It’s bad enough that politicians screw over their constituents. Do they have to screw over the English language, too?
Thanks to sleazy politicos involved in career-breaking sex scandals such as ex-Idaho senator Larry Craig and South Carolina governor Mark Sanford, such previously innocuous phrases as “wide stance” and “hiking the Appalachian Trail” have forever lost their innocence.
Those faux pas, and more, are hilariously spotlighted in “Tail! Spin!” at the New York International Fringe Festival. It’s the creation of Mario Correa, a former congress-ional aide and lobbyist who clearly knows the territory well.
The show features five performers delivering mostly deadpan, verbatim recitals of the actual words of such notorious figures as Anthony Weiner (Nate Smith), Mark Foley (Dan Hodapp), Sanford (Mo Rocca) and Craig (Sean Dugan). Former “SNL” regular Rachel Dratch plays the women in the men’s lives, and also reprises her riotous Barbara Walters impression. The text — taken entirely from real e-mails, text messages, IMs, press conferences and interviews — scathingly portrays its subjects hoisting themselves on their own verbal petards.
“I’m a fairly wide guy,” Craig haplessly explains about his foot wandering over to an adjoining bathroom stall at a Minneapolis airport. His wife, meanwhile, wonders, “I asked myself if I missed something somewhere.”
Directed by Dan Knechtges (“Lysistrata Jones”), the show humorously riffs on such things as Weiner’s boastful references to his “package” and the Sanford press rep’s platitudinous explanations for his boss’ bizarre disappearance.
The performers, who frequently double in peripheral roles, are terrific, with Smith especially funny as both the perpetually horny Weiner and a teenage male page who responds to Foley’s come-ons with Valley girl-style vocal inflections. Dratch is a hoot as the no-nonsense Jenny Sanford, the exception to the usual politician’s wife standing by her man. Her facial expression is priceless when she relates how her husband pathetically asked, “Why can’t you just give me permission?” when he wanted to travel to Argentina to see his mistress.
Clearly destined for future theatrical life, the show is also rife with sequel possibilities thanks to the seemingly never-ending stream of politicians incapable of keeping it in their pants.