His take on Moby Dick – Moby: toupee or not toupee – begins not with the invitation, Call me Ishmael, but with the command, Call me, Ishmael. Ishmael is an out of work, prematurely bald actor going audition after audition, being cruelly rejected, unfairly he feels, because of his folically challenged state. On the way to a casting call, he is drawn to Hair by Rachel with its lovely window display of wigs, toupees and extensions. Rachel’s toupees are her babies, she does not sell them, rather they are adopted, for a mere $10,000. Of course, these are not ordinary toupees. What happens next brings to mind that episode of the Simpsons, you know the one, Snake is executed, under the three strikes law, for robbing the Quickie Mart. Homer is the transplant recipient of his hair (Barney says “dibs on the liver”) and the hair takes control of his brain and he commits some heinous crimes. It was a lot like that. Great fun!
Ian Doescher has completed his trilogy of Star Wars in the style of Shakespeare, or Shakespeare with a Star Wars theme, depending upon your perspective, with his trilogy which consists of Verily, a New Hope, The Empire Striketh Back and The Jedi Doth Return. What did The Reader have to say? “Doescher has lovingly translated this epic story into Shakespeare’s iambic pentameter creating a play which is crying out to be read and performed in the homes of geeks all over. Verily, a new hope has all the fantastic qualities of Shakespearean drama: valour, villainy, mistaken identities, long detailed death soliloquies, magic, political intrigue and a chorus to fill in the visual gaps.” Yep, still quite true.