Do you like The Big Lebowski? Do you like Sesame Street? Well my wife does, so I drew her this:
I’m fully on board with Paul’s casting here — “Oscar The Dude” definitely works — but still, a part of me can’t help thinking that “The Big Bird Lebowski” could be epic.
I really love podcasts. They are intimate and portable little visits with people and ideas and information. If it is a podcast with a lot of interaction by regulars it can be like sitting in on a gathering of friends. And depending on the atmosphere – studio or a live audience, just two people talking or a bunch of folks jumping into the conversation – it can either be a really smart coffee break or a big rolling party. All while you shop for snow boots or wait for your train or make dinner. I would say about sixty percent of my entertainment hours are spent on podcasts. That leaves thirty percent for Buffy reruns and much less time for porn than one might have thought.
Anyway, all of this is why I decided to make a podcast of my own. The Standard Issues live show is now The Standard Issues podcast. However, a lot of storytelling shows are recording their performers and putting out a podcast. And we will be doing that as well. But for our first time out, we wanted to start off in a different direction right from the beginning and so I had a sit down conversation with some of the best storytellers in the New York scene to talk about what storytelling is and how they got into it. This will be a regular part of the show along with live performances and that is a combination that encompasses what makes the form so enjoyable to me. I am feeling like this could be something really special. Here is the link.
By the way, there is a very long discussion about the crafting of a story by Jeff for his recent GrandSLAM appearance. Hopefully, he will find a way to post some version of that very soon. And we will be recording new episodes of the Podcasts live on two dates this month – First at Domino Effect at Fifth Estate, February 15th, and then at The Standard Issues live show at Pacific Standard, February 22nd.
I have learned that there is a SUPERVOLCANO (which is a real thing not made up by an 8-year-old kid, apparently,) underneath Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming. This supervolcano has erupted in the past, and was possibly partially responsible for the extinction of the dinosaurs. According to one guy (who keeps saying “million” when he means “thousand”, which you’d think would be problematic for a physicist,) it WILL erupt again, and everybody who lives in the huge area depicted here will be pretty well f*cked.
Coincidentally, on the same day that I learned that 11 U.S. states and 3 Canadian provinces are just incontrovertibly screwed six ways to Sunday, I came across this amazing and hilarious Jack Kirby drawing from 1972 of what our future might look like after “A GREAT CATACLYSM!”:
Now she’s working on a one-woman show show that traces her journey from a little suburban Jewish girl obsessed with Wonder Woman to a fabulous burlesque Queen in NYC.
The show’s called Wonder Woman: A How-To Guide for Little Jewish Girls.
I’ve been writing and editing and re-writing my story for this Monday’s Moth GrandSLAM, just scribbling it over and over on a legal pad to make sure I’ve got it. The theme is “Into the Wild,” which poses a challenge. I’ve pretty much told and re-told what I like to think is a pretty solid story on that theme. I’ve told that thing right into the red dirt, to be honest. I’m sure my friends, family, and the odd person I am totally trying to impress is sick to their guts of it. I think I’ve worn a track in my brain from repeating it so damn much.
I got one of the best passive-aggressive guilt trips about this that I’ve ever had from anyone that wasn’t my own mother recently. She’s a great friend I met through the Moth, and when I suggested I wanted to visit that old incarnation of that story for the theme, she said “Yeah, I mean, you could do that. But if you won with it, I think you’d feel pretty cheap.”
She’s right. So I’m working on it, but brother, you never know you’ve got something until it’s over and done with. The challenge here is to find other material in that experience, stuff that didn’t make the first cut and massaging it into something brand-new. Read the rest of this entry »
Last night in a “discount store” in Prospect Heights, I came across an amazing little item. See, not only have factories in China been producing unauthorized knockoffs of popular toys (which is nothing new)… it seems like they’re hitting the “shuffle” button with whatever figures they have left in stock, and coming up with new super-teams too! Case in point: the SENSE OF RIGHT ALLIANCE!
Apparently, a robot-armed Batman, Spider-Man, Superman, the yellow Power Ranger, The Thing, and a redheaded Reed Richards and have teamed up…
…to FENCE AGAINST THE EARTH!
And on top of this already delicious ridiculousness, when I took a closer look at their approximation of Superman:
A friend of mine, Schaffer The Darklord, who is very creative, asked one of our other creative friends, director Burke Heffner, to help him do something very funny. Then they asked a bunch of other folks from the burlesque scene to lend a hand (including Cyndi and me – though I have a lens flare for a head, thank you Burke – Peter Aguero, Magdelena Fox, Jenny C’est Quoi, Boo Bess the Baroness, Rosie 151, Mary Cyn, Stormy Leather, Victoria Privates, Big Heath, and the list goes on.)
Anyway, they succeeded in making something very funny. It is an over the top parody of the life of a Nerdcore rapper who can’t decide if what lies before him is a slippery slope or a toboggan run. The result is goofy, fun, and not necessarily safe for work.
Our journey begins with Nelson Lugo and Hard Cory trying to get our protagonist home safely…
In preparation for the upcoming live show, I have decided to post something you won’t see from someone you will see. Because I take the direct route to nothing. Which is probably why my high school career went the way it did.
So at the live show, you will see a very talented magician and burlesque host. He will be performing magic. In this video I am posting, he is not. He is telling a story. His name is Nelson Lugo.
As part of Cyndi’s neverending quest to make burlesque performers tell a story and storytellers strip, we had Nelson over at Standard Issues in October.
He did a great job, because he is a charming man. However he did wear that hat. So this is more radio than video, in certain ways.
Oh, and you should drop by billyjoesboy.com. Because I am a brilliant literary mind who could desperately use the traffic bump.
