Many of these characters are characters that I've been dealing with for years-- the Nebbish and Maxwell, mostly, and the Immortality Worm to a lesser extent.  The Nebbish and Maxwell are characters that play an important role in my Young adult  novels in progress, "Maxwell's Sloth" and "Maxwell's Jest."  Within the context of those novels, the Nebbish is a fictional  character, starring in radio plays and comic books.  Having the opportunity to actually create an audible radio play about  these characters has been a magnificent experience.

This business about being exempt and immune is an homage to the Richard Farina novel, "Been Down So Long, It Looks Like Up To Me."  The main character of that novel desperately wants to be completely uninfluenced by the world.

This initial introduction has been run through a ProTools filter that replicates a telephone.  This is in homage to the old-time  radio character "The Shadow."  Whenever he spoke, it sounded like it was run through a telephone-- and this fact is  remarked upon by Doctor Hilarius in Thomas Pynchon's "Crying of Lot 49," which is one of the texts referenced by these characters.

I love this idea-- two competing entities, E.B.B. and F.L.O.W.  The yin and yang, one trying to conserve resources and the other trying to enjoy everything while the world still exists to enjoy.  The common thread is an acknowledgement that the world,  and life by extension, cannot last forever.

This idea of slowing or halting entropy owes a lot to the works of Thomas Pynchon.

The backing music here is zither music from "The Third Man."  The Third Man is a wonderful film, directed by Carol Reed and  starring Orson Welles, who played The Shadow in the old-time radio series.  He also played his Third Man character, Harry Lime, in an old-time radio series that ran for a year in 1951-1952.  It's one of the best OTR series, and this is an homage. Orson Welles is perhaps the best-known old-time radio star, and one of the best in the field.

"John Nefastis" is the name of a character in Thomas Pynchon's 'The Crying of Lot 49.'  He's created a device called "Maxwell's Demon," based on the plans of James Clerk Maxwell; Maxwell's Demon is a theoretical device that can sort hot and cold  molecules into separate compartments of a box-- the idea being that such a device could violate the second law of  thermodynamics.  Violating the second law of thermodynamics, of course, would be completely contradictory to the rules of  entropy.

Maxwell's slang, speaking style, and personality are a mixture of Slim Gaillard and Lord Buckley, two recording artists from  the 1940s and 1950s.  Slim Gaillard was a jazz musician, who made up his own language, that he called "Vout." To read more about Slim Gaillard, visit: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slim_Gaillard Lord Buckley was a spoken word artist, who told old, familiar stories in a "beatnik" style. To learn more about Lord Buckley, visit: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lord_Buckley

The License to Change is the "super-power" enjoyed by the agents of E.B.B.  Simply put, once you are granted a License to Change, you can meditate and focus the influence and pressures of the world to 'change' anything-- whether it be to change it into something else, or to create something from the raw materials of the world.

This scenario, where F.L.O.W. is selling illegal CFC spray cans of a recreational drug, is sort of a flagship move by the group. It's a combination of lack of caring about the environment-- the CFC will hurry along the hole in the ozone layer, bringing about global warming that much faster-- and the fact that they're selling nitrous oxide itself, a hedonistic drug that has been twisted from its initial purpose as anaesthetic.  This combination of hurrying entropy and advanced hedonism is  characteristic of F.L.O.W.

John's Changing of the contents of the canisters and cans into Helium is an inspired move on his part.  Other E.B.B. agents have used their licenses to change in some interesting ways-- the Nebbish himself was once drowning and being dragged along the bottom of a river; he Changed the blue, oxygen-depleted blood into red, oxygen-rich blood and returned to life. Bill, talking about his inspiration for the voice of the Nebbish, described it as "William Shatner meets The Tick."

Use of the two-way wrist-radio is a standard convention in old-timey radio.  Captain Midnight had one.  Dick Tracy had one.

"Good Lord!  This man's been shot!" follows a long line of characters in audio-only presentations belaboring the obvious-- because the audience can't see Number Six's wounds.

This is another standard storytelling device, where the hero is alerted to danger by someone who can only give sketchy details before dying, leaving some mystery and some time to advance the plot.

See also: "Good Lord!  This man's been shot!"

Using a compact disc as a plot device was a risky move-- by removing it from the timeless status of most Old-Time Radio.

"Nate Unusual" is a reference to the techno and noise musician Nate Unique.

For detailed analysis of the noise piece, please see "Sound Effects and Music Commentary."

In the original script, E.B.B. went through an elaborate scenario where they first tried to use a computer with an audio editing suite.  They were unable to isolate the track, and then Maxwell used his License to isolate the track. I prefer the "Flange-O-Vouty" because it maintains the Old-Time Radio tradition of bizarre machinery-- like the two-way wrist radio.  

"Andrew" in this case was played by Andrew Shearer.  Andrew was raised in Scotland, which aided immensely.

The Immortality Worm makes his first appearance in a comic book in "Maxwell's Jest."  He looks like an enormous maggot wearing overalls. The Immortality Worm is also a reference to Richard Farina's "Been Down So Long, It Looks Like Up To Me."  The main character is struggling to maintain is immunity and exemption, and suddenly is struck with terror and existential awareness. One of the other characters says, "It sounds like the immortality worm has been chewing."  When asked how to combat this, the character says "bite back."  The Nebbish, due to his immunity, just laughs and bites back when he is bitten.

The German dream chamical does not actually exist.  This is a reference to a presentation given in RTF 331R, "Dream and Delirium."  A student presented a slideshow about how he had read an article in a German journal, describing the blood purification procedure.  

A continuation of the magical realist technology aspect.

I've done a lot of reading about the nature of the collective unconscuous, the nature of presque vu-- the opposite of deja vu, where you experience something that you know you will experience in the future.  It's a fascinating area.

I'm not sure why it takes six months of preparation to give Eau Claire residents the drug that works on Maxwell instantaneously.

This part makes me laugh every time.

The Scotch Egg hates that nickname because Scotch Eggs isn't actually Scottish-- it was created in London.  The Scotch Egg  loathes any stereotyping or negative connotations to Scottish people or behavior.

This really didn't translate to audio very well-- the line in the script is "OLD MAN: Good lord!  (choke)" which is a reference to the old EC horror comics from the 1950s-- "Tales From the Crypt," "Vault of Horror," that sort of thing.  Whenever a character in those old comics is completely horrified, he always said "Good lord!  Choke."

"A group of hoodlums in ski masks carrying sacks with dollar signs on them."  Too corny?

This selective hearing-- Maxwell can't hear the Nebbish admonishing him-- is also characteristic of OTR.

Maxwell refers to The Nebbish as "Paulie."  This is intentional.

Ah, the Rhinoctopus and Vermicious Knid.  In the original script, this was followed up with the following dialogue: MAXWELL: And that crepe with wings! THE NEBBISH: A... bald... pastry-gle?

This series of terrible puns originally went on much longer.

"I am lucid to the point of madness" may be one of the best lines in the script.

Because the Scotch Egg has injected the drug into his brain, he can override the less-drugged-up Licenses to Change.

This is completely true.  Wisconsin cannot get enough donuts.

This is a reference to the lucid dreaming maneuver-- if you want to be able to control your dreams, and become aware within the dreamspace, some dream therapists claim that looing at your hand will break the spell and allow you to take control.

"I could throw a volkswagen a whole half block" is a line from the DJ Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince song "I Think I Could Beat Mike Tyson."

I once had a job in the Galleria Mall in Houston.  A creepy co-worker would always ask me to "Dance for Poppa." It is my pleasure to share this horror with you.

"What the crap?" is a hilarious semi-curse from the film version of "The Crow."

Another example of this radio play's obsession with shooting people in the head.  I didn't recognize this until the first version was recorded.

Ah, the elaborate death scene.

Maxwell doesn't really have any evidence that this will work-- although it's been shown that killing someone in real life will strand them in the collective dream, there is nothing to indicate that the opposite is true.  Faulty logic at work!

Another shot in the head-- this one a suicide.

Brian Ledden played both Tom, the Prisoner, and the Jailor here.  Just a wee bit of irony.

This is the first time that The Scotch Egg refers to himself as such-- it's an indicator of his increased frustration and madness.

Another terrible pun.  The laughter after this line always strikes me as genuine and makes me smile.

This radio play is actually the first ever appearance of The Scotch Egg.  It's his introductory story.  It sets him up for later appearances.  I'm planning to bring him back in a series of radio plays in the fall of 2007 surrounding the Nebbish. However, since they will take place after this encounter, there will be some fairly drastic changes. For example-- and this is an exclusive here-- due to the massive amounts of German sleep chemicals injected straight into the Scotch Egg's fevered brain, and the ridiculous amount of time that he's spent in the collective dream, I'm imagining that when he does make his return, it will be with super powers.  Perhaps he'll have the ability to project a  sphere around himself that will replicate the conditions inside the dreaming, or perhaps he'll be able to make others  hallucinate.  There's still time, but I feel that the character is ripe for continuation.