Johnny Showtime: PLAN 9 FROM OUTER SPACE LIVE

 by JB

Greetings, my friend. We are all interested in the future, for that is where you and I are going to spend the rest of our lives.

You are interested in JUST WHAT IN THE HELL could possibly motivate JB to get off his fat ass and drive into Hollywood, land of the unknown, the mysterious, the unexplainable? That is why you are here. The incidents, the places, my friend, we cannot keep these a secret any longer. My friend, can your heart stand the shocking facts about... a live staged reading of Plan 9 from Outer Space?

In what has become a Halloween tradition, comedian Dana Gould and friends presented Plan 9 from Outer Space last Thursday night as a staged reading at the Largo at the Coronet Theater in Hollywood. I dutifully bought tickets and drove out to see it. How could I not? This type of presentation seems to have been designed with one audience in mind. ME! Since moving to California, I often use this to motivate myself. There are screenings and events presented daily out here that I would have loved loved loved attending when I was a humble Chicagoan. How could I not go now? If not me, WHO? If not now, THEN.

Needless to say, it was a hoot and a half. My lovely wife accompanied me and we made an evening of it. Some other day, I will tell you all the story of the MOST BUGNUTS CRAZY UBER DRIVER WHOEVER LIVED. Rather than feeling like our lives were endangered, he simply added some “local color” to the story of our eventful, Plan 9 evening.

Four years ago, I had seen the TCM broadcast of a previous iteration of this show, which Gould and a slightly different cast had performed at the annual San Francisco Sketchfest. That one was good. The newest version I saw last week was even better.

The Largo is a wonderful venue for comedy—comfortable and intimate. The lobby has weird weird art and a full bar. The theater's interior looks like it was teleported to Hollywood yesterday from Hollywood in the late 1940s; could it be one of the crazy places Ed Wood and his coterie of friends might have hung out back in the day? The theater is located right across LaCienaga Boulevard from Synn Gentlemen’s Club, so discerning Hollywood nightclubbers have a CHOICE of entertainment options each evening.

TANGENT: Because you can’t go anywhere in Hollywood and NOT run into someone famous, I was surprised and delighted that Darcy the Mail Girl from Joe Bob Briggs' The Last Drive-In on Shudder was in the audience. She’s a big fan of horror, obviously, and very, very nice. Also, on the way home the next day we drove along the famous Magnolia Boulevard gauntlet of horror stores and boutiques. (RIP Dark Delicacies, sniff.) A new “Horror Boo-dega” just opened there. It is delightful. I suggest you all check it out, if you, like me, live nearby and are interested in “the unknown, the mysterious, the unexplainable.” I purchased Halloween-themed bath bombs for my wife, a garlic chopper in the shape of Dracula, and a big bag of Bones Coffee Company Shark Bite Medium Roast. You know, necessities. They have candy too!

BACK TO THE SHOW: The stage was set as if for a radio play, with scattered microphones, chairs, and music stands. The performance was accompanied by live music, including one musician well-versed in playing the Theremin, which really added to the evening's fun. The Overture for the show was a Theremin and piano rendition of “That’s Entertainment.” Weird, wild stuff!

Frank Coniff of MST3K fame took the role of Criswell the Psychic. Dana Gould served as narrator. Besides reading stage directions, he also commented on the action. EXAMPLE: “Because aliens have left no proof or evidence of their existence, if you have NEVER SEEN OR HEARD of them, that is PROOF THEY EXIST!”

Gould’s wife Kat Aageson appeared in the largely silent role of Vampira; Jonah Ray played "Jeff Trent", and Janet Varney played his long-suffering wife "Paula Trent." Because Ray and Varney have played these roles many times before, they presented a kind of reparatory company/Bizarro World look at prickly, frustrated 1950s marriages. It was both odd and hilarious.

Paul F. Tompkins killed it as Eros, the insufferable, egotistical alien. (“Because all of you of earth... are idiots! Your stupid minds... stupid!”) Laraine Newman, Kimmy Robertson, and Patton Oswalt all appeared as multiple characters; Newman proved very adept at screaming. The MVP of the night proved to be the performer I was least familiar with: Aaron LaPlante, a writer and cartoon voice artist who proved singularly great at playing a series of loud, exasperated 1950s male authority figures. His performance was a highlight among many highlights. Using a minimum of props (though the flying saucers dangling from poles got big applause) this fun cast worked their way through Ed Wood’s bizarro script with energy and gusto.

Obviously, I am very familiar with Plan 9 from Outer Space (Patrick Bromley and I recorded an award-winning podcast on it way back in 2011.) and this performance helped me see the whole thing in a different light. Here at FTM we have talked about any artistic endeavor being an act of will. Ed Wood’s original script is so weird, so daffy, and makes so little sense, that it becomes an act of faith ON THE PART OF THE AUDIENCE to get it make ANY SENSE AT ALL. Gould and Company simultaneously offered a performance of the original screenplay AND a meta-critique of it.

During SMM, it's worth remembering that movies—even the weird, bloody, surreal, terrifying, hilarious, thrilling, scary, spooky, gory movies we love—are wildly collaborative endeavors. That's what makes them what they are, and that's what makes SMM such a fantastic way to celebrate them: writing, reading, sharing, laughing, and getting ideas for our next screenings from our Seven Word Reviews makes THIS WEBSITE a wildly collaborative effort too.

All that is just to say: if you ever have a chance to see a bunch of hilarious people do a live reading of the script of Plan 9 from Outer Space, DO IT. It was the coolest.

Indeed, we in the audience that night all wanted “the full story of what happened on that fateful day.” We in the audience that night all wanted “the evidence, based only on the secret testimonies of the miserable souls who survived this terrifying ordeal.” We in the audience that night especially wanted to “punish the guilty... and reward the innocent.” We were all reminded that night... that future events such as these would affect us in the future.