Years back, if you were a member of the Los Angeles comedy-nerd-art-dork-hip-oisie, you would be lucky to receive an invitation to SUPERBALL. SuperBall was the brainchild of Mystery Science Theater 3000‘s Joel Hodgson and his brother Jim, and it was always the party of the summer, if not the autumn as well. Located deep in the deepest darkest San Fernando Valley, the massive party was a “celebration of 21st Century creativity” where you would experience giant telescopes, eight living versions of Dr. Evan Croix, The Tiki-Tee Surf Rod, the original stop-motion metal skeleton from the 1933 King Kong model, and an all-too-whimsical pot luck dinner. You would run into the Flight of the Conchords guys, Will Wright, Paul Reubens, an Atomic Reaction Simulator, and that cute PA you hooked up from the Mr. Show days whose name you don’t remember. Plus, when you’d leave they’d give you a really cool ring. I only have three rings, but there’s eight of them out there.
Now SuperBall has been re-invented, re-imagined, and re-born as TWENTYWONDER. Instead of just being about fun with stop-motion metal skeletons and guys ironically wearing pork pie hats, TWENTYWONDER will benefit people with Down syndrome (Trisomy 21). However – like all great charity events, this one is something you would actually do anyway, so you don’t have to think about the charity part.
TWENTYWONDER will gather rarities and marvels of the cultural collective together for an unprecedented, funky One Night World’s Fair – a bursting galleria of the unusual and unforeseen, a great experiential laboratory featuring a breathtaking array of phenomena from the world of Arts & Sciences, as scores of inspired, gifted souls join together to forge entirely new amalgamations of art, science, song, dance, laughter, and awe. Okay, I lifted that part from the press release, but really, its going to rock. Sarah Silverman, Dana Gould, Grant Lee Phillips, the Funny or Die folks, Joel Hodgson’s new project (called Cinematic Titanic), something called The Amaze-Ment!!! and the Batmobile will all be performing in some crazy unexpected way, plus many more science freaks and comedy geeks blowing your mind. (The geniuses from Harmonix, the creators of Rock Band, have whipped up a special surprise I’m not even allowed to be telling you about and will probably get in trouble for mentioning.)
It’s March 6th in Culver City, and you should go. I will be there, watching digital sock puppets perform karaoke, thinking about the old days, when David Cross had never heard the word “Squeakquel,” and happiness was a SuperBall night in the valley watching robots fight, then break, then fight again.
