by Samantha Prosser. @samanthprosser (Twitter), @samantharaquelprosser (Instagram).
ANCHORAGE, AK. - The local Throb Theatre Company recently held auditions for its upcoming “reimagining” of the Sam Shepard play Fool for Love, with director Deborah Fuller announcing that, in her version of the show, the romantic leads would not be siblings - a move that many are calling “lame.”
“I just think it’s gross,” said Fuller, who has already faced controversy for her production of Lysistrata in which the women withheld rich, dense literature instead of sex. “In every Sam Shepard play, there is a revelation of incest that takes place twenty pages before the end. I thought the piece would be more relatable if we took it out. I want the audience to root for these crazy kids, even when May tells Eddie his fingers smell like pussy.”
Simon Mack, a local actor with a buzzcut and sideburns, couldn’t have disagreed more.
“I tore up my audition sides and left,” said Mack, who also has a history of tearing up the “please keep it down” notes neighbors leave on his door. “Cleopatra and Albert Einstein - two incestuous legends, for your information - are rolling in their graves. You don’t disrespect history like that.” After chugging a 5-Hour Energy, he continued: “I didn’t move this far from the equator to not fuck my sister in a play.”
Bryce Mabley, who recently starred in Throb’s 2020 production of Othello, also had much to say.
“Deb took Iago out of Othello and that worked just fine,” said Mabley, a former court officer who was terminated after telling jurors to vote “not guilty” so he could go home early. “It’s already such a long play. Five acts? Come on. When my character lost all sense of conflict, it made acting much easier. Sure, reviewers called the show ‘lazy’ and ‘aimless,’ but we had fun. Fool For Love without incest, though… that’s just offensive.”
At press time, Mabley and other members of the theater company questioned whether Fuller had the authority to alter Shepard’s script. When asked for comment, Fuller said that she had recently taken a pilgrimage to the playwright’s grave, where she added an Oxford comma to his tombstone’s epitaph with a pocket knife. She claims that the sun began to shine very brightly at that very moment, and took it as his blessing. Sources say this was an inaccurate conclusion for her to draw, as it was midday and the sun would have done that anyway.
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