INTERVIEW: During difficult times, Robert Dubac finds the funny in ‘Book of Moron’
Photo: Robert Dubac performs in his new show, The Book of Moron. Photo courtesy of Moment-to-Moment Productions / Provided by Keith Sherman and Associates with permission.
Robert Dubac’s new one-man show is all about intelligence, or the lack thereof. In The Book of Moron, now playing at the SoHo Playhouse in New York City, Dubac plays multiple characters on his existential journey of trying to figure out these strange, strange times. Along the way, he has more than a few comedic zingers about the collective stupidity he sees in society and his own diminishing I.Q.
It has been a long road for this show. In its early stages, Gary Shandling actually served as the director. In recent months, Dubac, who is both writer and performer, knew he wanted to set up the show in New York City for an off-Broadway run that welcomed back audiences following the worst of the pandemic. The Delta variant, which still hovers like a looming cloud over live performances, had other thoughts.
“We always had the dream of coming here to New York, so I workshopped it a bit for a couple years prior to COVID and felt it was strong enough,” Dubac said in a recent phone interview. “Of course, I did not expect the Delta variant to affect us the way it did, but I thought if we were get back in before Broadway opened up, we might have a chance of getting people — first of all, give them something to laugh about because they have been shut down for the past year and a half, and also be able to get out and test the waters. But it’s been a little dicey because of the Delta variant. We’ve got a lot of people laughing and having a good time, if you want to come out. You have to be vaccinated, so it’s starting to work out. It’s just a slower climb.”
As Dubac put it, everything in the show is moron-related. Although the title of the play seemingly references a particular religion (and a particularly popular musical that normally plays uptown), the show has nothing to do with religion per say.
“It has to do with stupidity, which a lot of atheists might think is the same thing,” Dubac said. “We’ve been bombarded with so much hype and spin over the past four years, [so the show] pinpoints everything we’ve been told is not wrong, that’s not right, alternative facts, how we’ve been completely anesthetized with the truth. And the entire show is trying to use some critical thought in order to figure out what the truth is. Fortunately, it does it through laughter. Otherwise, I’d just be preaching.”
When Dubac was writing the piece, and constantly changing it for these changing times, he realized that as he’s grown older he has gotten better at finding the funny. When he was younger, say when he was creating the show The Male Intellect: An Oxymoron?, he could test out his comedic chops on a live audience. Nowadays, with a global pandemic churning outside, he relies more on his instincts when trying to figure out what material could work in the final show.
“I found that I’ve gotten better at it the older I am,” he said. “It used to be you had to try it out in front of an audience. Obviously, over this past year, there hasn’t been an audience, but I have found that a lot of it is the methodical way of memorizing and performing and understanding the cadence in your mind. I’ve had about 20-30 years of experiences, so I know when something … is going to hit and what’s not going to hit. And as a comedian or a standup, you learn to buffer the new stuff with something beforehand that you know works and something afterhand that you know works, so you have an in and out for the new joke.”
Dubac was quick to point out that The Book of Moron, which continues through Oct. 3, is not exactly standup comedy. First of all, he portrays several different characters on the stage of the SoHo Playhouse. Each character has their own voice, and this creates a buffer between himself and the outrageous lines that come out in the play. “So there’s a lot of humor out there that can be dark humor that people need buffered from a different voice, so that’s what I do quite a bit of in the show,” he said.
As he crafted The Book of Moron, he was conscious of not using any material that would grow stale too fast, so most of his ruminating on idiocracy is more existential in nature. He leaves the punchy, of-the-minute jests to the late-night hosts on TV.
“It’s more substance instead of image, more a trend instead of a fad, it’s more of an overall embracement of what’s going on in the culture,” Dubac said. “Yes, there are specific little nuances that I alert to, but those are easily changed. … There are references that can be plugged and played in, but the overall idea of it is a guy who has lost his memory. He cannot figure out what the truth is anymore. He has to start from scratch, which means he has no indoctrination, so he actually has to learn all four levels of the truth in order to be able to wake up from his coma of stupidity.”
And the audience is invited along for the ride.
By John Soltes / Publisher / John@HollywoodSoapbox.com
The Book of Moron, written and performed by Robert Dubac, plays through Oct. 3 at the SoHo Playhouse in New York City. Click here for more information and tickets.
