by Edward Medina

 

Randy has written a novel and he wants to read it to you. Actually, he needs to read it to you. He’s slaved and labored and sacrificed to get it done and he wants to make sure it’s just right. He wants to know if it qualifies as art. He must know if it measures up to the great authors that have come before him and even the ones that will come after him. His search for artistic perfection is his main driving force. So much so that he’s not even sure that his art exists whether he reads it out loud or not. He even questions if you just knowing he wrote something is enough to mark his work as artistically sublime. He wonders if he really needs to read it to you at all. This drives Randy’s existential dilemma. It’s why Randy continues to distract himself from the task at hand.

  

Randy is a puppet. A very self-aware puppet in fact. Not only that, he’s a puppet on a hysterically funny journey to discover the meaning of life and all its peculiarities. He wants to know what makes us all tick. Randy is alone for the entire ninety-minute mind trip onstage at Theatre Row’s Clurman Theatre. He’s at his desk, well used  typewriter to his right, continually unread manuscript to his left, and strewn all around the floor are chaotic piles of books and torn and crumpled papers. Randy has been hard at work and his mind is a buzz with thoughts he must express. All of Randy’s work pays off in a very funny evening of outright truths, blatant lies, broad exaggerations, and accurate observations

 

An evening with Randy is a combination of stand-up comedy and puppetry. It’s both wildly improvised and intelligently scripted. You’ll find yourself literally howling with laughter. Randy encourages that. He loves his audience to shout back at him, question his observations, and articulate their own opinions. The whole evening becomes a riotous amalgamation of master puppet and willing audience. You’ll find yourself laughing through riffs on Harper Lee’s other book, a three-and-a-half-minute condensed version on the life of Ernest Hemingway that blossoms into a remarkably funny yet astute conversation on the value of art versus character. You’ll also find social commentary being delivered on subjects like Veganism versus Carnism and there’s a Craig’s List story that will have you doubled over with an ending you will never forget. All this and more while Randy struggles and keeps stalling the reading of his presumably epic creation.

 

Randy’s own puppet master is a mystery. Whoever it is doesn’t want you to know because it doesn’t matter. Randy is Randy. He’s his own man with his own thoughts. Randy has been lauded and acclaimed. He’s travelled the world presenting and perfecting himself before many an adoring crowd. Before arriving in New York, he toured the country in order to understand his American fans better. The puppet has done his homework. Randy himself will tell you that what he’s presenting on stage is an anthropological social experiment and a one helluva good time. As always Randy, a philosopher in fabric and flock, is more than right.

 

Clurman Theatre

Theatre Row

410 W 42^nd St

New York, NY 10036

212.239.6200

http://randywritesanovel.com/

$81.25

April 18 – June 9, 2018