The best scene in “Dimension Zero” features icons of New York City: individual slices of pepperoni pizza who dance back into a whole pie, a Greek coffee cup, a yellow cab, a row of skyscrapers, a dollar bill, plastic garbage bags, and a rat – all of them puppets created and manipulated by the Brooklyn-based Boxcutter Collective.

The company, whose founding members are alumni of  Peter Schumann’s venerable Bread and Puppet Theater, describe their new show at HERE Arts Center as “a sci-fi puppet-filled anti-capitalist musical theater spectacle.”    To me, “Dimension Zero” is first and foremost deliciously inventive and playful puppetry — spiced with musical numbers, sprinkled with politics, dished out in a whimsical jumble of a plot.

Zandora 606 (Sam Wilson) from the Planet Zandora has been sent by Queen Zandora (all Zandorans are named Zandora) to investigate “a  previously uninteresting world” because the Earthlings are talking about colonizing other planets, thus spreading their dangerous habits.

“I’ve landed in a place they call New York City,” Zandora reports in her log (a la Captain Kirk.) “The residents appear to be very confused. They are obsessed mostly with two ideas: pizza and rent. They have a great love for one,but they are totally terrified of the other.”

And, even more baffling,  all Earthlings are obsessed with money. Cue the song: “It Doesn’t Make Sense”:

When the bottom line is money
And getting more is the most important thing
Something happens that is funny
Jobs that help most people don’t pay anything

Moving money from one place to another
is actually very profitable
But building housing to give people cover
Is somehow unaffordable

Zandora eventually enlists the Earthlings she meets, especially Radio Ray (Ali Dineen), to fight against the villain of the story, the evil Uncle Walter the Barefoot Billionaire (which evokes Walt Disney but also maybe Elon Musk, although the hand puppet resembles neither of them.)

Uncle Walter and the orphans

Uncle Walter produces a popular TV show called Orphan Wars, controls orphans brains with a newly developed device while making them mine precious metals on Mars, operates an ever-growing business of private prisons, and has started selling condominiums in Outer Space.

At first there is considerable mayhem: (Notice the guns jutting out of the skyscrapers?)

But then Ray uses her Ionic Oscillator to free the orphans brains from Uncle Walter’s grip (a kind of reverse flying monkeys/wicked witch situation), and Uncle Walter is defeated..

But defeating Uncle Walter is not enough for the Earth to be free of evil, as one of the Bing Bongs points out. (I’m not sure who the Bing Bongs are, but they wear a lot of tinfoil.)   “Dimension Zero is the corner of your brain where the logic of capitalism does not compute! We must collectively activate Dimension Zero to defeat this evil beast!”

This is the beast: Money! (Look at the back a one dollar bill to realize how clever this is)

The evil Pyramid, surrounded by the Bing Bongs

They lead the audience in reciting to the money monster: “We commit to imagining a world where you do not exist!”

There are other scenes along the way, such as a group of aliens holding rubber chickens, and a visit to a dive bar, where a puppet throws up, and a Punch and Judy puppet show that mixes in a keystone cop routine (with the audience applauding when the cop is knocked unconscious) Afterward, Zandora reports in her log –- and I (mostly) concur — 
“In this strange but interesting place called ‘Coney Island.’ I’ve just seen a ‘puppet show’. It presented well informed critiques of social issues, but in a form that is difficult to take seriously. I am not convinced that this medium is the most effective, but if this critique reaches more people, I believe many problems of this planet could be solved. I wish them the best of luck.”

 

Dimension Zero
HERE through October 30
Running time: 90 minutes no intermission
Tickets: $30 (they are sold out; waiting list starts two hours before showtime)
All Puppets, Scenery, Music and Text created by Boxcutter Collective
Travis Wright (Sound Designer)
Christina Tang (Lighting Designer)
Trudi Cohen (Outside Eye)
Claire Leibowitz (Stage Manager)
Laren LeBlanc (Costume Design for Zandora)
Ray Dondero (Wigs and Costumes for the Zandorians)
Cast: Joseph Jonah Therrien, Sam Wilson, Tom Cunningham, Darkin Brown, Jason Hicks, Lily Paulina, Ali Dineen, and Harrison Greene Rock band: Guitar/Piano by Kyle Morgan, Guitar/Piano by Rashad Brown, Drums by Chris Schroth, and Bass Guitar by Mary Feaster.
Photos by Richard Termine

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