|
For these and many other projects, I’m indebted to my friend Pat Byrnes for booze, fun and encouragement. Just think, but for a drunken dare one night at Ravinia, none of this would ever have happened. |
 Waveland Radio Playhouse |
| JAZZ POETRY…TRUTH! |
“A two-man assault on all three
of those words….Out-and-out painful in its sheer stupidity.” “One of the funniest things I've ever seen.” |
| MCCRACKEN AFTER DARK |
“Garner's McCracken is as funny as Rush Limbaugh. Thankfully, Garner doesn't believe what he says.” Lisa Madigan, Illinois Attorney General |
THEATRE OF THE BIZARRE |
“Inspired lunacy.” “There may be weirder things in Chicago,
but you'll be hard pressed to find anything odder….an evening
of anachronistic, irreverent satire.” |
| WAVELAND RADIO PLAYHOUSE
|
“Madcap sound-and-fury.” Chicago Sun-Times “A
steady onslaught of clever humor.” “Just a riotous show.” |
JazzPoetry…TRUTH!
Performance Art Company terrorized many an audience in its heyday.
JPT! introduced their ideas of Fleischkomikteater ("theatrical
meat-humor") to an American public that sorely needed something
to help them wake up. Their stage version of Macchiavelli's "The
Prince," complete with whale songs and four-legged stilts,
is not to be missed. Except that they never perform anymore. To
explain the act here would be pointless. It was an experience to
be lived, and like all seminal eras in the arts, it will be nostalgically
remembered by all who saw it and didn't get hit with a piece of
meat.
My
friend and piano teacher 
Theatre
of the Bizarre was a long-running cabaret show that I hosted and
co-produced at the Elbo Room in Chicago. At the invitation of my
friend and co-producer Steve Ginensky, I donned the persona of Armando
von Shtuppenvald, German art casualty (remember the Dieter character
on SNL? Okay, now picture him as funny) and hosted a motley assortment
of comedy and variety acts every Wednesday for over two years--the
stranger, the better. Alumni from TOB have gone on to greater things
in many directions, including the New Yorker, The National Poetry
Slam, and the Upright Citizens Brigade. Also arising from this show
was Politically Correct Bedtime Stories, which is the reason you're
even reading this right now.
The
Waveland Radio Playhouse used live radio broadcasts as a format
for having some chaotic fun onstage. Three of us worked hard all
night to bring to life 100 or more characters in a single show,
while providing live sound effects, music and snafus to keep things
rolling. Among my favorite episodes are the cliffhanger "He
Dies in the End," the melodrama "Doctors' Hospital of
Medicine," and the buckle-swashing "Clambeard the Pirate."
We played a number of venues in town, as well as trade shows (the
Batesville Casket Company sales convention was particularly memorable).
