The producer told me it couldn't be goofy, it had to be "hot, male and sexy". Yipes. I've learned over time that pretending to do a scene on stage just makes me feel like a goober, so I often do go for comedy (or a song parody) rather than eroticism when asked to stage a fantasy production. Infamous among said comedies is the infomercial for the "BoinkCo Pocket Torturer... All your dungeon needs in one compact package!"
But, nope, no go, I had to come up with a "serious" fantasy.
Yeah, right, serious.
I went for artistic with a touch of whimsy. That was as close as I could get. Except, this time, I wasn't going to be the one dancing across the stage in silver draperies (I seem to get typecast into that role when helping other people with THEIR fantasy productions. Mostly because I *can* dance across a stage in silver draperies without tripping over my own feet, I suspect :-) )
I'd done the logo for the weekend (an embossed leather globe superimposed on the club logo), and kept coming back to that globe.
The result was "Atlas Spanked", an allegory wherein Hermes torments Atlas until he can tolerate it no longer, exacts vengeance upon Hermes, and then is punished by Zeus for abandoning his duties.
Sounds pretty dramatic, right?
yeah. Right.
Well the crowd liked it (they laughed in the right places, roared in the right places, and were intently silent in the right places).
First off, the music: Atlas Spanked Soundtrack (5.4M!!)
It's a pastiche of 4 musical segments... 3 short pieces and one full song for the punishment scene.
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Atlas at Work Music: Excerpt from "National Anthem of Macross"* Opening tableau in "Atlas Spanked"... Atlas at work supporting the globe (yes, I know he actually supported the firmament in the real mythos, but Atlas supporting the world is now a popular culture image) * The segment is about 37 seconds. We used most of that to move me into position behind a drape. I then elevated the globe (some crowd reaction as it appeared above the curtain), struck my pose, and then the drape was whisked away. So the audience was only staring at the tableau for maybe 10 seconds before the action in the next segment began. |
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Hermes bedevilling Atlas Music: Excerpt from Tomita's "Mercury" from Holst's "The Planets"* Hermes, after passing by to deliver a message, can't resist the chance to come back and see if he can get Atlas to twitch. *About 3 people in the audience caught the musical pun here. That was good enough for me :-) |
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Hermes gets his Music: "Korben Dallas" from "The Fifth Element" Atlas was only willing to put up with so much, and gives in to his Titanic temper, sets down the world, sits on it, bends Hermes over his knee and gives him a proper spanking for being such a brat |
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Don't mess with Father Nature Music: "Credit Racket" by Laurie Anderson Of course, Zeus then shows up and properly disciplines Atlas for slacking off. You can't tell in this flash photo, but the edges of the thunderbolt are in fact electrified with EL wire and glowing blue. We played this as real as we could. I've actually been zapped by the power supply for one of my EL wire kits, so it wasn't heard to react to the thunderbolt as though it were a real "Violet Wand". The scene was finished when Zeus pulled out a thunderbolt-bladed knife and "carved" his mark and a "Don't Touch" warning into my torso, then stood me back up and replaced the globe in my hands. Zeus then hauled Hermes off for *his* just rewards and we finished in almost the same tableau as at the start. |
Of course, audience members all told me they liked it with the same answer: "It was Cute".
Feh. "Cute". Better than "Goofy".
When pressed, they would also say that yes, it was also "hot, and male, and sexy". But it was still "Cute".
I'll have to live with that, I suppose.