Featured Play...
Trailers & Downloads
Links of Interest
The Mustache Man
-
Chapter One
-
Chapter Two
-
Chapter Three
-
Chapter Four
-
Chapter Five
-
Chapter Six
-
Chapter Seven
-
Chapter Eight
-
Chapter Nine
-
Chapter Ten
-
Chapter Eleven
-
Chapter Twelve
-
Chapter Thirteen
-
Chapter Fourteen
-
Chapter Fifteen
-
Chapter Sixteen
-
Chapter Seventeen
-
Chapter Eighteen
-
Chapter Nineteen
-
Chapter Twenty
-
Chapter Twenty One
-
Chapter Twenty Two
-
Chapter Twenty Three
-
Chapter Twenty Four
-
Chapter Twenty Five
WELCOME TO MY WORLD
Hello. Welcome to my worlds. Yes, there is more than one universe on this web page. To your right is The Mustache Man, a scifi novel in serial form published every week for the next eighteen weeks. The Mustache Man will not disappear if you respond. I’ll publish a link to a new chapter every week in face book. To the left under trailers and downloads is “Remain Calm,” written by Dyan Cavalli and myself. The Remain Calm clip is a trailer followed by the opening scene including Frankenstein as a monster complete with snoopie growl. Re:UndineOdine is a musical written by Odine Hofstahl and myself. If you want to listen to the music, it’s there. These worlds are not just mine. The Mustache Man belongs to Pete Vargas and Detective Carlton James (who may or may not be an angel in disguise); her partner Ex Detective Robert Schulman (Shul) and Pete Vargas’ family, Chance Montclaire, her daughter Jewels and Bert the bulldog with his milky way eyes. The world of “Remain Calm” is inhabited by Gin and Lou, Frankenstein, Mary Shelley and Byron and her husband, Shelley. The musical, “RE:UDINEODINE” belongs to Ben and Odine, who sing and write letters over the internet and the Fates, Pill Box, Cassy and Mary. So, whether you’re celebrating Christmas alone or with friends, welcome to my worlds. I hope your apartment doesn’t get as crowded as mine with all these people from all these different universes.
Remain Calm
Gin and Lou are back together, not as lovers but collaborating on a screen play about Mary Shelley, the creator of Frankenstein. In walks Frankenstein himself. The play poses the question whether lovers whose paths have separated through the storm of love can return to each other as friends? This is what “Remain Calm” is truly about: two people, Gin and Lou who cannot stop helping each other get through life’s storms. At the end of “Remain Calm” Gin and toast each other as Mary Shelley looks on from the mist of the past. They have invoked her ghost to help them get past the illusions of betrayal and the disappointments of love. They are truly friends again.
Frankenstein has just delivered a gift to them: Mary Shelley’s secret journal with the missing pages the world has never seen. They will work on a screen play of Mary Shelley’s life as the play ends. And they will continue to work on the living relationship of a friendship that is truly “until death do us part.” In a world that sometimes feels like it’s going “to hell in a basket” perhaps this is the best that some of us can do: Preserve the love between friends who were once lovers, forgive and go on to fortify our spirits against the reversals of fortune this world holes in store for us. With humor, wit and fantasy (Frankenstein speaks and sings at the end of the play) “Remain Calm” is a small beacon of hope for those of us who believe that friendship must endure beyond the vicissitudes of love.
****************************************************************************
My Thoughts...
THE WOMEN IN MY ART
I have collaborated with women as playwright and composer.
I met Christy Arnold, my music collaborator, at the Village coffee in Scottsdale, Arizona. She radiated patience as my adult fingers stumbled over guitar chords. Christy told me to sing songs I love. At our first lesson I belted out Amazing grace to the dismay of patrons glued to their lab tops. Four and a half months later I visited my stepdaughter and composed my first song on the guitar to a slug (Roger) who made frequent appearances in Dhyandra’s slightly rusty bathtub. Suddenly I heard the opening song of my first musical Re: Undine Odine (released on face book on Slug in the Tub Productions) “Siren.” Six months later I was with Christy in Andrew Brown’s studio with five actors recording the trailer to Re. Christy’s spirit and skill and driving guitar and flair for sharpening my lyrics and chords gave life to Re: Undine Odine. Christy continues to breathe life into my current musical in progress, “Vampyre, Vampyre.” Her work on “Re: Undine Odine” made this musical about two people who write letters and poems over the internet possible.
My life changed with the next gift from a female collaborator, Odine Hofstahl. We exchanged e-mails and poems that form the core of the story of my musical, “Re: Undine Odine. Ben wants love from Odine; she needs a true friend. Ben floods Odine with his poems and coaxes Odine to an open mike to perform her poem, “My baby called me on the phone.” Odine sirens Ben into her dreams where she becomes Undine, the siren who gave up her immortal soul for a mortal and Ben becomes Odin, the God of the Vikings. The soul of this piece is the letters and poems Ben and Odine write to one another. These letters and poems became the libretto of “Re: Undine Odine” and the heart of the songs.
Dyan Cavalli is my collaborator in both “Remain Calm” and “Vampyre, Vampyre” a musical in progress. Gin and Lou are back together, not as lovers but collaborating on a screen play about Mary Shelley, the creator of Frankenstein. In walks Frankenstein himself. The play poses the question whether lovers whose paths have separated through the storm of love can return to each other as friends. As I write this Dyan and I have completed “Remain Calm” and she continues to collaborate with me on the book of my musical, “Vampyre, Vampyre.”
The final jewel in this life chain of female collaborators is my daughter, Brandy. I am now coached by my daughter at the AZ academy in Phoenix in “The Method.” My daughter helps me to reawaken a forty year acting career stopped by a twenty year career in the public schools.
Christy Arnold, Odine Hofstahl, Dyan Cavalli and Brandy Hotchner are the women collaborators transforming my work as a playwright, composer and actor. I can barely fathom how lucky I am to have these women infuse the spirit of my art.