Hamlet, the Rock Musical

Posted By: Paul - Tue Mar 03, 2020 - Comments (0)
Category: Beauty, Ugliness and Other Aesthetic Issues, Costumes and Masks, Death, Ineptness, Crudity, Talentlessness, Kitsch, and Bad Art, Pranks and Revenge, Theater and Stage, Homages, Pastiches, Tributes and Borrowings, Pop Art, Foreign Customs, Seventeenth Century, Sixteenth Century, Brain Damage, Cacophony, Dissonance, White Noise and Other Sonic Assaults

Big Boot Dance

The performer is. Harry Relph, aka Little Tich. The performance was filmed at the 1900 Paris Exposition.

More info: wikipedia

Posted By: Alex - Sun Aug 04, 2019 - Comments (2)
Category: ShowBiz, Theater and Stage, Vaudeville, Shoes, 1900s

Bathtubs Over Broadway

A new documentary about "industrial musicals" is just hitting selected theaters.

The film's homepage.

The book that served as the source.

Posted By: Paul - Tue Nov 27, 2018 - Comments (0)
Category: Ineptness, Crudity, Talentlessness, Kitsch, and Bad Art, Theater and Stage, Industry, Factories and Manufacturing, Outsider Art, Surrealism, Twentieth Century

Via Galactica

One of Broadway's biggest flops.





NYT article here.

Wikipedia page here.

Posted By: Paul - Wed Aug 22, 2018 - Comments (1)
Category: Ineptness, Crudity, Talentlessness, Kitsch, and Bad Art, Theater and Stage, Science Fiction, 1970s

Effect of Gamma Rays on Marigolds

Paul Zindel's play The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 1971. It inspired Paul Newman to make a film of the same name the next year.

And in 1974 it inspired 13-year-old Danny Kleiner of Philadelphia to wonder what the effect of gamma rays on marigolds would be. So he made that his school science project. He used cobalt radiation to produce the gamma rays. Unfortunately, I don't know what the results of his experiment were.

I haven't read or seen Zindel's play so I don't know if a similar experiment is featured in the book. I'm guessing it must be. I wonder how many high school students were inspired by Zindel's play to do similar experiments?

Danny Kleiner examining his gamma-ray-exposed marigolds
via Temple University Library

Posted By: Alex - Sat Oct 14, 2017 - Comments (4)
Category: Theater and Stage, Experiments, 1970s

Drive-In Opera

Back in 1989, the Norwegian National Opera staged the world's first (and only?) "drive-in opera" with a performance of the Barber of Seville broadcast live on a 225-square-foot movie screen in downtown Oslo. The idea was that people could watch the performance from their cars. This was supposed to be a way to bring opera to the masses, to let people know that "opera can be fun."

However, the event didn't go quite as planned since the Norwegian audience wasn't quite clear on the "drive-in" concept. Most of them showed up on foot. And many of the cars that did show up parked facing away from the screen. More info at AP News Archive.

Posted By: Alex - Sun Feb 22, 2015 - Comments (7)
Category: Music, Theater and Stage, 1980s

STREB Lab

"Superheroes" or not? Your call!

Posted By: Paul - Tue Nov 05, 2013 - Comments (4)
Category: Daredevils, Stuntpeople and Thrillseekers, Theater and Stage, Dance

The Ostrich Dance of Renita Kramer

During the 1950s, contortionist Renita Kramer toured the world performing her Ostrich Dance. Or, as she called it, her Strauss Waltz. (Strauß in German means ostrich.) [Source: musings of a failed taxidermist] But that's pretty much all the information I can find about this obscure performer.

Posted By: Alex - Wed Jul 17, 2013 - Comments (6)
Category: Theater and Stage, 1950s

Cat Theater Reopens

Good news. The Moscow Cat Theater (previously mentioned, quite a few times, by Chuck) has reopened after a year-long absence. Below are some videos of the cat theater in action.

Posted By: Alex - Mon Apr 15, 2013 - Comments (5)
Category: Animals, Theater and Stage, Cats

Sebastian the Bullet Catcher

Edward Sebastian Adriani, who went by the stage name 'Sebastian,' was a magician who specialized in catching a .22 caliber bullet between his teeth. He even had steel dental plates put on his teeth -- to help him better 'catch' the bullets. Other parts of his act included placing a concrete block on his wife's stomach and pulverizing it with a sledgehammer. Read more about him here.

Posted By: Alex - Wed May 23, 2012 - Comments (7)
Category: Magic and Illusions and Sleight of Hand, Theater and Stage