New York / Idiot Savant
by rstahl
I’m in Manhattan interviewing an artist named Joseph Delappe, who did the Dead in Iraq project – an intervention with the video game America’s Army. The interview will appear in a short documentary I’m producing called “Returning Fire” about artists and activists at the intersection of entertainment and war. The video should be done before year’s end. Delappe has so many fascinating projects going on right now – especially his virtual Ghandi exhibit. You can get a sense of these here.
We also got to see a dress rehearsal of the new Richard Foreman play Idiot Savant starring Willem Defoe – at The Public. (I was involved in a production a couple years ago in Athens of his Paradise Hotel.) Theater at its avante-gardestness. A truly alternative headspace, this one dealing with such issues as theology and anthropophagy. It features, among other things, a giant duck god. Defoe is really something, a national treasure. It opens on Tuesday, Oct. 27, if you’re around.
Comments
yes, i greatly enjoyed “Idiot Savant” too–although my stomach was offering me much pain and distraction. i believe my synapses got refused. foreman is a mental recalibration, much as having an engine’s timing checked in the days before electronic distributor systems.