MADMENOFTHEMOUNTAIN is a collection of vision-afflicted souls pursuing ritual significance through Theater and Live Performance. Drawing on Automatic Text, Clown training, Viewpoints, Plastiques, and Plastics, the Madmen hope to create a shadow world which might rectify our own and create new possibilities in this Live Continuum. Recent Seances have occurred at CRS Manhattan with Gus and Fred Smash the TV, Have U Seen My Soul? at The Stable, Williamsburg, The Idiot’s Audition at La Mama ETC, The Nose/Two and Two/ Imagining Cain at Here Arts Center, and The Wheel of Seizures at One Arm Red.
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June 15th, 2011GW
September 20th, 2010
George Washington is a sonofabitch and he won’t leave me alone. He’s in disguise with them cheapie sunglasses that he ripped off from the pharmacy, but I know it’s him because he is green: the hair-do, the nose, the pompous startled look.
In slurred speech he tells me that “A Dollar Bill is a Map…”
” A map? A map to what?”
“The indisputable solutions to this country’s problems.”
Leaning in with his ripened breath, ” It’s time to save this country. Are you with me?”
“Uh- I don’t know- sure I guess so”
It’s George -freakin- Washington after-all. How do you say no? But I kind of feel like saying yes to GW is like saying yes to those people in polyester suits selling Jesus in the hellfire of summer- they never sweat cause they are on the right side of the law- in other words NUTS.
That’s just how George is looking at me right now. I think he wants me to realize something essential about America and he is trying to beam this realization into my brain with his crazy stare.
“C’mon guy, are you with me?”
I’ve heard before that he hangs out in the food court at the Mall looking for unsuspecting victims. And then he swoops down on them like a big green vampire. Well now he’s hovering over me, about to put his wooden fangs in my neck, and feed on what little soul I have left.
“Have you ever studied a dollar bill? Think… go into the recesses of your skull and identify the disparate details…”
“There’s a… there’s a pyramid.”
“Exactly and what do they put in pyramids?”
“Dead people?”
“NO- WRONG- Incorrect! Pyramids are for treasure you moron. That’s where the Kings put their treasure….”
“I’m pretty sure their organs go in their too- sealed up in clay jars for the after-lfe.”
“Well I don’t know about any of that! I know about treasure. But in order to get the treasure, you need somebody who knows how to find it. That’s what I’m offering- with my campaign- The George Washington Express Train to Wealth and Prosperity. Will you join me?”
“Listen George, it’s been great chatting with you, but I must be going.”
“Where?”
“To get shoes- I need shoes.”
“You’re wearing shoes.”
“But I need new ones.”
“This is just what I am talking about, this plague of materialism that is consuming the nation!”
“What do you want me to do?”
“You can start by contributing a meatball sub and a coke to the campaign… you see me staggering about like a drunken pelican. I have got to keep my energy up.”
It hits me: We enshrine these symbols only to have them lust after our goods.
I look him square in the eyes-
“Are you a golden calf George Washington?”
“Nope, I’m just a man who’s hungry for a meatball sub.”
It’s sinister and sickening, but perhaps partly true.
I hand him the bill with Lincoln’s picture and walk towards the exit.
“Who is this monkey- this vandal?” I hear him sneer behind me…