Last night I saw MacHomer for the third time. It was at the California Shakespeare Theatre in Orinda. We headed up for a picnic before the show, which was interrupted briefly as I went to talk to a documentary crew about the show–they’re apparently producing a DVD version of the show to be used in schools and I was called upon to talk about the educational potential of the show, as the Simpsonologist I am.
I had gotten front row seats, only to find that two of those seats had been accorded to the DVD crew; the solution ended up being to move all of the seats down by two.
Rick Miller’s performance was, as usual, amazing. The show is fascinating and funny. Most people have heard that it’s a Simpsonizing of Macbeth, but not everyone knows that it’s full of other popular culture references, self-referentiality, and even political jokes (the newspapers have Quebec separatist jokes). The show routinely incorporates that week’s news and local names as well.
It demonstrates Rick’s mastery of voice work, body work (each character he portrays in the one man show has a distinctive body posture), art work (he does all the music and art for his shows), understanding of the Bard and The Simpsons and theatre conventions, and rapid wit.
Was going to add a picture of Rick and I, but I can’t get the uploader to work . . .
