$700,000 from the taxpayer for off-Broadway musical about global warming

[Adam]

National Science Foundation funded climate change musical to tune of $700,000

Call it Climate Change: The Musical!

The National Science Foundation has spent nearly $700,000 on a climate change-themed theatrical production, leaving some in Congress questioning if the organization's grant funds could be put to better use.

Rep. Lamar Smith, R-Texas, questioned White House science czar John Holdren in a hearing last Thursday about the way the NSF is using taxpayer money -- including on the grants for the play, a New York production called "The Great Immensity."

[....]

The play is being produced by New York-based activist theater group The Civilians with a grant award from 2010. According to a plot description on the theater company’s website, "The Great Immensity" focuses on a woman named Phyllis as she tries to track down a friend who disappeared while filming an assignment for a nature show on a tropical island. During her search, she also uncovers a devious plot surrounding an international climate summit in Auckland, New Zealand.

The description says the play is “a thrilling and timely production” that is “a highly theatrical look into one of the most vital questions of our time: how can we change ourselves and our society in time to solve the enormous environmental challenges that confront us?”

[....]

But the play wasn't the only NSF-funded project Smith had questions about. Pointing out several examples, Smith questioned the following projects:

• A $15,000 study on the fishing practices in and around Lake Victoria in Africa
• A whopping $340,000 on the examination of the “ecological consequences” of early human fires in New Zealand
• $200,000 towards a three-year study of the Bronze Age
• Another $50,000 towards the survey of archived lawsuits from 17th century Peru
• $20,000 for a study on the causes of stress in Bolivia

Unbelievable. Just unbelievable.

[Gingersnap]

How much waste like this is happening? Nobody, and I mean nobody knows. This is a prime example of 'mission creep'. The NSF should be in the business of promoting science. Climate change, Warmism, global warming/cooling, etc., is pretty much in the realm of political propaganda. Political bodies do this and it's part of their function but this body should stick to the original mission.

Luckily, the play will only be seen by a few urban women and gay men. I was reading just recently that Broadway is pretty much tanking because they can't get most women or virtually any straight men to attend.

[phillygirl]

It is really ridiculous. Our government is about providing advertisements, not providing services.

[Adam]

How much waste like this is happening? Nobody, and I mean nobody knows.

That's actually why I created this forum. No, NEIP is never going to manage to tabulate all of the waste in government, but we can at least get an idea of the scope of it.

This is a prime example of 'mission creep'. The NSF should be in the business of promoting science. Climate change, Warmism, global warming/cooling, etc., is pretty much in the realm of political propaganda. Political bodies do this and it's part of their function but this body should stick to the original mission.

AFAIC, it's just plain propaganda. I'm really pretty astonished at both the volume of stark, naked propaganda coming out of the Obama administration and the unabashed cheek of it. The Left had a complete meltdown because Bush had some flags around him at public events, but the Obama cult just gives a complete pass to this. Just imagine the shitstorm if Bush had spent tens of millions of dollars on an ad campaign to promote the Iraq war, much less having administration lackeys going to Hollywood to tell (not ask; TELL) screenwriters how they were to work positive mentions of Iraq into TV and movie scripts.

Luckily, the play will only be seen by a few urban women and gay men. I was reading just recently that Broadway is pretty much tanking because they can't get most women or virtually any straight men to attend.

Broadway isn't quite tanking yet, but it's about to. They haven't had anything genuinely fresh and new since "Wicked" opened, save a couple of neat limited engagements here and there, such as Patrick Stewart and Ian McKellen's mashup (which closed this past weekend). Broadway is busy resting upon their collective laurels doing mostly revivals lately. They're cheap to put on and don't require a lot of writing work, so they're about the only "new" things to come along these days. "The Book of Mormon" has run out of bitter, angry atheists to play to, and they've had to slash their ticket prices. "Wicked" probably still packs the house on weekends, but I'd bet the Thursday night shows are playing half-empty now; two years ago there was a six-month waiting list to get two seats together for even a Wednesday matinée. People have rejected the avant-garde for the sake of avant-garde stuff: people literally getting up and walking out of "Spring Awakening" was a routine matter before it closed. Turns out that there's a lot of people who don't want to pay $175 for an orchestra seat to watch some guy masturbate on stage, no matter how many Tonys the production has won.

Broadway will come back. It always does. It's just that the writers are going to have to do some actual work for a change.

[phillygirl]

That's actually why I created this forum. No, NEIP is never going to manage to tabulate all of the waste in government, but we can at least get an idea of the scope of it.

AFAIC, it's just plain propaganda. I'm really pretty astonished at both the volume of stark, naked propaganda coming out of the Obama administration and the unabashed cheek of it. The Left had a complete meltdown because Bush had some flags around him at public events, but the Obama cult just gives a complete pass to this. Just imagine the shitstorm if Bush had spent tens of millions of dollars on an ad campaign to promote the Iraq war, much less having administration lackeys going to Hollywood to tell (not ask; TELL) screenwriters how they were to work positive mentions of Iraq into TV and movie scripts.

Broadway isn't quite tanking yet, but it's about to. They haven't had anything genuinely fresh and new since "Wicked" opened, save a couple of neat limited engagements here and there, such as Patrick Stewart and Ian McKellen's mashup (which closed this past weekend). Broadway is busy resting upon their collective laurels doing mostly revivals lately. They're cheap to put on and don't require a lot of writing work, so they're about the only "new" things to come along these days. "The Book of Mormon" has run out of bitter, angry atheists to play to, and they've had to slash their ticket prices. "Wicked" probably still packs the house on weekends, but I'd bet the Thursday night shows are playing half-empty now; two years ago there was a six-month waiting list to get two seats together for even a Wednesday matinée. People have rejected the avant-garde for the sake of avant-garde stuff: people literally getting up and walking out of "Spring Awakening" was a routine matter before it closed. Turns out that there's a lot of people who don't want to pay $175 for an orchestra seat to watch some guy masturbate on stage, no matter how many Tonys the production has won.

Broadway will come back. It always does. It's just that the writers are going to have to do some actual work for a change.

Great news, because I've been meaning to go see that. I heard it was pretty good. Nothing wrong with poking a little fun at religion here and there. Even for us non-atheists.

[Frostbit]

Great news, because I've been meaning to go see that. I heard it was pretty good. Nothing wrong with poking a little fun at religion here and there. Even for us non-atheists.

Have you watched "Life of Brian" ?

[scott]

Great news, because I've been meaning to go see that. I heard it was pretty good. Nothing wrong with poking a little fun at religion here and there. Even for us non-atheists.

You have to see it. It's horrible!

[Adam]

Great news, because I've been meaning to go see that. I heard it was pretty good. Nothing wrong with poking a little fun at religion here and there. Even for us non-atheists.

You have to see it. It's horrible!

I've had at least four completely non-religious couples who went to see it and were so offended by the sheer venom of the show that they walked out at intermission. One of the couples left because people were so angry and volatile during intermission that they genuinely feared for violence breaking out before the show was over, and this was a Tuesday night show.

I don't really care what people see on Broadway (or anywhere else), and I've certainly gotten shows that I personally consider offensive for people, but "The Book of Mormon" is, without a doubt, widely considered the most offensive show on Broadway by people around here, who are Broadway regulars. So much so that we actually pulled a group booking of the show (300 seats) when very regular clientele refused to go on our organized trip if that was the show. A year later, better than half of our audience (from all over the country, from Seattle to Tampa to Chicago to Maine) were so offended that they walked out of the show, and these are people who happily watched things like "Hair," so not exactly prudes. At least four of the people we had who stormed out, fuming, are self-professed liberals from Berkeley (well, Richmond) who themselves have done things like nude sit-ins, and even they were so offended that they refused to sit through the show. I know because I had to personally find them tickets to some other impossible-to-get show for the "night off" because they were so incredibly furious about the show.

I think that Trey Parker is a comedic genius. I also think that "The Book of Mormon" is also probably so incredibly offensive that it's no better than Sandra Bernhard and Bill Maher doing a duet of "Gang-Rape Sarah Palin:" some things are just so incredibly offensive that they're simply just not funny any more to most people. If you (the Royal You) find them funny, then fine, but don't be surprised when lots of other people don't find them funny at all. Andrew Dice Clay was considered one of the funniest guys around for a while, too. Now, not so much.

[phillygirl]

You have to see it. It's horrible!

I was thinking of you when I thought I heard it was good.

[scott]

I've had at least four completely non-religious couples who went to see it and were so offended by the sheer venom of the show that they walked out at intermission. One of the couples left because people were so angry and volatile during intermission that they genuinely feared for violence breaking out before the show was over, and this was a Tuesday night show.

I don't really care what people see on Broadway (or anywhere else), and I've certainly gotten shows that I personally consider offensive for people, but "The Book of Mormon" is, without a doubt, widely considered the most offensive show on Broadway by people around here, who are Broadway regulars. So much so that we actually pulled a group booking of the show (300 seats) when very regular clientele refused to go on our organized trip if that was the show. A year later, better than half of our audience (from all over the country, from Seattle to Tampa to Chicago to Maine) were so offended that they walked out of the show, and these are people who happily watched things like "Hair," so not exactly prudes. At least four of the people we had who stormed out, fuming, are self-professed liberals from Berkeley (well, Richmond) who themselves have done things like nude sit-ins, and even they were so offended that they refused to sit through the show. I know because I had to personally find them tickets to some other impossible-to-get show for the "night off" because they were so incredibly furious about the show.

I think that Trey Parker is a comedic genius. I also think that "The Book of Mormon" is also probably so incredibly offensive that it's no better than Sandra Bernhard and Bill Maher doing a duet of "Gang-Rape Sarah Palin:" some things are just so incredibly offensive that they're simply just not funny any more to most people. If you (the Royal You) find them funny, then fine, but don't be surprised when lots of other people don't find them funny at all. Andrew Dice Clay was considered one of the funniest guys around for a while, too. Now, not so much.

It's as offensive as South Park, just on stage. You'd like it.

[Adam]

It closed, unsurprisingly a huge waste.

The curtain has come down on Climate Change: The Musical and reviews of the taxpayer-funded play about global warming are downright icy.

The play, which is actually entitled "The Great Immensity," and was produced by Brooklyn-based theater company The Civilians, Inc. with a $700,000 grant from the National Science Foundation, ended its run early amid a storm of criticism from reviewers and lawmakers alike. It opened a year late, reached just five percent of its anticipated audience and likely fell short of its ambitious goal of informing a new generation about the perceived dangers of man-caused climate change.

Plus, it apparently wasn't very good.

“Despite fine performances, the musical mystery tour is an uneasy mix of fact and credulity-stretching fiction. It’s neither flora nor fauna,” New York Daily News reviewer Joe Dziemianowicz wrote in a review at the time. “[The] songs — whether about a doomed passenger pigeon or storm-wrecked towns — feel shoehorned in and not, pardon the pun, organic.”

The play, which featured songs and video exploring Americans’ relationships to the environment, opened in New York in April with a three-week run before going on a national tour that was supposed to attract 75,000 patrons. But it stalled after a single production in Kansas City, falling short of the lofty goals outlined in a grant proposal. It was envisioned as a chance to create "an experience that would be part investigative journalism and part inventive theater,” help the public "better appreciate how science studies the Earth’s biosphere” and increase “public awareness, knowledge and engagement with science-related societal issues.”

[Celeste Chalfonte]

Great news, because I've been meaning to go see that. I heard it was pretty good. Nothing wrong with poking a little fun at religion here and there. Even for us non-atheists.

I haven't seen it, but I heard it was very funny. Converely, I heard Spring Awakening was a screeching bore.

I like a good spectacle once in a while, but mostly I prefer smaller venues for my theater-going. If you get a chance to see the Kinsey Sicks perform in a relatively small theater, I heartily recommend it. In a large place, you would miss too many of the throw-away lines, often the funniest part of the show.