DEAD END DUMMY to Transfer to La MaMa Next Month

Coney Island USA, the organization that brings you the Mermaid Parade, Sideshows by the Seashore and Burlesque at the Beach, is proud to announce the next phase of its 30 year mission to defend the honor of American Popular Culture: Dead End Dummy, a Funhouse Philosophers Production.

Funhouse Philosophers is Coney Island USA's new resident theatre company, a special initiative to bring variety entertainment and the theatre arts to its fall season, by presenting theatreworks in the distinctive populist vein of its pioneering sideshow, burlesque, and other popular programs.

Written by Coney Island USA's Founder and Artistic Director Dick D. Zigun, Dead End Dummy, is an expressionistic Halloween time trip that uses the eerie atmosphere of the sideshow to take you into the mind of a disturbed vaudeville ventriloquist, played by Sideshows by the Seashore's Scott Baker - who actually performs ventriloquism in the role. His journey takes him from vaudeville and melodrama, through gramophones and silent films, old time radio, and 50's television and ultimately a Quixotic attempt at a vaudeville revival. Along the way, he meets his nemesis Thomas Edison (Douglas Mackrell, The Royal Order of the Holy Mackerel), and is separated from the love of his life (singer Poor Baby Bree, PoorBabyBree.com). The show features a live musical score, played on cello, piano, uke and toy xylophone by Becca Bernard, and was directed by downtown showman Trav S.D., (travsd.wordpress.com) who most recently produced and directed the sold out NYC Fringe hit I'll Say She Is, the first ever revival of the Marx Brothers' first Broadway show.

Dead End Dummy runs at Coney Island through November 2, 2014, then moves to La MaMa on November 7, running through November 16, 2014.

This project is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, in partnership with the City Council.