It's a Dry Teat


Reviewed 10/23/05

GUV TV
Book by Philip Taylor and Ben Tyler; Lyrics by Philip Taylor, Ben Tyler, and Gavin McLeod; Music by Gavin McLeod
Directed by Philip Taylor
Scottsdale Center for the Performing Arts
4301 Theater, Scottsdale
(480) 994-2787
October 21st - November 6th, 2005
$36.00
Discount tickets may be available at

At once funny and awful, silly and smart, inspired and awkward. No, I speak not of Arizona’s historic cabal of misfits and scam artists we generously call politicians, but of Ben Tyler’s latest iteration of the GUV franchise started so many years ago at the long lost Mill Ave Theatre. Each time a version has been mounted, it spelled doom for a performing space: first was the theatre turned high-priced hair salon in the attic of a Mill Avenue walkup, and next, the 1996 bust GUV: The Emperor Strikes Back opened and closed the cavernous, converted film emporium, The Scottsdale Playhouse. I have no fears for Theatre 4301, although the irony of this former IMAX theatre in the bowels of the political clusterfuck formerly known as The Scottsdale Galleria should not be lost while taking the elevator down. What do writer/director Philip Taylor, writer/actor Tyler, and writer/music director Gavin McLeod have to offer to the public in the third installment of this satire? More of the same. That’s more of a disparaging remark than it is a compliment.

When GUV TV works, as it sometimes does, it is a treat; but when it doesn’t, it clunks onstage like a dying jackalope. Where the cast, some of the material, and the acoustics killed the first sequel, two and a half of the three negative elements have been removed. The cast (Tyler, Tracy Coe, Kristen Drathman, Cathy Dresbach, Christian Miller, and Mel Reid) is a professional, supremely talented bunch that is doing its best to carry the show. Though the theatre is oddly shaped, the acoustics are marginally better. As for the material, well…it has a few moments. It’s just that those moments inevitably wind up buried long after the punch lines have been left behind.

Those good moments include the first act-ending spectacle “Let’s Work Together (“I” in Napolitano),” in which a guitar-wielding Janet (played and sung wonderfully by Dresbach and sporting a subtle “rainbow” guitar strap) drags everyone along as she strums and strong-arms her way around stage flanked by sycophants and a security detail. Another high point is the beginning of most every sketch, including a Mexican game show hosted by a lusty Vincente Fox (Tyler) with promises of a fake social security card and a dropoff in Casa Grande; a cooking (the books) show with J. Fife (Miller); and an Arizona Survivor battle among the remaining state Republicans (Drathman and Miller). I say the beginnings because the one enormous problem of the authors is the inability to know when to let go of a joke and end the scene. A cute song sung by dynamo Coe about last year’s transformer woes hits the coda that wouldn’t quit with a multi-minute long refrain referencing every possible song over the past 100 years containing the word “heat.” The couple next to me sighed repeatedly as yet another “hot” line from another song was tossed in. So it was with every sketch: A promising start, some jabs and biting asides (though not nearly as slash-and-burn as previous productions), and then on and on and on until the original point is blunter than Sheriff Joe.

A joking “Arizona Idle,” based on American Idol, offers five songs, the highlight being Reid rapping “Do the McCain” in a white fright wig. However, it takes up almost as much time to get to this as the somewhat enlightening and sorely long-winded history lesson chronicling every single Territorial and Elected Governor to darken the steps of the Capital at the start of the show. It’s a matter of a cutting show desperately in need of pruning.

As half the name of the show is TV, there’s a video element. Produced by local actor Gene Ganssle, it is horrifyingly amateur and not very funny to boot. It makes slapdash Channel 3 look like video masters in comparison. There was a noticeable and amazingly annoying two-second lag between audio and video, and moments that could have been enhanced by some type of video that were left instead to limp along with stills.

Gavin MacLeod’s onstage band is consistent, although they often compete with the uniformly unmemorable music and awkward lyrics. Joseph Wolves Kill has created an entertaining onstage mural; you might find yourself staring at it while listening to a litany of heat references or during some of the later sections of never ending sketches.

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