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With Great Power #277... 22 Panels with Marin Theatre: The Gift of Nothing · 22 Panels - A Comic Book Podcast

• 0:02
  Tad Eggleston: Good evening, everybody. Welcome back to 22 panels tonight. Er…
• 0:07
  Tad Eggleston: 20 panels. My guest tonight is… Mark's always laughing at me. I'm not the actor, Mark. You get your words right, I stumble. My guest tonight is Joseph O'Malley, who is… are you reprising your role in.
• 0:26
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: And I am revising my role.
• 0:28
  Tad Eggleston: is reprising his role as… I just wrote this down, and then I put the wrong screen up. Reprising his role as Ozzy in the musical.
• 0:40
  Tad Eggleston: Is it a musical? Or just a play? Oh, it is a musical. I got it right.
• 0:45
  Mark Pracht: Music, yeah.
• 0:46
  Tad Eggleston: In the musical, The Gift of Nothing, being performed at the Marin theater.
• 0:53
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Started already, or coming up? Oh, at least our rehearsal's tomorrow, so…
• 0:59
  Tad Eggleston: rehearsals tomorrow, so…
• 1:00
  Mark Pracht: Exciting.
• 1:01
  Tad Eggleston: right around the corner. This is… this is a play, co-written and… and…
• 1:07
  Tad Eggleston: by… by Patrick McDonald, and based on… on his, his Mutz book of the same title. So, Joseph, thank you for joining us. Mark Pratt is also here to co-host, because he knows a thing or two about,
• 1:23
  Tad Eggleston: taking comic stuff and making it into theater stuff, so I figured he would ask the better questions.
• 1:32
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Always go down the theater person in the room.
• 1:35
  Tad Eggleston: I mean, I… I know a lot of theater people, but I've never been an actual theater person.
• 1:43
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: To welcome you to the committee.
• 1:46
  Tad Eggleston: So, Joseph, thank you so much for joining us, and tell us about the production.
• 1:53
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Yeah, The Gift of Nothing is a play that was commissioned for the Kennedy Center theater for Young Audiences program in 2014, and…
• 2:05
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: based on the book and an interest in the book, Aaron Posner, who's a really remarkable playwright, he had a play that kind of took over the American scene,
• 2:19
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: 15 or so years ago, called, Stupid Fucking Bird. Sorry if I can't… not supposed to curse.
• 2:25
  Tad Eggleston: We're absolutely down with that.
• 2:28
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: But that was based on The Seagull, and it became one of those plays that was kind of done at every theater in America. So it was exciting to hear that that guy was taking on a children's book and putting it together.
• 2:42
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: As a musical,
• 2:45
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: His daughter was very young at the time, and so he and his partner adapted it into,
• 2:52
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: A really wonderful holiday show that,
• 2:58
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Kind of lives outside of the traditional holiday fare.
• 3:03
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: In the way that Patrick McDonald, is unique in doing, you guys know his work, I know, Ted, you have a deep appreciation for Mutz, but…
• 3:16
  Tad Eggleston: I, I… I actually have a deeper appreciation since,
• 3:21
  Tad Eggleston: Having… I mean, we talked a little bit about the comic strip.
• 3:24
  Tad Eggleston: book club that 22 Panels has, and we did George Harriman and Crazy Cat.
• 3:28
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: So being able to see how…
• 3:31
  Tad Eggleston: he… he clearly has a love for Crazy Cat, but also has a love for, like…
• 3:38
  Tad Eggleston: Pogo and Calvin and Hobbes and whatnot, so, so, like…
• 3:43
  Tad Eggleston: You have… you have, at times, a crazy cat-type… comic strip, but… aimed towards…
• 3:53
  Tad Eggleston: children and the parents reading to them in a way that I just really enjoy. I guess is the best way to put it.
• 4:02
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Yeah, and it's so interesting that this play is for children,
• 4:08
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: But it's such a beautiful piece of writing, because I think what Patrick does in his comics as well is he doesn't play two children, he just writes in a voice that can be appreciated and understood by children, but then is just crushingly beautiful to adults.
• 4:25
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: lived through some life and, you know, are… especially those, shelter stories and the big Sunday panels, just…
• 4:36
  Tad Eggleston: I, I mean, the all-ages story is a special thing to begin with.
• 4:47
  Tad Eggleston: In whatever medium it comes across, but it seems to be something that happens
• 4:53
  Tad Eggleston: more in comics, and even more in comic strips, probably, than any other medium. You know, peanuts. Peanuts means as much to the 5-year-old that can't even read the words as it does to…
• 5:09
  Tad Eggleston: The parent looking at it and seeing the world through their kids' eyes again, or remembering, it just… yeah.
• 5:17
  Tad Eggleston: Yeah.
• 5:18
  Tad Eggleston: And that's the… I mean, I was rereading some mutts today, just to get ready, and remembering that the other thing, and, like, when I read Mutts the most, when it was in, like, the daily paper, and I still got a daily paper, and therefore I had the daily comics to read.
• 5:36
  Tad Eggleston: I was strictly a cat guy, so, so, like…
• 5:42
  Tad Eggleston: The cat really spoke to me.
• 5:45
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Yeah.
• 5:47
  Tad Eggleston: But now, I… This is the grave.
• 5:49
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: There's a debate in the musical, by the way. Right.
• 5:54
  Tad Eggleston: Well, my wife had been a dog person, so, like, since we got married, we've had dogs and cats in the house, so I now have much more appreciation for both animals, but more importantly, can see how much Patrick clearly knows both animals.
• 6:12
  Tad Eggleston: You know, these are not caricatures of cats and dogs. These are…
• 6:19
  Tad Eggleston: cats and dogs. This is… I mean.
• 6:22
  Tad Eggleston: you see Tom and Jerry, and the cats and dogs kind of act like cats and dogs, but like…
• 6:29
  Tad Eggleston: Tom doesn't act… you know, Tom doesn't do enough just… Silly, dumb stuff.
• 6:38
  Tad Eggleston: Does that make sense? You know, you never see Tom jump up on the mantle and just randomly knock something down.
• 6:49
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Yeah, yeah.
• 6:50
  Mark Pracht: I mean, I think that… I think that one of the wonderful things about
• 6:54
  Mark Pracht: Newspaper strips, in general, is that, like, they are intrinsically have to connect with a wide audience, right?
• 7:03
  Mark Pracht: Because no one… like, you're just getting the newspaper, and you're opening it up, and you either connect to it or you don't. And I think that it… what is wonderful about having read the script is that it really does have that openness to…
• 7:18
  Mark Pracht: You know, you could look at it… you could look at it in a vaguely religious sense, you could look at it in a humanistic sense, you could look at it in a very,
• 7:28
  Mark Pracht: I don't know, anti-consumerist, sort of sense. Like, there's so much there.
• 7:35
  Mark Pracht: Not… not to… not to… not to push tech out of the way and say, let's talk about the play, but…
• 7:42
  Tad Eggleston: Well, I mean, we need to talk about the play, that's what he's here for.
• 7:47
  Mark Pracht: I think that what… what was, like, really lovely when I was reading the script is that, you know, it's… it just sort of, like.
• 7:56
  Mark Pracht: as a… as a work, it's so open… open-hearted, and I… you know, it was… I find it… I find it really fascinating, you know, like, I've worked on a few new works, and
• 8:09
  Mark Pracht: So, I'm assuming, like, since you were in the original production, you were in the room with,
• 8:15
  Mark Pracht: Mr. Posner and Mr. McDonald, was that correct? And that had to be an experience. I, I, I… Can't…
• 8:23
  Mark Pracht: I can't imagine, so I, like…
• 8:26
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Cause, I mean, like.
• 8:28
  Mark Pracht: Truth be known, stupid fucking bird is an incredible piece of work. I, like, I can't even imagine what it must have been like to work with these people, so…
• 8:37
  Mark Pracht: Tell us about that, will you?
• 8:39
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Yeah, yeah, I will. I'll also really quickly say for any listener who doesn't understand the play, it's very funny, I've been, like, trying to describe it as I ramp up toward doing a show to get people to come to see the show, and I keep describing it in different ways, and one way I describe it is, like, oh, it's Zen Buddhism for kids, because those lessons are in there, and another way is, like, oh, a Christmas story that's about…
• 9:01
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: It's not about presence, but about… presence, with…
• 9:07
  Tad Eggleston: That's…
• 9:07
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: And…
• 9:08
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: But then I wind up just describing the play, so for anybody who is listening who's like, but what are they talking about? Gift of Nothing, the premise is really simple, which is Mooch the Cat sees his friend, Earl the dog, and he sees that he has everything, and he asks himself, what do you get?
• 9:27
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Your friend who has everything.
• 9:29
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: And then he realizes, oh, I get him nothing.
• 9:33
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: And so he goes to look for nothing, but there's always something on TV, there's always something at the store, there's always something to do. And in this very short book, he realizes that if he gets really quiet, and he…
• 9:45
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Says nothing?
• 9:47
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: And he does nothing?
• 9:51
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Then he can find nothing.
• 9:55
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: And the play expands that, and he also then pulls out a huge gift, gift box, and gets the audience to throw nothing into the box, and it's filled with joy and songs, but, like, just that description alone still…
• 10:13
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: gets me. I… I think it's… it's so beautifully simple. And…
• 10:20
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: the tingles that I feel like describing the play are also the ones that you get in the room with those two gentlemen, because they both carry a big presence. I mean, Aaron is just… he's… you can feel his focus, and it's expansive, and it's exciting, and…
• 10:39
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Patrick McDonald, like… All of the warmth that's in the comic strip is, like.
• 10:48
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: is emanating from him in person, too. There aren't two sides to that person.
• 10:54
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: In that sense. It was, he's the most gentle presence in a room, and, it's really just…
• 11:04
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: What seemed really…
• 11:08
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Tickled by the idea, and, really thrilled to see it come to life in a new… in a new way.
• 11:17
  Mark Pracht: I was really struck by how… You know, the book.
• 11:22
  Mark Pracht: which, for anyone who doesn't know, the book, The Gift of Nothing, is… is a lovely piece of… of graphic storytelling, but it's also very, very simple. You know, it's… it's… it's, there's… there's… and the way it's expanded in the play
• 11:39
  Mark Pracht: I… I just… it really… it really worked really well for me. I… I loved it. I, you know, especially the… the character of Doozy.
• 11:47
  Mark Pracht: I was like, okay, this is… this is the… this is sort of the whole…
• 11:53
  Mark Pracht: gesturing. We're on an audio podcast, I'm gesturing. Yeah. But this is… this is the… this is the… the… the framework of what… what we're learning, you know? And I… I thought, it's just so lovely. I… I… I feel like I'm a broken record, but… I don't…
• 12:10
  Tad Eggleston: I don't feel like I've heard Mark say the word lovely that many times, and that sort of…
• 12:14
  Mark Pracht: It's… It's really nice, you know, it's like…
• 12:21
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: But these are the feelings that Mutts, like, that mutts brings up.
• 12:24
  Tad Eggleston: You and I are normally talking about either Jack Kirby or, like, pulp comics.
• 12:29
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Oh my god.
• 12:30
  Tad Eggleston: Hearing him say lovely is…
• 12:33
  Mark Pracht: Well, I mean… It's weird for me. I'm a huge… like, I'm big on sentimentality, you know, especially…
• 12:42
  Mark Pracht: as Tad knows, the last couple years of my life have been a little tough, and The…
• 12:51
  Mark Pracht: The sentiment in this play…
• 12:54
  Mark Pracht: And it's… it's in the book as well, 100%, so anybody who wants to buy that book should do so. It's just… Yeah, I think it's, like, so…
• 13:04
  Tad Eggleston: Definitely, definitely a Christmas recommendation for me.
• 13:07
  Mark Pracht: You've got some kids, this is one to pull out.
• 13:10
  Tad Eggleston: Yeah.
• 13:10
  Mark Pracht: You know, the simplicity of nothing…
• 13:14
  Mark Pracht: You know, the concept is nothing, but really.
• 13:19
  Mark Pracht: like, to me, anyway, is the idea is that what my gift is really time with me, right? Right. It's nothing between us, really, is what… I believe that's what's in the final song. And that is… that is a beautiful concept, and it is…
• 13:36
  Mark Pracht: It is lovely, and…
• 13:39
  Mark Pracht: you know, I… I had the disadvantage when I was reading the script, is that I didn't have, like, I couldn't hear the melodies or the songs.
• 13:49
  Mark Pracht: But I, you know, I was…
• 13:52
  Mark Pracht: I was very struck by the lyrical content, very, very much. It was… it's… it's… it's…
• 13:59
  Mark Pracht: Yeah, it's… I… I don't… I could sit here… I mean, I'm gonna toss out right now that if you make a cast recording, Mark and I want a copy.
• 14:07
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Okay, great.
• 14:10
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Yeah, just personally send you what I have. Yeah, there is,
• 14:18
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: those, those ideas that I feel are closer to, like, the Zen Buddhist realm are really lovely,
• 14:28
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: In person, in a theater.
• 14:33
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Yeah, when Earl, the dog, who was played by Maggie Donnelly in the original, so lovely. But when she sings that line, you know, just this moment.
• 14:46
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Just those words are, it's amazing to feel a room slow down in that way.
• 14:55
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: it's what I love about this comic strip that, again, my head, especially because we're having this conversation, and you guys are so deeply invested in these strips, is that, like, the things that are required to…
• 15:13
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: really jive with the comic strip are the things that are required to put on the show.
• 15:21
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: an absolute sincerity.
• 15:25
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: It's not sentimental if it's… if it's honest.
• 15:29
  Tad Eggleston: You're reminding me of something Howard Chaikin said the last time he was on, which is that the two
• 15:38
  Tad Eggleston: American art forms are the musical and the comic.
• 15:46
  Mark Pracht: 5.
• 15:47
  Tad Eggleston: What?
• 15:48
  Mark Pracht: There's 5 American art forms, that's… There's 22.
• 15:52
  Mark Pracht: That's… that's misquoting… that's misquoting Harlan Ellison, which is, sorry, this is a quote that I…
• 16:00
  Mark Pracht: It's a quote that I put on the cover of all of my play… my comic book plays. It's… there's 5 Native American art forms. It's, musical theater.
• 16:12
  Mark Pracht: The, the detective story is created by Edgar Allan Poe, banjo music, Jazz, and comic books.
• 16:22
  Tad Eggleston: Okay. Now, I want to make it clear that Howard, in typical Howard fashion, didn't say Native American art forms, he said great American art forms. So I think he was making a statement about the other three, not necessarily one I agree with.
• 16:40
  Tad Eggleston: But a statement nonetheless. But what he went on to talk about is that…
• 16:46
  Tad Eggleston: What they have in common, what's unique… Is that they both involve taking…
• 16:57
  Tad Eggleston: Two other art forms and using them
• 17:01
  Tad Eggleston: together. And not… not using, like, he's like, opera is using one instead of the other. What the American musical has somewhat become now is a soundtrack with, like, words in between. But the classic American musical, and…
• 17:20
  Tad Eggleston: And yes, Mark, there are good musicals. I'm quoting Mr. Chaikin. And I know, everybody else can't see the faces Mark is making. I may be misquoting Mr. Chaikin, so Howard, if you're… if you're listening, all mistakes are my own.
• 17:38
  Tad Eggleston: But… but that they take two…
• 17:41
  Tad Eggleston: Two art forms that are, already…
• 17:46
  Tad Eggleston: Great, but… but weave them together in a way that… to… to… to…
• 17:51
  Tad Eggleston: to get the full story, they're inextricable. You need to…
• 17:56
  Tad Eggleston: follow along with everything. It's not just the words, it's the words and pictures, it's not just the music and song, it's the music and the song, and the acting, and the…
• 18:08
  Tad Eggleston: Dialogue and the, you know, the full experience.
• 18:12
  Tad Eggleston: So, I was actually taking this, I was segmenting to,
• 18:19
  Tad Eggleston: Mark was talking, or Mark had asked you a little bit about, Mr. McDonald was…
• 18:28
  Tad Eggleston: On set with you.
• 18:30
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Yeah.
• 18:31
  Tad Eggleston: Putting the… the…
• 18:33
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: I'm gonna pull out… this is my copy of The Best of Mutts, and he's just generous, but also just his ability to draw these in 3 seconds is amazing, because this was…
• 18:44
  Tad Eggleston: Oh, wow.
• 18:45
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: his…
• 18:47
  Tad Eggleston: Personally.
• 18:47
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: wise…
• 18:48
  Mark Pracht: Oh, that's fantastic.
• 18:50
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: But he, yeah, he's just so generous within himself and his ideas and his time.
• 18:58
  Tad Eggleston: But my more specific question is,
• 19:03
  Tad Eggleston: You know, and you may or may not have been able to talk to him about this, but did he have theater background? Was this… or was this kind of the first time that he was doing that? And, like, how was it having…
• 19:18
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: A very creative person, who definitely has a feeling for taking different things and working them together, but works in.
• 19:28
  Tad Eggleston: a different medium, Be a part of that process.
• 19:33
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: I wish I could have been in on those earlier conversations, just to be a fly on that wall, to, understand…
• 19:41
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: how they pulled and expanded certain things, but, his job in the room, as I remember it, 11 years ago, was really kind of…
• 19:54
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: to… I would say, like.
• 20:01
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: understand, be the limiter of the tone, but also go, yes, this is in my world. Like, how
• 20:08
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: How much of this, and I think Aaron was constantly referring to them, going, how much of this is, fits in the world? Because we never wanted to be outside of that world of mutts to make a point, and there was so much in that story, but it was like, how far can we go outside of it for the scene in the shopping center, which is, you know, two pages in the book, and it's…
• 20:32
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: all of this stuff, and so there was a great kind of heffa-lumps and woozles musical number with moving shopping carts and almost Commedia dell'arte masks, and it was like, there was question of, like, does this fit into the world, and where do we land at the end of it?
• 20:50
  Mark Pracht: You know…
• 20:52
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Yeah.
• 20:53
  Mark Pracht: Yeah, no, I… I think that,
• 20:57
  Mark Pracht: I mean, for myself, I mean, like, I'm not.
• 21:01
  Mark Pracht: I don't have an encyclopedic knowledge of mutts, but, you know… I don't either.
• 21:06
  Tad Eggleston: to make that clear. I don't have the encyclopedic knowledge.
• 21:10
  Mark Pracht: Good.
• 21:10
  Mark Pracht: you know, like…
• 21:13
  Mark Pracht: for myself, I mean, when I looked… when I looked at the script, I… I read through it once, and I thought, you know, I know this comic strip, but I… I don't… I've never read the book, the book, the Gifted Nothing book, and I thought.
• 21:26
  Mark Pracht: that's probably where the really interesting com… and that's, like, I think that it's so…
• 21:34
  Mark Pracht: Lovely how, you know, like you say, that that… the scene with the shopping mall.
• 21:39
  Mark Pracht: It's two pages, two drawings, and it, it…
• 21:44
  Mark Pracht: The way it sort of pops out, It's almost…
• 21:51
  Mark Pracht: I have another friend of mine who does
• 21:54
  Mark Pracht: Fold out, you know, like, pop-up books.
• 21:57
  Mark Pracht: Hmm. That's what he does, and he…
• 21:59
  Tad Eggleston: Oh.
• 22:00
  Mark Pracht: big curator of those things. And…
• 22:03
  Tad Eggleston: pop-up books.
• 22:04
  Tad Eggleston: Who's my daughter. I want to meet this person, Mark!
• 22:10
  Mark Pracht: And, but I mean, that's what it sort of made me think of, like, each time, you know, like, there was, you know, you had the various members of the ensemble coming in as the grabber. Grabber 1 and grabber 2, and I was just like, okay, this is lovely. Because it's just the right amount of energy.
• 22:27
  Tad Eggleston: again.
• 22:29
  Tad Eggleston: It does mean exactly what you think it means, if that's okay.
• 22:34
  Mark Pracht: like, I liked how… I liked how it expanded out from what was in the book. Yeah. It just… it did it in such a nice.
• 22:42
  Mark Pracht: tonally consistent way, exactly what you're talking about. You know, I think that,
• 22:50
  Mark Pracht: Yeah, I guess, you know, it's in…
• 22:53
  Mark Pracht: Go ahead.
• 22:54
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: The big departure to me, from the book, or the element that's not in the book, because I think it's explored in the rest of the Mutts canon, is the…
• 23:03
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: how can a dog and a cat be friends? And then the owners being dog people or cat people, and that's the arc, the inclusive arc of the play that I think was, a really, was a genius stroke by, Aaron and his partner Aaron and Patrick.
• 23:24
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: to have that woven throughout it so that they all end up at the same and go, oh, I'm a dog person, but I can also be a cat person, and of course cats and dogs can be friends, is a simple idea that's also a very big human idea.
• 23:38
  Mark Pracht: Sure, yeah.
• 23:39
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: No, you know, you actually made me think of something, and this may be something that you don't have any.
• 23:45
  Mark Pracht: any context on, but there was a moment in the script where they talk about Frank.
• 23:52
  Mark Pracht: And they say he plays drums?
• 23:54
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Yeah.
• 23:55
  Mark Pracht: And I don't think at any point, at any time, that I have ever read Mutts, or anything… that I've ever come across the idea that Frank played drums.
• 24:04
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Oh, yeah.
• 24:04
  Mark Pracht: And I was like…
• 24:05
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: plays drums is because they were trying to get as much music on stage for as… with as little extra people as possible.
• 24:11
  Mark Pracht: Got it.
• 24:12
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Yeah.
• 24:14
  Mark Pracht: I wondered, I wondered, I wondered about that, but it was like one of those little… it was just.
• 24:20
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: And also, the actor playing Frank, Michael John Casey, is really good at the drums, and they went, how perfect, because he has the least to do in the show, and so he could do the most throughout the show. So, yeah, that one wasn't necessarily canon, but certainly helped the show.
• 24:36
  Mark Pracht: But it's just one of those little things you throw, like,
• 24:41
  Mark Pracht: You know, not to… not to…
• 24:43
  Mark Pracht: like, that I'm always struck by little things like that that, like, make me think, okay, there's a whole… there's a whole reason behind that.
• 24:54
  Mark Pracht: you know, whenever I'm reading a script, I always think that, okay, there's somebody who says something…
• 25:00
  Mark Pracht: that maybe seems like something of a non sequitur, doesn't quite have a full explanation, and you're wondering, is the audience supposed to just take that and expand it in their mind, or is that something… and see, now, that's the answer, and…
• 25:13
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Yeah.
• 25:13
  Mark Pracht: That's awesome. Like, that's… I love that kind of… I love that kind of collaborative and…
• 25:20
  Mark Pracht: theatrical… Problem solving, you know?
• 25:24
  Tad Eggleston: And now I just have to have an autism brain thing come out, because it will stick in my brain until then. Between Mark talking about banjo playing as one of the five American… and you just talked about the…
• 25:38
  Tad Eggleston: the… Frank plays drums because he needed as many instruments on stage, I immediately thought of the balladeer in Assassins, and my favorite performances have him
• 25:50
  Tad Eggleston: Playing the banjo as… as… You know, it's not the pit or anything like that, it's… So, yeah, okay.
• 25:59
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: And I love the idea, I mean, there's a reality.
• 26:01
  Tad Eggleston: Oh, dude, dude.
• 26:02
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: He never says in the Mutts comic strip that Frank doesn't play the drums, so it's fun to imagine that behind all that curmudgeon behavior in the basement, he could just be tearing away.
• 26:13
  Mark Pracht: So…
• 26:15
  Tad Eggleston: So, Joseph, what's your,
• 26:18
  Tad Eggleston: What's your history with comics before this?
• 26:22
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: I will add.
• 26:24
  Tad Eggleston: It's like, I was hoping that he wouldn't ask this question.
• 26:27
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: I wouldn't ask this. No, I, I've always been, fascinated by them, and, my time and attention is never,
• 26:37
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: has never allowed me to dive so far into it, but also, at multiple points in my life, I've gone.
• 26:44
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: I'm gonna try getting really into comic books.
• 26:48
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: And then, we can help if you will.
• 26:51
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: But actually, I moved into a really, sweet town in Northern California called Benicia, and this comic book store opened up across the street, and so in the last year, I walked in and I went, what's new? And so there's, a newer Batman series that I just started, like.
• 27:10
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: subscribing to.
• 27:12
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: It's the Ultimate Batman, where he has the…
• 27:16
  Tad Eggleston: The absolute Batman?
• 27:17
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: In Absolute Batman, inside the… The chest plate, and I've… I actually,
• 27:29
  Tad Eggleston: Though, I gotta tell you, if you're enjoying that, the Absolute Wonder Woman's even better. It is, okay. Kelly Thompson's knocking it out of the ballpark.
• 27:37
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Oh, good, good, good. I love the world, it's so cool. Alfred as, like, a secret assassin is so hard, and yeah, it goes dark in really…
• 27:51
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: fun ways that don't feel, like, trite in any way. Like, they're…
• 27:58
  Tad Eggleston: So is this Zeppelin Comics?
• 28:01
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Mrs. Zeppelin Comics.
• 28:02
  Tad Eggleston: Hey, hey, I love it when I can find your comic shop before you…
• 28:06
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Right, right down.
• 28:07
  Tad Eggleston: That's true.
• 28:09
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Yeah, I also, I, I dove into,
• 28:14
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: into those early Eisner books as well, and I think they're the most… I mean, there's a reason there's the award after them, but they are the most stunning storytelling, and the ones… the… that was… the A Contract with God was the first book that I read where it really leapt out of the page for me, and I felt like, oh, these are big…
• 28:36
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: theatrical beats that are happening that are dangerous and aren't for light entertainment. Yeah, yeah. Yeah.
• 28:46
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Yeah.
• 28:46
  Tad Eggleston: One of the guests on my last podcast, we had our annual baseball and comics roundtable.
• 28:54
  Tad Eggleston: was able to say that he lost the Eisner the one time he was nominated, but he lost it to Will Eisner, so he doesn't know if that counts.
• 29:10
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: You shouldn't be able to win your own award.
• 29:14
  Mark Pracht: Well… You know, who knows?
• 29:19
  Mark Pracht: He's Will Eisner, he can do whatever he wants.
• 29:23
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: He could. He should graciously step and say, you know, something else.
• 29:29
  Mark Pracht: I get all of these awards, because my name's on it.
• 29:34
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Yeah.
• 29:35
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: But I, I suppose, Tad, in the same way that you are an appreciator of theater, I'm an appreciator of comic books and comics, and that I, I'm not so deep in them, but I, I love everyone.
• 29:49
  Tad Eggleston: I mean, I need to… I need to find more theater…
• 29:53
  Tad Eggleston: that I can afford and make the time.
• 29:56
  Tad Eggleston: Okay, because I adore the… No, no, I know Mark has helped me out with that.
• 30:01
  Tad Eggleston: Oh, Mark has absolutely helped me out with that. Like, I actually had a subscription to CityLit.
• 30:08
  Tad Eggleston: last year? Something like that.
• 30:10
  Tad Eggleston: Yeah.
• 30:11
  Mark Pracht: He subscribed until my comic book plays were over, and then…
• 30:15
  Tad Eggleston: I, I've, I've been to two since then.
• 30:19
  Tad Eggleston: I've been… I've been to at least one at City Lit that neither you or Sean were in.
• 30:27
  Tad Eggleston: I mean, it happens.
• 30:30
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Here's the other fun theater crossover that I loved, and I wish the one, like, property I wish Marvel would jump on in the media world is that,
• 30:39
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: 1601, the… did you…
• 30:42
  Mark Pracht: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 30:43
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: That, like, limited series.
• 30:45
  Tad Eggleston: 1602.
• 30:45
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Or 1602, see? This is how well I know it. But I, I…
• 30:50
  Tad Eggleston: We can't talk about as much as we used to be able to talk about.
• 30:53
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: I know, that's the shame. But they had other authors pick up other ones.
• 30:57
  Tad Eggleston: Right.
• 30:59
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: One thing that I wish Disney would pick up and give, like, a limited series to, because that would be cool to see.
• 31:07
  Tad Eggleston: I know that it's been kicked around in the possibilities for what if.
• 31:16
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Oh, okay.
• 31:18
  Tad Eggleston: Cause… Because one of the guys that's been on a couple of times is one of the what-if directors.
• 31:24
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Yeah.
• 31:26
  Tad Eggleston: So I know that it's possible, I don't know if it'll get.
• 31:30
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: It's just funny that they gave Kenneth Branagh, like, Thor, but not…
• 31:33
  Tad Eggleston: That thing. Yeah.
• 31:34
  Mark Pracht: Yeah.
• 31:35
  Tad Eggleston: I mean…
• 31:37
  Tad Eggleston: They got… I mean, Disney's an interesting, corporate overlord. Sometimes they get it, and sometimes they don't.
• 31:46
  Mark Pracht: Well, you know, I… I do have one thing. Have you had… I mean, like, I know you guys haven't… you're just starting rehearsals tomorrow, so… Sure. There's no way, but, like, when you were doing the original run, did you have, like…
• 32:01
  Mark Pracht: Mutts fans show up that were… Oh!
• 32:07
  Tad Eggleston: Was there cosplay at the Kennedy Center, is what he's asking. That's not what I'm asking.
• 32:12
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Yeah.
• 32:13
  Mark Pracht: I'm just… I'm trying to compare, like, like, I'll be brutally honest, I'm trying to compare it to my own experience, so… Right.
• 32:20
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: I don't remember that because they had such a powerful machine of, like, classes of kids coming in.
• 32:29
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: that it really… the focus was on those kids, so I don't know if there were people who were, like, die-hard Mutts fans saying, I didn't run into them at the stage door or anything.
• 32:44
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: But it was fun. I don't know how much I can talk about this, but it's passed, so I will… it was interesting at the time, and I think maybe because the success of the…
• 32:53
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: 2D, 3D animated Peanuts movie didn't necessarily balloon, but that same producer was talking to Patrick during that period, and I think if that Peanuts movie had really taken off, there might have been a Mutz movie coming down
• 33:09
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: But he was watching this process going like, oh, how is this gonna work in terms of adaptation and what kind?
• 33:15
  Mark Pracht: Yeah, yeah. No, it's… I mean, it's just always an interesting, you know, like, having a crossover between something that has,
• 33:25
  Mark Pracht: You know, a built-in audience, and try, you know, like, my own work, I tried to… connect…
• 33:35
  Mark Pracht: like, I wanted to bring…
• 33:37
  Mark Pracht: comic fans into the theater, and I also wanted to introduce people in the theater into this new art form, and or this art form that they were unfamiliar with. And that it was… for me, it was super…
• 33:50
  Mark Pracht: exciting, and it was really successful, which I… I just really… I'm always curious.
• 33:57
  Tad Eggleston: stuck with me.
• 33:58
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Yeah.
• 34:00
  Mark Pracht: But I mean, like, I've also, like, I've… I've met several people who are working in similar genres, like, there's another guy in Rhode Island who's doing a bunch… who's done a bunch of comic book history plays, and,
• 34:14
  Mark Pracht: Crystal Skillman and Fret…
• 34:16
  Mark Pracht: Crystal Skillman and Fred Van Lenti in New York did a play about Jack Kirby, which, you know, like, I did a play about Jack Kirby and Stan Lee, and and it was… it's been… I've…
• 34:29
  Mark Pracht: developed relationships with all of these people that I found, and we've all talked about it, you know, how…
• 34:36
  Mark Pracht: Bringing these sort of…
• 34:39
  Mark Pracht: pop culture kind of things into the theater, like, how much the audiences have just really gotten excited about them, and I think it's really kind of cool. I mean, and like, granted, I mean, I know it's… this is theater for young audiences, so it's a very different kind of thing, but it is…
• 34:58
  Mark Pracht: I mean, it is really exciting. I always… I get really excited about anything like this, so…
• 35:04
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: And I think the… I'm curious to see how it manifests itself in your plays, too, because it's like, oh, you're taking a process that primarily lives on the page, or with those writers in the room, and, you know, down here, and then you're bringing it into a real space, and…
• 35:23
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: I think we're really fortunate with the format, with the gift of nothing, because
• 35:30
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: the simplicity of Patrick's drawings lend itself to
• 35:37
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: presentational theater in a way that, you know, the backdrops were two-dimensional and didn't look cheap, because that was the world, and so it meant that, like, the characters really spring forward outside of them, which they do on the page as well, and so that's the fun of it is,
• 35:56
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Yeah, you get… you're, like, kind of breaking the fourth wall there in that you're…
• 36:02
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Kind of leaping into three dimensions, yeah.
• 36:05
  Mark Pracht: Well, yeah, like, like, my shows all have,
• 36:11
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: narration elements.
• 36:13
  Mark Pracht: So, it's always about going out to the audience, and also,
• 36:18
  Mark Pracht: to the… to the chagrin of my director, who never really liked projections, they were also very projection heavy, because, you know, it's… it's a visual… it's a visual medium, you know? It's gotta… it's gotta have this stuff, and you have to be able to see these things, and… or at least elements of them, and I think that…
• 36:36
  Mark Pracht: Like, there is… I guess what's really…
• 36:41
  Mark Pracht: sorry, I'm starting to rant about everything, but I mean, I think what's really interesting is that you have… that there is… when you talk about comics.
• 36:52
  Mark Pracht: you have… there's sort of an inherent falseness to it. I mean, you're looking at a static image on a page, right? And when…
• 37:00
  Mark Pracht: you're doing theater, there's sort of an inherent falseness to it, right? You know, you've got a… you've got a set, you've got, you know, and you're having to create, with your imagination, the world that these people are existing in. And I think that that
• 37:15
  Mark Pracht: there's something inherently connective to that, and I think that it's… it's really interesting, and I think, again.
• 37:27
  Mark Pracht: with your… for Tad's benefit, lovely play that you're working on.
• 37:34
  Mark Pracht: I mean, I… you can… you can feel that. You can feel that sort of, like.
• 37:39
  Mark Pracht: the invitation to the audience to use their imagination to… I mean, like, obviously you have a human actor playing a dog, and a human actor playing a cat.
• 37:51
  Mark Pracht: Right? I mean, like, it's this… this whole idea of… of,
• 37:57
  Mark Pracht: I think that that's all intertwined, and I think it's really exciting.
• 38:02
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: I think that's the fun of it, and I think that's… that's what makes all great comics and comic books work, is that you have this,
• 38:11
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Often really stylized world, and a world that goes, like, this is either gonna be fun or exciting,
• 38:20
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: you have an expectation, and then when a real moment happens in it, it's all that more effective. And that's the… that's where I think we wind up in this play, and where the best of Patrick's work, does it as well, is that in a Sunday comic strip, he can still wind up on a really simple truth.
• 38:41
  Mark Pracht: Yep. Yeah.
• 38:42
  Mark Pracht: Because, yeah, the emotion is full and real.
• 38:47
  Mark Pracht: And… complete.
• 38:49
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: and uncynnical, like, it's the least cynical comic strip. I just don't think there's a cynical panel in the whole thing, and, like, anytime there is kind of, like, a side-eye, even those are sincere, it's just, you know, coming from a cat or a dog, but there's… there's…
• 39:07
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Yeah, nothing goes unsaid, and that kind of, like,
• 39:12
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: not naivete, but that, like, child's view of the world, I think, is why it translates well to theater for young audiences, because the dogs are human only in that they look at the world the way a child does. Otherwise, they do behave like dogs and cats.
• 39:30
  Mark Pracht: True.
• 39:31
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Yeah.
• 39:32
  Mark Pracht: Yeah.
• 39:33
  Mark Pracht: It's fair. Yeah, it's cool.
• 39:35
  Mark Pracht: So…
• 39:36
  Tad Eggleston: There have been… A handful of other… Musicals adapted from… comic strips. Did… in…
• 39:48
  Tad Eggleston: Particularly in the initial round of
• 39:52
  Tad Eggleston: like, when you were performing the show the first time, when you were being involved in, was there any… any study of those? Was there any… any looking at Annie, at, it's a… you're a Good Man Charlie Brown, Doonsbury the Musical, which I just discovered existed? Oh, wow.
• 40:11
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Yeah, I don't know, I don't know for Patrick or Andy, who wrote, really lovely music. The funny thing about Andy Mitten, who wrote the music, is his other job is he directs fairly low-budget horror movies in Los Angeles, and then he wrote the sweetest music.
• 40:31
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: And he's the nicest guy, but it's so funny to see that his, his other world is…
• 40:37
  Tad Eggleston: Some of the horror artists that I know are some of the nicest people I know in comics, but man, can they draw some.
• 40:45
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: I can go…
• 40:46
  Tad Eggleston: Fucked. Up. Shit.
• 40:50
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Yeah, yeah, from the, we didn't… I didn't, ever kind of consider those other adaptations. Maybe Aaron did, but, in getting ready for the role, I did try to dive into those comic strips, and…
• 41:07
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Physically, I tried to find a language based on
• 41:12
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: how Ozzy is drawn in the… in the comic strip.
• 41:17
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: So he's like, oh, he's really tall, because he's basically Patrick McDonald, and he's also very tall and slim, and there are so many straight lines, and, like.
• 41:27
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: either a turn of the head, but the body is… because it's in two dimensions, it, like, it gives you a really specific set of vocabulary that can be really dynamic on stage if you…
• 41:39
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: commit to it. So, it was really fun to dive in and go, oh, what here is actually useful, not just as an idea, but,
• 41:49
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: What can I, like, work into the performance itself?
• 41:53
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Yeah.
• 41:56
  Mark Pracht: Yeah. Yeah, that's… yeah, I mean, like, you know, that's… finding those…
• 42:04
  Mark Pracht: Those, you know, with any character, you know, you find those ways to… Physically make yourself
• 42:11
  Mark Pracht: feel it, you know? And it's… when you have… I can only imagine having something that's actually a… there is a visual representation to
• 42:21
  Mark Pracht: to use, that's…
• 42:23
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Yeah.
• 42:23
  Mark Pracht: That's fascinating.
• 42:25
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: It's fun, because then you see where it repeats to, and where it's reliable, you know? Yeah. Yeah, yeah. A lot of, like, fast changes, like single panels, where it'll be here, and then it'll be this, you know, in fact, again, like, those things wind up being playable in real time. Yeah.
• 42:46
  Mark Pracht: It's fantastic.
• 42:47
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Yeah.
• 42:49
  Tad Eggleston: Speaking of dogs and cats, I just got a text message from my wife, because she let my dog out, and Eddie, the brat cat, who's regularly on this podcast, and part of our
• 43:01
  Tad Eggleston: came back in with him. She wanted to know if I knew that Eddie had gotten out. I…
• 43:07
  Tad Eggleston: Didn't see him get out, but, like, that's something he does! But apparently today, rather than making us chase him, he just came in with the dog.
• 43:17
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Oh, great! He went and gone!
• 43:21
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: These are the secret worlds that have…
• 43:23
  Mark Pracht: There you go.
• 43:24
  Tad Eggleston: A couple nights ago, he got out as I was letting the dog in. In fact, I think the dog… Potato ran interference, because Potato, like, tripped me as I was trying to catch Eddie going out the door.
• 43:38
  Tad Eggleston: And it was, like, 10 o'clock at night, and wet, and cold, and I had to go put shoes on, and by the time I got out, I had no idea where he was, and I walked all around the house for, like, half an hour, and then just as I was going back to the…
• 43:51
  Tad Eggleston: door to… to… to figure out what to do next. He goes strolling up to it in front of me.
• 43:58
  Tad Eggleston: It was the first time I'd seen him while he was out.
• 44:00
  Tad Eggleston: It was when he was strolling up to the door, like, hey, Dad, you ready to go in now? It's kind of wet and cold out here.
• 44:08
  Tad Eggleston: And that… I mean, that's… you know, to bring this back, that's what I often feel like with Mooch, is he's… he's the one that's one step ahead of his… his human.
• 44:18
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: All the time.
• 44:19
  Tad Eggleston: It's like, yeah, hi! In fact, I read a strip today that was great, like, he's out, and what's the dog's name again? I can't… I'm drawing.
• 44:29
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Right.
• 44:30
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Yeah. Yeah, Earl's like, hey, it's snowing! And Mooch is like, hold on. He runs upstairs, jumps under the covers, and looks out to the window and goes, hey, yeah, it's snowing!
• 44:41
  Tad Eggleston: Like, okay, yeah, yeah.
• 44:43
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Yeah!
• 44:44
  Tad Eggleston: Of course, I have the cat that… that… Eddie's also the cat that… the one cat that doesn't, like, care about water.
• 44:52
  Tad Eggleston: he joined me in the shower this morning. I don't know why.
• 44:56
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Beautiful.
• 44:57
  Tad Eggleston: I just looked down, and there was a cat.
• 45:02
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: I do up this… yeah, oh, you, you go, Mark.
• 45:06
  Mark Pracht: Oh, no, I was just saying, I was just sort of, like, I was sliding through the script while we were talking, and I just realized that the character descriptions of Mooch and Earl
• 45:18
  Mark Pracht: Both list them as geniuses.
• 45:22
  Mark Pracht: A genius of smooth positivity and enthusiasm. A genius of exuberant joy and goodness. Yeah, I mean, like.
• 45:29
  Tad Eggleston: Now, if you read enough mutts, you understand the difference between what a cat genius is and what a dog genius is.
• 45:37
  Mark Pracht: 100%, but I, I… the… the description…
• 45:41
  Mark Pracht: Of them as geniuses is… is…
• 45:43
  Tad Eggleston: They're not… they're not graded on the same scale. I'm gonna think of a different.
• 45:47
  Mark Pracht: word than lovely, but… Yeah.
• 45:51
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Yeah.
• 45:52
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Is… is… I'm… Yeah.
• 45:54
  Mark Pracht: Wonderful.
• 45:55
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: I think there's a thing about, I think, Patrick's worldview that's,
• 46:03
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: On display in the comic strip and in the show.
• 46:07
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: And that there's no ownership of pets, and I really do believe there is an equality, impact.
• 46:16
  Tad Eggleston: I mean, they're…
• 46:17
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: the species, and I think it's such a beautiful message, and it's executed in the way that even when I introduce him, I say,
• 46:27
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: That's my dog, Earl.
• 46:29
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: And I'm his… Ozzy.
• 46:31
  Tad Eggleston: Yeah, yeah.
• 46:32
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: I'm not his owner.
• 46:33
  Tad Eggleston: What's the same.
• 46:34
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Not his… Right, right.
• 46:35
  Tad Eggleston: There is ownership with pets, it's just they own you.
• 46:43
  Mark Pracht: I mean, well, that's… that's also in the description here. It's… it's Millie is Mooch's person, and Ozzy is Earl's person.
• 46:51
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: person. Right. This is my dog, I'm his person. Person.
• 46:55
  Mark Pracht: That's right.
• 46:56
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Yeah.
• 46:57
  Mark Pracht: It's fantastic. Yeah.
• 46:59
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: In a similar way, he never uses a specific holiday name in this show, and so it starts, and they're getting ready for a day when you give presents to the people that you love, and they say a very special day over and over again. But it's a…
• 47:17
  Tad Eggleston: So it could be a birthday, could be Valentine's Day.
• 47:20
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Yeah, it's…
• 47:21
  Mark Pracht: I mean, it's…
• 47:22
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: And it's a special day.
• 47:23
  Mark Pracht: Well, you know, and the thing is, is like, you know, not to… It's, it's so inclusive.
• 47:31
  Mark Pracht: But yet, by putting it in from the perspective of a dog and a cat.
• 47:38
  Mark Pracht: why would you think of it as anything else? Of course! And I think that there's an amazing logic to that, and there's… it's… it makes it…
• 47:48
  Mark Pracht: it makes a point without making it feel like it's making a point, you know what I'm saying?
• 47:54
  Tad Eggleston: That actually…
• 47:55
  Mark Pracht: That's… Yep.
• 47:58
  Tad Eggleston: Yeah, yeah, no, no, I love that, because you're right. I mean, what's a holiday to a dog and a cat? It's a time they get presents, and that's it. Though that also just reminded… there was a wonderful… I think it was a Blue Sky post that somebody sent me.
• 48:12
  Tad Eggleston: Where somebody asked, does a dog understand what an elevator is, or is it just the… the… the world-changing box?
• 48:23
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Right.
• 48:26
  Tad Eggleston: Oh! Yeah.
• 48:31
  Tad Eggleston: But, but, I mean, that… When you look at…
• 48:37
  Tad Eggleston: And comics do this well, whether it's Mutz or any number. I mean, one of my favorite comics last year was,
• 48:46
  Tad Eggleston: a book called Man's Best, and it was… it was Athos, Porthos, and Lovey in space.
• 48:54
  Tad Eggleston: Because the… the… the pug just looked like a lovey, so the whole naming thing got… got thrown off, but… but, you know, it was… it was… it was…
• 49:05
  Tad Eggleston: Two dogs and a cat in… in space, you know, trying to find their… their master after the, the, the…
• 49:15
  Tad Eggleston: The ship had crashed.
• 49:17
  Tad Eggleston: And it had just that perspective of…
• 49:23
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: God.
• 49:23
  Tad Eggleston: They know what they've been told, they think, you know, they have what's essentially just costumes for them, but they're convinced that it's actually, you know, I've got my laser jet suit.
• 49:37
  Tad Eggleston: You know, etc.
• 49:40
  Tad Eggleston: it's so much fun to look at, you know, because there are also things that they know way better, you know? I can't figure out what other dog has gone by by sniffing the air.
• 49:51
  Tad Eggleston: You know, I can't figure out…
• 49:56
  Tad Eggleston: I mean, I don't even want to think about all the things my cats figure out.
• 50:01
  Tad Eggleston: That's one of the reasons why cat comics can be so much fun.
• 50:07
  Tad Eggleston: Yeah, so… Just, you know, because I, I…
• 50:17
  Tad Eggleston: won't get to see it on stage. Talk to me about how it's… staged.
• 50:22
  Tad Eggleston: how… how Mooch and…
• 50:28
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Earl, yeah.
• 50:29
  Tad Eggleston: Earl.
• 50:30
  Tad Eggleston: are costumed and whatnot. Just a little bit.
• 50:34
  Mark Pracht: As… as the theater person on this.
• 50:38
  Mark Pracht: You haven't started rehearsals yet, right? So…
• 50:41
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: No, but I can tell you, but I can tell you at least from how it was, and actually…
• 50:46
  Tad Eggleston: Kennedy Center.
• 50:47
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Yeah, and our director, one of the wonderful kismet things about this production is our director is…
• 50:55
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: directed all the movement in the original production, and she happens to live in the Bay Area, and so it was a good chance for her. So there will be some, some continuity there. But, yeah, they are in… Mooch and Earl are in dog and cat costumes, in that, Earl's costume is black and white, you know, white… Right.
• 51:20
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: black spots, and there's a black splotch on the face, and…
• 51:29
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: the language, the physical language is sometimes dog, but they're not on all fours all the time. And the same with Mooch,
• 51:41
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: sometimes they're on all fours, but they're not pretending to walk on all fours. There just may be moments when they happen to be there.
• 51:52
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Earl is bouncing around all the time, it's a lot of up and down, and, like, Earl is all energy, and Mooch is a little bit like Benverine. There's a lot of movement there, there's a little bit of Fosse in the way that cats can be. And so it's… it's really fun to see, though, those two,
• 52:14
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: in the world together, and, you know, the lack of height difference is just kind of accepted at the beginning in the way that… with any of these, like, talking animal stories that you see on film, where you go, okay, so this… these are the rules. And really, it's never discussed, but the humans aren't… aren't…
• 52:34
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: speaking English back and forth with the dogs, with Mooch and Earl. That they speak English to each other, and the humans speak to each other, but there isn't much made about that gap.
• 52:48
  Tad Eggleston: Right.
• 52:48
  Tad Eggleston: No, and again, I was just curious as to the basics of what the rules wound up being, because there are different ways to decide to do those rules, you know. Another choice that could have been made, particularly because it's a…
• 53:04
  Tad Eggleston: A play for younger people would have been to have younger actors, and therefore actually have
• 53:11
  Tad Eggleston: smaller Mooch and Earl. Yeah, yeah. That's… I'm not… I didn't say it was necessarily the right choice, Mark, as you move your head back and forth. I said it was…
• 53:24
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: possible choice, and that's where the question came from. Yeah.
• 53:29
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: What questions do you answer?
• 53:32
  Mark Pracht: In the room.
• 53:33
  Tad Eggleston: And how many boxes do you have?
• 53:36
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: There's a regular box. Oh, it's such a fun thing. It's so great. He pulls out a box, and it's, like, this big, and he goes, great, and he finds nothing with the kids, and then he goes, great, throw in your nothing, and they start, like, just throwing air. He's like, come on, throw in all, like, we all found nothing, throw it in, and then he goes, I'm gonna need a bigger box!
• 54:00
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: And then he walked off stage, and then pulls out a box that's 8 feet tall, by 8 feet wide, and plops it on stage, and they throw it, and it's a beautiful, like, a beautiful sight gag, because it's huge, and then that last song between the two of them is in that box, so it, like, becomes the center of the stage.
• 54:25
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: And then it's the sweetest moment that we all started crying during the first time it was staged, because we were all just like, I'm never gonna see a sweeter thing in my life!
• 54:35
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: And a dog and a cat singing about how nothing is everything. Yeah.
• 54:41
  Tad Eggleston: box.
• 54:41
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: In a box. In a box.
• 54:43
  Tad Eggleston: Which the cat would love, and the dog might put up with.
• 54:47
  Tad Eggleston: My cats adore boxes. They live in boxes.
• 54:51
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: This one is.
• 54:52
  Tad Eggleston: My dog likes to tear up boxes.
• 54:57
  Mark Pracht: But these… this dog and cat love being in there together, Tad, because…
• 55:02
  Tad Eggleston: Well, and that is… that is… my dogs and cats are friends, and that is the scenario in which Potato would allow the box to continue to exist, as if it was being used by one of the four cats. And he might join them in it.
• 55:22
  Tad Eggleston: But… but otherwise, it's…
• 55:24
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Thank you.
• 55:24
  Tad Eggleston: It's a shoe toy to him, and it's… and it's the best toy ever to them.
• 55:31
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: There's a great line in the play, also, where Earl is talking to Mooch, and he says, but why can't a dog and a cat be friends? I think we have a lot more in common, like…
• 55:41
  Mark Pracht: Haha!
• 55:41
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Hi!
• 55:43
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Don't question anything, and you don't question anything, and then the cat goes.
• 55:47
  Mark Pracht: Oh, the city.
• 55:48
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Yeah!
• 55:50
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: But why don't I? And then he, like, starts asking questions.
• 55:54
  Tad Eggleston: Well, see, I will say, you know, for those who have any question about dogs and cats being friends.
• 56:01
  Tad Eggleston: Our two departed animals, Matt and Salvador, would never admit to being friends.
• 56:09
  Tad Eggleston: Like, like, if you walked in the door and they happened to be sharing a chair, they would immediately both get down.
• 56:15
  Tad Eggleston: However, If there was an open bag of chips on the table, And Salvador loved chips.
• 56:24
  Tad Eggleston: All he would need to do is stand at the bottom of the table and look up, and Matt would decide to go up onto the table.
• 56:31
  Tad Eggleston: Because Matt doesn't follow rules.
• 56:35
  Tad Eggleston: and knock the chips down on the floor, at which point Salvador was obligated to clean up.
• 56:43
  Tad Eggleston: So tell me that's not friendship.
• 56:48
  Tad Eggleston: That's…
• 56:51
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Ted, the clear love and knowledge of you… that you have of those animals,
• 56:59
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: the familial closeness is why Mutz works, and…
• 57:05
  Tad Eggleston: It is.
• 57:05
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: It is, 100%. Because it's a chance for us to go Oh, how lovely, Mark.
• 57:15
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: It's a chance for us to kind of live in that, for a bit.
• 57:19
  Tad Eggleston: I think just once, he should have said loverly.
• 57:22
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Love her, Lou.
• 57:23
  Mark Pracht: That's a gift.
• 57:24
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: different musical.
• 57:25
  Mark Pracht: Yeah, yeah.
• 57:28
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Gentlemen, it has been such a joy to talk to you.
• 57:30
  Tad Eggleston: I do have to ask the final question really quick.
• 57:33
  Tad Eggleston: Yeah.
• 57:36
  Tad Eggleston: You're enough of a novice in comics, I'll understand if it's not a comic, but the final question is always, tell me something you love, preferably a comic.
• 57:45
  Tad Eggleston: But we don't have rules. Preferably storytelling, but again, with the rules.
• 57:49
  Tad Eggleston: But something that you love, That not enough other people have experienced, and you need them to, so that…
• 57:58
  Tad Eggleston: You have more people to talk to him about.
• 58:01
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Fight something I love.
• 58:04
  Tad Eggleston: Something you like.
• 58:04
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Not a lot of people have experienced.
• 58:07
  Tad Eggleston: It's not enough people around you, because you need more people to talk about it.
• 58:12
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Oh, Dan…
• 58:18
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Brown, is that his name? Who's done all the Darth Vader and Daddy and Me books.
• 58:27
  Tad Eggleston: Oh, Jeffrey Brown! Jeffrey Brown!
• 58:30
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Sorry, Jeffrey Brown.
• 58:32
  Tad Eggleston: Chicago area, he's been on it.
• 58:34
  Mark Pracht: I was gonna say, the Da Vinci Code guy?
• 58:36
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: I know, that's why I was like, it's not Dan Brown, there's no way. Jeffrey Brown, sorry, Mr. Brown. His… his clumsy is one of…
• 58:46
  Tad Eggleston: Oh!
• 58:46
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: the best pieces of modern adult relationship writing I've ever experienced. It's staggering, it's made me, like, read most of his other stuff, even though I didn't get his name right. But I recommend to anybody who has a hint of interest in Jeffrey Brown to find that book, because it's…
• 59:06
  Tad Eggleston: It's part of… the whole trilogy has been put together now, so you can buy them together.
• 59:14
  Tad Eggleston: Joseph needs to run and take his daughter to the theater.
• 59:17
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Give my paper.
• 59:18
  Tad Eggleston: So we will, we will say goodbye, but people, people should go read Jeffrey Brown, people should… Yeah.
• 59:25
  Mark Pracht: You…
• 59:26
  Tad Eggleston: Listen to the general ground podcast on 22 Panels, and go to the Marin County theater… Yes.
• 59:32
  Mark Pracht: Joseph should pitch the show when and where and how, you know.
• 59:38
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Yes, come to Marin theater, you can find it on marintheatre.org, and the show is The Gift of Nothing. We'll be running from December…
• 59:49
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: 13th through the 23rd. It's a short little run, but there are a lot of early morning and daytime performances for you and your.
• 59:58
  Tad Eggleston: And we didn't point this out earlier.
• 1:00:01
  Tad Eggleston: It is presented in partnership with the Muttville Senior Dog Rescue.
• 1:00:06
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: Yes, it is.
• 1:00:06
  Tad Eggleston: So, seeing it's Potato, my dog was a senior dog when we got him, and a very senior dog now. I have…
• 1:00:14
  Tad Eggleston: A very soft spot in my heart for the senior dog rescues. So, thank you for that as well, Joseph. It has been…
• 1:00:20
  Joseph O'Malley - Stand & Deliver: So much.
• 1:00:21
  Tad Eggleston: Absolute blast to talk to you, to get to know you. For Joseph O'Malley and the Marin theater, this has been 22 Panels. We will see you after the next page.