PLANET PROCTOR | APRIL 10, 2015 Planet April Showers Where Am Us Anyway? f you’ve been wondering if I’m back, the answer is – almost. After our three-month adventure in Italy I returned to a lot of unfinished business, new commitments, and an immersion in the writing, Ifilming, production, promotion and posting of the weekly web series Boomers on a Bench with my comic cousin, Jamie Alcroft, not to mention the self-inflicted death of our housemate, Jessica Charity – but I said I wouldn’t mention that. Nonetheless, I am doing my best during the heavy dry rains this month, to full-Phil projects such as the editing of my memoir, Where’s my Fortune Cookie, co-authored by Brad Schreiber, and collaborating on a theatrical satire starring God with the prolific Samuel Warren Joseph. Meanwhile, Melinda and I are participating in an Antaeus’ New Playwrights Lab and I, in the staged reading of the play Secrets by William Coe Bigelow about blacklisting – all this prior to my scheduled second cataract operation on May 11. So enjoy this latest orbit, motivated by the spiraling chaos created by the irrational national and international yearnings to return to the archaic and outmoded delusions of worlds long gone. April fools reign. “If life gives you lemons, make lemonade. Then start looking for someone whose life has given them vodka.” ~ Sayings of Chairman Tom IN THE NEXT WORLD, “I spent half my money on gambling, alcohol and wild women. YOU’RE ON YOUR OWN The other half I wasted.” ~ W. C. Fields couple made a deal that whoever died first would NUTWORK Acome back and inform the other if there is life after THROUGHOUT death. And so, when after a long and happy marriage the THE ‘PLANET,’ CLICKING husband was the first to die, true to his word he made e watched Paddy DARK RED TYPE the first contact: “Marion, Marion,” she heard one night WChayevsky’s 1976 OPENS A RELATED in a dream, and answered, “Is that you, Bob?” And he Network the other night and INTERNET LINK. responded, “Yes, I’ve come back like we agreed.” were struck once again by a harsh vision of the future “That’s wonderful! What’s it like?” she asked. delivered by broadcasting tycoon Ned Beatty to the Mad Prophet of the Airwaves, played by Peter Finch. Read “Well, I get up in the morning, I have sex. I have breakfast below or WATCH ON YOUTUBE and then it’s off to the golf course. I have sex again, bathe in the warm sun and then have sex a couple more times, “For me, the cinema is not a slice of life, then I have lunch – you’d be proud, lots of greens – then but a piece of cake.” ~ Alfred Hitchcock another romp around the golf course, and then I pretty much have sex for the rest of the afternoon. After supper, TESTING, ONE, TWO, THREE it’s back to the course and more sex until late at night when I grab some much-needed sleep, and then the next day it 1. In which battle did Napoleon die? His last battle. starts all over again.” 2. Where was the Declaration of Independence signed? At the bottom of the page. “Oh, Bob,” she said, “You must be in Heaven!” 3. River Ravi flows in which state? Liquid. “Not really,” Bob responded, “I’m a rabbit somewhere in 4. What is the main reason for divorce? Marriage. Arizona.” n CONTINUED There are no nations. There are no peoples. There are no Russians. There are no Arabs. There are no third worlds. There is no West! There is only one holistic system of systems, one vast and immane, interwoven, interacting, multi-variate, multi-national dominion of dollars. Petro-dollars, electro-dollars, multi-dollars, Reichmarks, rins, rubles, pounds and shekels. It is the international system of currency, which determines the totality of life on this planet. There is no America. There is no democracy. There is only IBM and ITT and A T & T and DuPont, Dow, Union Carbide and Exxon. Those are the nations of the world today. The world is a college of corporations, inexorably determined by the immutable by-laws of business. And our children will live to see that perfect world in which there’s no war and famine, oppression or brutality -- one vast and ecumenical holding company, for whom all men will work to NEDWORK ‘The totality of life on this planet.’ serve a common profit, in which all men will hold a share of stock, all necessities provided, all anxieties tranquilized, all boredom amused… 5. What is the main reason for failure? Exams. Also, if you want a lean, mean, terrifically accessible 6. What can you never eat for breakfast? Lunch and Shakespearean romp, go see Henry IV, Part One at the dinner. Antaeus Theatre at 5112 Lankershim Blvd. Tautly directed 7. What looks like half an apple? The other half. by Michael Murray and keenly and humorously presented 8. If you throw a red stone into the blue sea what it will in a daring contemporary interpretation, it breathes new life become? Wet. into this action-packed drama. 9. How can a man go eight days without sleeping? No As my Amish/Irish mother used to say, “Don’t miss it if you problem, he sleeps at night. can.” ANTAEUS WEBSITE 10. How can you lift an elephant with one hand? You will never find an elephant that has one hand. “The world will not be destroyed by those who do evil, 11. If you had three apples and four oranges in one hand but by those who watch them without doing anything.” and four apples and three oranges in other hand, ~ Albert Einstein what would you have? Very large hands. 12. If it took eight men ten hours to build a wall, how long would it take four men to build it? No time at all, the BACK HOME IN INDIANA wall is already built. 13. How can you drop a raw egg onto a concrete floor or an embarrassingly long time, from the mid- without cracking it? Any way you want. Concrete F1930s to the late 1970s, my hometown was guilty of floors are very hard to crack. exclusionary practices regarding people of color under the so-called “sun down” law. But now, surprisingly, at a “The Mormon Church has just affirmed time that Indiana has been thrust into the public spotlight because of a socially insensitive Conservative attempt to that marriage should be between a man and a woman pass a clearly discriminatory “Religious Protection” statute, and a woman and a woman…” the City Council has passed a stunning resolution, which I ~ Phil’s Phunny Phacts proudly summarize below… As The Community of Goshen, Indiana, We Hereby: • Acknowledge the racist and exclusionary aspects of Goshen’s “sundown town” history, along with the pain and suffering that these practices caused; and • Commit to being an uncommonly great community through our advocacy for quality and justice for all; and • Pledge to work toward the common good by building a community where people of all races and cultural backgrounds are welcome to live and prosper; and • Summarize this resolution in nine words: It happened, it ALL ABOARD! was wrong; it’s a new day. rain to Zakopane is a dynamic, touching piece of ”You cain’t pray a lie.” ~ Mark Twain Ttheater; a unique love story about anti-semitism and bigotry in general, subjects that now unfortunately seem to be more timely than ever. WITH APOLOGIES TO DISNEY Tanna Frederick and Mike Falkow give “The two best indercella and her sugly isters lived in a marge performances of this season in this masterwork of Henry lansion. Rindercella worked very hard frubbing sloors, Jaglom’s long and extraordinary career, which he has R emptying poss pits, and shivelling shot. At the end of the beautifully and bravely written, all the more amazing as it is day, she was knucking fackered. The sugly isters were a true story from his late father’s life.’’ It is truly a must-see, right bugly astards. One was called Mary Hinge, and the a powerful and rare, not-to-be-missed play, now in its fifth other was called Betty Swallocks; they were really forrible month at the Edgemar Center for the Arts in Santa Monica. huckers; they had fetty sweet and fatty swannies. The READ REVIEW n CONTINUED sugly isters had tickets to go to the ball, but the cotton runts would not let Rindercella go. Suddenly there was a bucking fang, and her gairy fodmother appeared. Her name was Shairy Hithole and she was a light rucking fesbian. She turned a pumpkin and six mite wice into a hucking cuge farriage with six dandy ronkeys who had buge hollocks and dig bicks. The gairy fodmother told Rindercella to be back by dimnlight otherwise, there would be a cucking falamity. At the ball, Rindercella was dancing with the prandsome hince when suddenly the clock struck twelve. “Mist all chucking frighty!!!” said Rindercella, and she ran out tripping barse overollocks, so dropping her slass glipper. The very next day, the prandsome hince knocked on Rindercella’s door and the sugly isters let him in.. Suddenly, not getting any real nourishment. By the time you finish Betty Swallocks lifted her leg and let off a fig Bart. “Who’s shaking the shit out of a politician, there’s nothing left but fust jarted?” asked the prandsome hince. “Blame that fugly an asshole with a briefcase.” ucker over there!!” said Mary Hinge.