Thursday 25 August to Saturday 3 September 7:34 PM
The Mockingbird on Main, 320 North Main Street, Davenport IA
The latest comedy from the Haus of Ruckus team of T. Green and Calvin Vo runs from August 25 through September 3 in downtown Davenport. Random access idiots, and as those first two words and the title acronym suggest, the show has a technology theme. But despite this latest Mockingbird on Main presentation re-introducing audiences to Green and Vo’s well-known and much-loved characters Fungus and Johnny, the duo’s third theatrical adventure since November won’t get them playing video games. Not exinternally anyway.
“Random access idiotsexplains Green, “is about Johnny and Fungus – our self-inserted characters – who order this legendary video game called Battle Mountain Brawlers: The Battle of Brawler Mountain, and they find themselves literally being sucked into it. And it is not only a game world exploration, but also a world exploration behind the game – the programming and code behind the video game is personified and becomes its own little world. So Johnny and Fungus explore those different environments as they go through the world of the game, and they meet some crazy video game characters.”
“There’s a lot of space opera out there,” adds Vo, “a lot of superheroes, a lot of future dystopia… . tons of science fiction. But very rarely do people ever go go inside the computer. I say that knowing that Wreck it Ralph has two movies and free man consists. I do. But really, the idea of being zapped into a virtual world isn’t as explored as going to space. So when we came up with ideas for Johnny and Fungus, we thought, “Okay… what if they went into a computer?”
As fans of Haus of Ruckus’ past Mockingbird titles “Jacques” alope and “Pants” Labyrinth You know, Green and Vo’s comedies are never about one thing: an encounter with, say, a legendary half-jackrabbit/half-antelope, or the search for a missing pair of pants. So other than it being about two guys stuck in a video game, Random access idiots is also about dolls (Vo says “We have dolls that” lighting up … that was For real hard to figure out…”), electronics, and the temptation to perform extreme combat scenarios.
About the music Vo says: “I’m a huge 80s synth pop/electro fan, and I like to match music with stories and vibes. So I think when we started working on the idea of a video game, I listened to electro a lot, and I thought, ‘Why don’t we put them together? Because they have a similar feeling. In the late ’70s and ’80s was the arrival of synthesizer music, and it has kind of a computer sound, so we kind of mixed those elements together. So you’re going to hear some of that Kraftwerk/Wendy Carlos influence. But we wanted to stay away from anything incredibly recognizable. You’ll hear music that sounds familiar, but you don’t want to go, ‘I know That!'”
As for the fights that make their way to Random access idiotsGreen says: “Personally, one of my favorite things about it is the sound design for it. The fact that there are effects for every little thing, and the punches they definitely have…. It was so nice to see stage fights, but especially fights that looked and sound like they took place in a video game.”
“I don’t get cast on stage fight shows very often,” says Vo. “But I have quite a bit of experience with stage fighting and choreography, and I’ve done a lot of martial arts in the past, alone, outside of school. So when we started this show, I thought, ‘If I’m going to direct, I want there to be quite a few fights.’ Because sometimes you go to a play with stage fights and you see 30 seconds to a minute of really good stage fights, and there’s your fight. That’s great, but I wanted a show that focused on fighting, where the fighting was part of the story.
“And what was nice,” Vo continues, “is that we have different characters appearing at different levels, and each character has their own fighting style. So everything is within the safety and choreography of stage battles, but still reminiscent of battles you see in video games. So there’s a boxer character, there’s a Muay Thai character… . Such things.”
Like “Jacues” alope and “Pants” Labyrinth, Random access idiots features, in addition to Green and Vo, a top-notch ensemble of young actors and comedians, with Bella Kuta and Emma Regnier making their Haus of Ruckus debut, and the troupe’s recurring performers including Sarah Goodall, Jo Vasquez, David Weaver, Keenen Wilson, and Max Robnett, the last to run this show in between his recent lead role in Genesius Guild’s the frogs – that Green and Vo co-wrote — and star in the Spotlight Theaters next month The producers. (Since Vo calls Robnett “a theater superhero,” Green adds, “If there’s anyone who could get way too much on their plate, it’s Max.”)
“It was really cool,” says Green of the Haus of Ruckus casting, “with this being our third show, every time we get people interested, they jump right in. It was so nice that people are willing to take scripts that can be a little weird or silly and say, ‘Yeah, I can do this – this is fun.’ And so far every member of every cast we’ve had has been super motivated to work within our style.”
Vo agrees. “I think a lot of people see our social media and think, ‘Okay, these guys do comedy, and they do comedy about weird stuff… but what’s the environment like?’ And what was really nice is that every single person who participated in the rehearsal process with us was flexible and dumb and easy to work with, but also super-professional. I think what people don’t know about the rehearsal room until they get in there is that while we like to do things creatively, we also like to do it efficiently, and we’re pretty planned.
“Like, we have a five, five and a half week rehearsal process,” he continues, “depending on how things go in pre-production. We won’t stretch beyond that because we’ve found that if we do that , the piece will eat itself. But shorter than that, and you’re just super gnawed for time and overworked everyone. So we do five, five-and-a-half weeks and take everyone’s schedule into account, and T does a lot behind the scenes work with the stage managers to schedule the calendars. We are accommodating to other people’s lives, and they in turn try to do the same for us.”
With two Johnny-and-Fungus productions behind us and Random access idiots along the way, some will wonder if Green and Vo are finding it increasingly difficult to come up with fresh material. Still Green Says “I’m Staying” assuming it’s hard, but I think it’s really made it easier for us to understand each other’s style. More and more, as we do these shows, it’s getting easier for Calvin to write Fungus and me to write Johnny.
“And for us to write to each other,” adds Vo. “What people may or may not know is that T. is all comic stamina. T. will never run out of material.” So although November’s planned Haus of Ruckus title Creepy Piet Johnny and Fungus won’t show up, don’t think you’ve seen the end of those two desert/labyrinth/code-draw slackers.
“The plan was that we were going to make 162 plays with Johnny and Fungus,” says Green.
“And then there will be a world tour somewhere,” says Vo. “They are immortal.”
Random access idiots runs in downtown Davenport from August 25 to September 3, with performances Thursday through Saturday at 7:34 PM, and admission is $10. For more information, visit TheMockingbirdOnMain.com and Haus of Ruckus on Facebook and Instagram , and reservations are available by emailing HausOfRuckusQC@gmail.com.
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