Mystery Sandbox Theater
Gallery 13
1215 E 13 Ave

For the most underground theater experience in Denver, take a seat at Gallery 13 for the next performance of Mystery Sandbox Theater's "Delirium." Mystery Sandbox Theater, created by Roger Beauchamp and John Ankerpont, is a deliciously heretical blend of performance art and Muppets Gone Goth. There is absolutely nothing mainstream about this production, nor the venue for that matter. In fact, the entire experience might best be described as an aesthetic deep tissue massage hosted by Steven McDole, owner of Gallery 13.

Gallery 13 is an art gallery featuring work by local artists. For Mystery Sandbox Theater performances,the venue is converted to a theater via the addition of a few dozen fold out chairs complimented by a couple of vintage couches and thoroughly lived in recliners, all of which have been made into minor art objects due to some well placed paint drizzles and cohesive arrangement. The stage is a small puppeteering box graced by a luxuriant antique red-velvet curtain that floats in front of the audience like a living spectral canvass of theater life through the ages.

Audience members, upon entering, are greeted by Steve McDole, and invited to the back of the gallery to enjoy complimentary wine, beer and popcorn. There is ample time before the show to browse multiple genres of artwork displayed throughout the gallery while an evocative blend of 40s and 50s music drifts through the room like an ethereal vapor.

By the time you are gently instructed to take your seat among the throngs of young hipsters and graceful works of art you will find that this feels more like an intimate gathering of Denver 's avant-garde than a theatrical endeavor. But as the lights go down and the curtain rises you'll find yourself in for more than a few surprises.

Flashing lights leak intriguingly through gaps in the curtain as a shift in music directs the audience's full attention to the stage. The show opens innocently enough, with Granny and Pattie Pumpernickel yokeling it up on the farm with the cat. Granny and Pattie provide the comic relief that eases the audience's transitions through some of the more uneasy scenes. In other words, they are the down-to-earth narrators who keep the audience somewhat grounded in reality by breaking up some otherwise very unearthly theatrical journeys.

In two acts of four scenes each, Beauchamp and Ankerpont use music, lighting, stage effects, action and dialogue to steer the audience through dark recesses of imaginings that make Chuckie and ET seem like comical cartoon characters. The puppets themselves, beautifully grotesque and brimming with character, can only be described as art evolving -- both on stage and in the audience's mind. In act one, the audience relaxes into the blue-skied cock-a-doodle-doings of Pattie and Granny. However, just as the first yawn of "cute puppets" begins to work its way to the throat, viewers find themselves plunged into scene one, aptly titled "The Scum of Love," starring Stan and Raptorina drifting through a haze of fog while dancing in an alien Gothic nightclub scene backlit by techno colored lights.

Stan is perhaps my favorite character. His face has the leathery air of a mummified alien with dark slashes of sockets for eyes and an intriguingly gaping gash for a mouth. His hands are painful exclamations, like fin- gers of twisted tree stumps bemoaning their upside-down-ness to the air above. Sam dances and whirls through an alien plane of reality that feels like a chasm or a tomb. Or perhaps his fetal qualities might make it a womb of dejection, evoking the rejection and pain of still-born love. There is something about Stan that lingers on the mind, like the rancid taste of love unrequited, long after the curtain goes down. Indeed poor Stan must be the scum of love, a character to whom many of us can relate.

Another standout of act one was "The Precious Baby Doll Twins" performed to the song "Are Friends Electric?" The song is wraithlike, and the Baby Doll Twins are cadaverous representations of twisted innocence. The twins reminded me of a time in the late 60s when Denver was adorned by scores of naked plastic dolls nailed to porch- posts. I never got the point of that movement, but it left a lasting impression, as does the twins' scene. The echoing vocals of "Electric" provide an appropriate backdrop to the morbidness of a vacant life exhibited by the twins who play with body parts as if they were rattles and teething rings. This is, it seems, a social commentary on the abhorrent distortions real life can take on. The scene is meaningful, it is hopeless, and it is intensely sad.

Not to worry though, Granny and Pattie come to the rescue and retrieve the audience from the depths of depravity with wagon- loads of colloquialisms, and mouthfuls of parroting dialogue just before intermission. Intermission also brings the drawing of ticket stubs for mystery door prizes. Lucky audience members were given CDs, and wrapped packages that included plastic ants, a whoopee cushion, and blue-mouth candy. By the end of the intermission the atmos- phere was decidedly light-hearted again, as was the rest of the show.

Act two featured Queen Wannakumba and the Tiki-a-go-gos in a wild dance routine performed by some amazingly mobile and limber happily-hideous puppets.In the second scene of act two, the audience is treated to Granny and Pattie singing acutely off-key karaoke, in a funny (if slightly too long) satire of the bar trend that should have been buried before it was birthed.

By far, the stand out scene of act two was Wanda Winnebago at the Black Cat Lounge. Winnebago, a red-lipsticked, gash-mouthed, aging lounge singer reminiscent of Gloria Swanson opens by singing "The Crying Game." A dozen or so peacock feathers waved around on her head while the machis-mo-femme hoarseness of her baritone voice wafts through the audience. The singing numbers are punctuated by jokes about her new boobs, which are poseable, and the finite "infrastructure" of her bouffant.

Wanda treats the audience to a hilariously hoarse, frogified version of "I Fall to Pieces" just before she does a costume change for her next number.The garish make-up, the well-timed waving of the cigarette holder, and the presence of back-up singers make her next number, "SOS," feel like a trip to the dive-bar act of a pathetic off-the-strip Vegas casino. Wanda wraps up her act with a poignant aplomb steeped in the pathos of an arthritic has-been glamour queen.

"The Curiosity Crew," is the finale of the show in which aliens dance to techno-moan music while waving a stop sign. But, even after two hours of "puppets," the audience is left wanting more. In whole or in part, this show is more of a shared experience than a dramatic puppet production. It reminds us that there is voracious life hidden in the underground of our psyches and that this life finds light through the vehicle of art. Roger Beauchamp and John Ankerpont are artists who play an active role in the presentation of their work. They are accomplished puppeteers who, though never visible to the audience, are so familiar with their character's nuances that they infuse each puppet with a living and honest existence. Ankerpont is a poet, and Beauchamp is an artist that works in multiple mediums. The puppets are but one outlet for Beauchamp 's artistic talents. Constructed of wire, paper, cardboard, paint and various other accouterments, the puppets combine onstage to embody an unlikely family of warped humanity that lurks somewhere below the surface in all of us. It is perhaps this appeal to our thalamic nature that drives the emotional impact of this production. Or it is perhaps our intrigue with the other-worldly underworld of existence that gives us a connection to the reality of these mutations of human nature. Whatever the motivations, I highly recommend a visit to Gallery 13 for the next presentation of Mystery Sandbox Theater.

The next show date should be sometime in May (call the information line for details). I'd advise arriving early, as the production I attended filled the house completely. Given that the ticket price is only $5, and given that Steven McDole uses both his venue and his gracious hosting skills to create a warm and intimate ambiance, and given the fact that the price of admission includes free wine, beer, and popcorn along with some very unusual visual art, I'd have to bill this as one of the best dollar-for-dollar entertainments on the Denver theater scene.

If you're up for an off-balance, extra-worldly inversion of social consciousness, if the words weird, wild, and wiggy appeal to you on any level, or if you're curious to see what's trippy and hip in Denver theater, be sure not to miss the next unveiling of Mystery Sandbox Theater. Until then, as Granny says, "Keep your sunny side up and your smelly side downwind."

Additional reporting by Michael Albert. For information, call 720-849-3768.