Flux Theatre Ensemble

What is The Imagination Compact?

And how can I learn more about Flux's Misdummer?

Jeremy Basescu

Playwright, The Mechanicals, May 19th

Flux History: Plays developed at Flux Sunday include A Wonderful Wife and Calling CQ

1. What is your favorite Shakespeare play?

*King Lear.* It creates such a complete, compelling world that I can't help
but get sucked into it every time I start reading. Nature and artifice,
family and bastardry, sex and insanity… and it's often a mess, but such a
fantastic mess that I just want to roll around in it, run through a
torrential storm, and howl.

2. What is your favorite line of text?

"If music be the food of love, play on." ~*Twelfth Night*


3. Does Shakespeare influence your writing at all?

Shakespeare influences how I breathe, how I think, and how I live my life.
Writing plays is an extension of each of those, and his influence is
inextricable from my imagination.  I grew up with the Charles and Mary Lamb
versions, played Sebastian in the second grade, and went to see
*Midsummer *outdoors
before I learned how babies are made.  Shakespeare's characters are more
real to me than most of the people I know, and they are just as likely to
show up in my plays.  Having said all that, I still haven't read through the
histories.  Someday.

4. If you had to date one of the Midsummer lovers, whom would you date and
why?
Helena.  Totally.  Aside from that I have a soft spot for hard-luck cases, I
don't think there'd be a dull moment.  Also, I'm pretty sure she's hot.

5. What is the first thing you think of when you hear the word "flux"?
A trampoline.

6. Fairies: colorful playmates or dangerous tricksters?
Both (the best kind).  I think I might stay out of any long-term romantic
entanglements, though; last thing I need is a bad break-up followed by
waking up the next morning with a wombat for a head.

7. If the Flux Capacitor made time travel possible when the DeLorean reached
88mph, what do you think would happen if Flux Theatre Ensemble got theatre
up to 88mph?
Marty McFly would play Hamlet.  This would officially signal the death of
theater.  On the bright side, all you need is a DeLorean to sneak into the
world premiere of *Titus Andronicus*.

8. Complete this sentence: "It's too late to go back now, I'll just have to
do without my _______"
Sense of self-worth

9. If a capricious fairy turned you into an animal against your will, what
animal would you be and why?
An anteater.  I've always secretly wondered what those things are thinking.
I'm guessing it has something to do with ants, but there's only one way to
find out.

10. Which would win in a fight - the forest of Midsummer or the forest of
Arden?
Never bet against sweet Puck.

11. How many licks does it take...?
As many as possible.

12. Would you rather have a beer with Richard Burbage or William Kemp?
Clearly Kemp.  Burbage was a pompous twit; Kemp was the funniest drunk
alive.  However, if we were going on a hunting trip, I'd take Burbage,
because Kemp would be much likelier to pull a Dick Cheney.

13. If we could compact your imagination, what color would it be and why?
Brown.  Put lots of colors together, and you get brown.  (I have no
imagination.)