Wrote two or four pieces about this other Ralph Steadman. Oregon’s version (above) was a big-headed, big-hearted, big-bodied multi-dimensional entertainer I had the pleasure of hanging out with a few times back in the day. The day before the day actually. As Gonzo as the other artist formally known as Ralph Steadman.
“Greater Tuna is the hilarious comedy about Texas’ third smallest town, where the Lion’s Club is too liberal and Patsy Cline never dies. The eclectic band of citizens that make up this town are portrayed by only two performers, making this satire on life in rural America even more delightful as they depict all of the inhabitants of Tuna — men, women, children and animals.” From the official website.
Ralph has been dead a few years; I just unfriended him on Facebook. Find I know more than a couple of folks who live on, online. October 17, 1990. – JDW
“Hunger was his best pickle.”
I don’t know what that means either. It’s a line from a eulogy – for a local judge who was found dead in a one-piece Dale Evans swimsuit, with fringe – offered by the Reverend Spikes in SRO Productions “Great Tuna.” The uproarious comedy is at the Portland Civic Theatre through November 11.
Ralph Steadman plays the Reverend, as well as nine (9) other characters from the town of Tuna, Texas, population 573.
Jay Randall Horenstein plays another ten (10) folks. Between the two of them, they manage to expose the psyche of the entire population of our second largest state like a bad bowl of chili. The morning after.
Maybe you’ve heard of Steadman. He’s the most ballistic of talk show hosts of 620 KGW talk radio, co-starring in the morning from 5:30 to 9 with Deb James. That’s a.m. Ralph’s a natural for this tour de farce that features a down-home country radio station (OKKK) as its framework.
Yes, he is. Yes, he is. He surely is.
Consider the Wheelie/Struvie Report. The McNeil-Lehrer Hour as done by Gomer Pyle. “We have the results of the Tuna Junior High American Essay Writing Contest. Third place went to Levita Posey for ‘The Other Side Of Bigotry.’ Runner-up was Jimbo Beaumont for ‘Living With Radiation.’ First place was won by Connie Carp, daughter of W.H. and Vera Carp. Her moving piece was titled ‘Human Rights: Why Bother?’ Congratulations, kids. You’ve done us proud.”
Then there’s the indispensable farm report. “Beef up. Pork down. I got chickens vacillating.”
When they’re not on the air, Steadman and Horenstein are on stage as the station’s devoted listening audience. Jay Randall captures the room as Stanley, the drugged-out, long-haired teenager who spent a year in reform school for the heinous crime of stop-sign defacement. He’s the rebel with the skull on his t-shirt… “Kill’em All. Let God Sort’em Out.” Now there’s a Lone Star philosophy.
Steadman spends much of the evening in drag. We’re talking major league ugly here. Six feet tall, “280 pounds of lean, mean, blue-twisted steel, he looks like a pile of bowling balls. Arranged in a pyramid. You haven’t lived until you’ve seen him in a purple muumuu, couple strand of pearls and a beehive wig. You haven’t. You surely haven’t.
Big Ralph’s favorite role is that of Berta Bumiller. “She has no control over her own home. Her kids are screwed up. Her marriage is a total failure,” Steadman points out. “But, she is confident she has the answer to society’s problems.”
And what’s that?
“She’s the chairwoman of Citizens For Fewer Blacks In Literature.”
Relax.
This is satire. Bertha may not be kidding, but Ralph is. Yes, he is. He surely is. “Greater Tuna” is nothing short of hysterical. It’s so funny, a fight almost broke out recently in the audience. Apparently, a self-appointed member of the Performance Police decided another man was having too much fun. He was laughing TOO LOUDLY.
The next thing, two grown men are standing beak-to-beak like bantam roosters with hormonal problems. Jawing at each other, they almost came to blows. Unfortunately, they did manage to interrupt the performance momentarily, draining the good vibrations off the stage like some black hole of bad karma.
Maybe you remember Ralph from that Pace Picante sauce TV ad. The one where they caught some dude with New York City salsa. Ralph’s big line was “Get a rope.”
The man can act.
After seven years of not being on stage, “Greater Tuna was a play that offered everything,” Ralph Steadman explains. “It is cleansing and spiritual, a personal catharsis. I needed to know I could still make audiences laugh.”
That the man can do. That he can. Surely.
Epilogue. Stanley somehow managed to reach old age.
But it’s true what they say about your brain looking like fried eggs in a hot pan.
Anyway, he unfriended all Ralph’s friends, then afterwards, reprised this piece.
It’s that kind of thinking that’s gonna make America great again.
Surely.
