The Friday Five, October 28, 2011

FIVE LITTLE KNOWN FACTS ABOUT THEATRE

File under: Top Secret (filed under Bottom Secret).

by Matt Raudsepp of Matt and Kyle and Matt

Theatre was invented by an alien race

Long ago, just prior to the time the great pyramids were built, an alien race settled on Earth. While they had publicly enslaved us to build massive monuments to their gods, they had secretly come here to create an ancient-times “reality show” for their weekend entertainment. These aliens watched us in our newly built slave-homes behind the veil of an invisible “fourth wall”. Human interpreters were present in the alien viewing rooms to translate or expand upon things said or done by the unsuspecting ”performers”, and as such, developed an eye for the drama of human existence. Theatre was born.

The aliens had no urinary system

It is entirely unnatural to sit still for that long without going to the washroom. While the human interpreters needed constant “intermissions” (so-called for disturbing the alien transmissions) to relieve themselves, the aliens had a complex water recovery system inside their bodies and never urinated (see: NASA documents).

Applause has evil roots

Upon completion of the “performance”, or after growing tired of the human spectacle before them, the aliens would disengage the invisible “fourth wall” and draw attention to themselves by clapping their flat, vertical jaws together. The surprised human slaves assumed this was praise. The human interpreters knew that the clapping sound was the aliens’ way of readying their mouths for feeding. Bowing was the only way to avoid the mouth-tentacles as they shot forth to reel the “actors” into the salivating mouths of the aliens. For no other apparent reason other than post-traumatic stress disorder, the human interpreters who promoted theatre post-alien-evacuation continued to clap and cry after performances, solidifying applause’s place in Theatre tradition.

The first playwrights were alien scientists

They were developing mind control devices to use on human slaves when they stumbled upon the idea of making humans say whatever ridiculous things they could think up. The very first written plays consisted of two humans saying a string of alien swears and cusses. Having no understanding of the language, the human interpreters assumed it was high art. I believe that show was later erroneously translated by Aeschylus, and titled “The Persians”.

Theatre only exists on Earth

The aliens eventually evacuated Earth but never thought to tell their own stories once they had returned to their home planet. It was all a blip on their vast radar. Humans on Earth kept the torch burning and developed Theatre into what it is today. Still, undercover tours of youths from the alien planet occasionally appear in theatres around the world hoping to hear some dirty cusses in their native language. Greek tragedies sometimes get laughs from disguised alien teenager tours, but Cirque du Soleil always delivers the worst alien vulgarities via its made-up languages. So, the next time strangely dressed teens laugh during serious parts of your favourite shows, just remember: at least nobody is being eaten by an alien’s vertical jaws tonight.