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Dead ringers
Sci-fi rock opera sets celebrity lookalikes
against a flying, brain-eating jukebox
The last sword: Celebrity lookalikes face off against a brain-eating Wurlitzer jukebox in the new rock opera “Bloody Brains in a Juke Box,” starting March 6 in Coney Island. Photo by Tatiana Ilina
By Kevin Duggan Rage against the machine!
A Coney Island theater troupe
will bring a sci-fi satire rock opera
about vintage celebrity lookalikes battling
a brain-devouring Wurlitzer jukebox to the
People’s Playground. “Bloody Brains in a
Juke Box,” which opens on March 6 for
a month-long run at Coney Island USA,
is a comedy reminiscent of cult movie
musicals of the 1970s and 1980s, according
to the show’s writer.
“It’s something like ‘Rocky Horror
Picture Show’ or ‘Little Shop of Horrors,’ ”
said Dick Zigun, the head of the Funhouse
Philosophers company and the unofficial
mayor of Coney Island.
The experimental theater piece uses
songs — accompanied by a live rock
and roll band — to tell the story of midcentury
Hollywood stars Sidney Poitier,
Audrey Hepburn, Jackie Coogan, and
Jayne Mansfield, in an alternate universe
filled with echoes of their lives and the
characters they played. The story spans
150 years, starting in the 1950s with all
of the characters as doctors, and ends in
2099, at the end of the world.
The characters face off against a
jukebox that comes to life, flies around,
dances, sings, and eventually consumes
their brains, in a story that is only for those
over 18, according to Zigun.
“It’s very weird, very macabre, funny
as s---, there’s a lot of bad language,
simulated brain juice, brain matter
splatter,” he said.
All of the characters die by the end of
the second act; the third act is set in 2099,
when aliens discover the machine, which
has become an international celebrity.
Zigun issued a call for film star
lookalikes back in October, and saw
more than 100 applicants before finding
his actors. Nightlife figure Satine
S’Allumer will portray Jayne Mansfield
“outrageously in drag,” according to
Zigun, while burlesque performer Reina
Terror plays Audrey Hepburn, character
actor Peter Sullivan takes on Coogan, and
up-and-coming dancer and singer Aaron
McMillan plays Poitier.
“We were looking for young talent,”
Zigun said.
The sentient jukebox is voiced by
puppeteer Sam Wilson, who must also
maneuver the full-sized device across
a stage strewn with bloody props. The
production is the 40-year-old theater
group’s most ambitious — and most
expensive — yet, according to Zigun.
“We put about $20,000 into getting this
show created,” he said.
“Bloody Brains in a Jukebox,” at Coney
Island USA 1208 Surf Ave. at W. 12th
Street in Coney Island, (718) 372–5159,
www.coneyisland.com. March 6–29, Fri–
Sat at 8 pm, Sun at 3 pm. $12–$30.
Your entertainment
guide Page 33
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HOW TO REACH US
COURIER L 2 IFE, MARCH 6-12, 2020
Feds kill
Brooklyn
seawall Development continues in post-Sandy fl ood
BY JESSICA PARKS
Eight years after Hurricane
Sandy devastated
southern Brooklyn’s
coastal communities,
developers continue to
erect multi-family and
single-family homes
along the Kings County
shoreline as homebuyers
seek out luxury waterfront
properties.
“People want to live
in specifi c communities
along the water,” said
Alexander Lotovsky of
Citiscape Consultants,
an architecture fi rm
based in Sheepshead
Bay. “When Hurricane
Sandy happened, everyone
thought this was the
end to an era in Manhattan
Beach and that
has proven to have been
completely wrong.”
From the onset of 2019
to the publication of this
article, developers have
fi led more than a dozen
new building applications
in Sheepshead Bay,
Manhattan Beach and
Gerritsen Beach with
the city Department of
Buildings, which if approved
could bring hundreds
of new residents
to the shoreline communities,
where just years
ago locals were holed up
in their buildings waiting
for the water lines to
recede.
“When Sandy hit we
had somewhere around
10 feet of water in our
building,” said Maurice
Kolodin, a resident
of the Bel Air apartment
complex on E. 12th
Street. “The entire fi rst
fl oor was wiped out of
each building. There was
no out, you could not get
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FLOODED WITH
BY ROSE ADAMS AND
JESSICA PARKS
Just weeks after President
Donald Trump
blasted the plan on
Twitter, federal authorities
abruptly halted a
$19 million feasibility
study of a massive storm
protection barrier off
the coast of southern
Brooklyn — prompting
experts to advocate for
smaller-scale, localized
alternatives.
“We are in support of
looking at innovations
of resilience and applying
them in places they
are needed,” said Robert
Freudenberg, the vice
president of the Regional
Plan Association.
The US Army Corps
of Engineers was halfway
through its six-year,
multi-million dollar
storm resiliency study
that examined four proposals
to build stormresilient
infrastructure
around New York and
New Jersey.
The proposals included
a $9 billion plan
to build scattered levees
and fl ood walls across
the city’s coastal areas
and a $62 billion sea wall
equipped with retractable
gates that would run
six miles between the
Rockaways and New Jersey.
However, the study
came to a stop when the
Army Corps announced
on Feb. 10 that their
2020 work plan did not
include funding for further
research — less than
a month after the commander
in chief publicly
called the potential sea
wall “foolish.”
plains as buyers seek luxury waterfront digs
An “eco-friendly” longterm care facility proposed for Sheepshead Bay has
been designed with fl ooding in mind. Citiscape Architectural Consultants
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