Get It On!

Hi Everyone,

Happy 23rd. A few things to report since the last newsletter:

GETTING THE PLAY BACK ON. THAT.
GETTING IT TO AMERICA. THAT TOO.

As promised in November, a small, fluctuating band of around 23 seekers met on January 23rd to figure out the nuts and bolts of how to get The Caper Back On. Channelling the steady revolution of ‘The World’ card, (in accordance with Mrs Portinari’s Doctrine of the Reverse Tarot. As you do), we put our heads together and began putting a few logistics in to place. There was math. And calendars.

This was followed by a field trip to see Jimmy Cauty’s New Bedford Model Village and John Constable’s moving tribute to the ‘Winchester Geese’ at the Cross Bones Graveyard in Southwark, (where, thanks to the ever-thoughtful Kate Alderton, we also laid beautiful little David Bowie black star pendants on the remembrance gates).

Once our feasibility study was done, Daisy and co. had to do some meta-programming on How Exactly we can manifest our fun and games, without anyone losing an eye.

That meant admitting that an American show in 2017 was a huge ask without a crazy miracle. Sparing you the ins-n-outs, we decided to focus our efforts on a longer London run in May 2017, dubbed The BioSurvivial Production. But the sadness re our shelved Santa Cruz plan lingered. Then Daisy and Michelle Watson came up with a cunning plan. In Daisy’s own words (originally sent to Richard Rasa who looks after the Wilson estate) below:

“We started talking about how we had won over Liverpool prior to our Bob festival there: We turned up, were lent a lovely venue by local Bob/Ken fans, having put the word out to local artists/Discordians that they could come and get involved, and amongst talks by John Higgs, Alan Moore and myself – showcased Bob’s first trip scene, pulled together in three gloriously chaotic hours – which remains the best version of that scene we ever performed (picture: 23 hooded Illuminati, a man-eating typewriter built out of a sofa, an enormous polystyrene head projected with trip-like morphing animal/alien/god heads, a man-sized white bunny and full-blown song and dance numbers).

Importantly, we weren’t presenting Liverpool with a fait accompli, but with a grand caper they could throw themselves into – and that’s what created the prerequisite magick for our festival nine months later…

So, what we now propose is that our visit to Santa Cruz be a similar type of caper – a cosmic holiday if you will, in which we ship over as many of our gang as we can (definitely Bob and Arlen so we have a strong spine) and cast remaining parts with local actors – invite musicians, set and prop designers, etc, Discordians and Bob fans galore to revel in the absurd challenge of staging Cosmic Trigger in a week – culminating in a non-professional, volunteer, donation-based performance or two (this also means we avoid the work-visa-related headaches), allowing whatever glorious chaos may wish to manifest in a celebration of Bob – if a festival wants to happen around the show – bring it on!

Rather than this being a poor cousin of a more professional tour of our show, I see this as the perfect way to bring together the Bob communities from both sides of the pond in a way that (if our UK experience is anything to go by) will bond us in Erisian-brother-and-sisterhood more than any straight-up performance ever could. We could then plot and plan for a more substantial US tour, if the gods are amenable.”

Sound like a plan? So… we’re on the case – raising funds, sorting out potential venues, raising our social media game and gearing up to make it happen in 2017! So, as part of us drumming up the ammunition, Kate and Olly (our Arlen and Bob) have been working together to:

RELEASE THE FLYING SURVEY MONKEYS!

Look out for an email from us very soon after this one, asking for your helping filling out a hort(ish) survey which will give us lots of crunchy, tasty data to help build a case for putting the play back on! To sling an Illuminati Papers quote atcha from Bob’s Ten Reasons To Get Your Ass Out Of Bed Every Morning essay: “we need you on our side – the side of hope and action – and we need you now.” Our survey is 23% less sucky than other surveys. Maybe.

FESTIVAL 23 IS CONVERGING

It’s been a total inspiration to watch the team behind Festival 23 working their socks off to make their vision of Discordian-inspired music, talks, performance and malarkey manifest. It’s shaping up to be quite a party over the weekend of the 22nd-24th July. Early Bird tickets are available now and up to (*cough*) April 23rd.

Confirmed acts include Greg Wilson and Kermit’s Super Weird Substance, Knifeworld, Richard Norris, Bloom, Jimmy Cauty’s Model Village, puppet Alan Watts, John Higgs, Cat Vincent and a selection of Cosmic Trigger Play cast members (shenanigans tbc).

More info and tickets if you click on the apple HERE. Newsletter subscribers can add the Code CT23 and get free badges. Tidy.

MAGICAL MYSTERY TOUR

On February 23rd, Fortean writer and magician Cat Vincent organised a magical working to help Cosmic Trigger in its heroic ambitions to get across the pond. A merry band gathered in front of the Jung bust in Liverpool, exactly two years to the day since Daisy plonked some rainbow knickers on the philosopher’s head. Read his brilliant Blog post about it on our website HERE

Thanks for reading thus far – and keep a third eye out for the Survey Monkey!

Michelle Olley
Cosmic Trigger Play Apple Corps