for some distraction that will soothe our souls.
Although I technically entered the world of NeoVaudeville through the New Burlesque, it didn't take long before I discovered
The Yard Dogs Road Show. I was one of 12 playwrights comissioned to write a half-hour radio play for The Northeast Theatre's (now Electric Theatre Company)
Lackawanna Rails series with WVIA. I wanted to tie into local history but write something with contemporary relevance. Something that young people could relate to. In my research, I found
Hobo, a book by Eddy Joe Cotton so marvelous I ended up writing it into the play. The stimulus for a restless, starry-eyed girl to run away from home in search of something genuine. Something that might make her feel alive.
THE LINKS
Ward Hall
Jim Rose Circus
Pickle Family Circus
Burning Man
Penn & Teller
Bill Irwin
Say Family AGAIN Samuel!
Mysterious and enticing Samuel Sullivan of the Sullivan Bros. Carnival freak sanctuary pulls the family card so often in this fourth season of NBC's Heroes it's sure to be in the drinking game.
For example: take this, meant to entice invincible cheerleader Claire from episode 8:
"We're all like you. A family of sorts. People with extraordinary abilities. Family is about more than blood. It's about trust. It's about love. About those who embrace you. The real you. Unconditionally."
"Those who don’t get it ...or who may be offended by it are usually thrill seekers who have not found their thrill. They seem disoriented, almost drunk from their own assumption of what they think life should be. They have crawled into the cannon without lighting the fuse. And have been sitting there for far too long. Funny thing is, they want to join the circus. But the circus is "dumb" - it’s no way to live. So they make trouble instead, sit on the sidelines having sex with magazines and drinking far too many energy drinks.
August 2006.