30 Days of NYMF: Ubu: A 'Patamusical

“Great Reading, or Bad Production?”

By: Brantley Aufill and Tony Mayes (Book)

Ubu: A ‘Patamusical began 14 years ago as Brantley was finishing his junior year in high school.  Yep, high school.  Monty Holamon asked him to spend the summer learning to walk on stilts.  The reason: the one-act play that Monty was planning to direct that fall was based on three French plays by Alfred Jarry, and three of the characters, the Paljenttents, needed to be about 10 feet tall. Huh?

After the truly bizarre one-act play production, simply titled UBU, had its final performance, Monty found he had just gotten started.  Songs developed from the score, characters expanded (in depth, girth and height).  By 1999, Monty’s 40-minute adaptation had exploded into a full length piece.  

We grew up together and were both influenced enormously by Monty’s eclectic theatrical style. Over the course of the last few years, we joined forces with Monty to fine-tune Ubu: A ‘Patamusical into what it is today: a crazy, bizarre, Looney Tunes of a show.   The Ubu family lives in a kitchy suburban home with three TV-addicted daughters, and provides pataphysical commentary on the world.  Four-letter words and scatological language may no longer carry the same shock value, but Jarry’s absurd commentary on culture and politics is still on target.  Our new Paljenttents, Achras, Freemen and Memnon have reasons to exist beyond simple absurdity.

We have run into an interesting ‘predicament’ with our reading in the NYMF Developmental Series. We know exactly how wacky this show is to be. We know the Paljenttents are 10-foot tall henchmen. We know the Daughters have an eerie constant presence. We know Memnon is just a head in a box. We see this show so vividly in our heads, because it was borne out of a production that we all loved, and from the mind that trained us.

The ‘predicament’ is how much of that do we attempt to share at what’s supposed to be a reading? Lighting? Projection? Props? Graphics in the program? At what point does a ‘great reading’ turn into a ‘bad’ production’? And as we push to reach (but not cross) that line, limited rehearsal and tech times dictate and challenge every fiber of our vision.  We wager it’s a good problem to have.  We’re just trying to find a way to take something as simple as a reading and make it a little more Ubu.  Merde.