The Hideout Theater
Earlier this year, the Hideout Theatre was delighted to present Who Is T. Henry Baudecliffe?, an improvised exploration of the fractured world of outsider artist and phenomenon T. Henry Baudecliffe. Now, we are bringing it back for a one-time holiday event.
The works of T. Heny Baudecliffe, in their dark and twisted way, touch on a number of typically American themes: family, frontier, and homespun innocence versus urbane corruption. And, as Baudecliffe himself recognized, there’s no better setting for those themes than the holiday season.
Santa Claus — or various Santa-like figures, often with animal limbs or other unexpected appurtenances — appears in Baudecliffe’s drawings as regularly as figures like Jesus Christ, Abraham Lincoln, and Tarzan. Clearly Baudecliffe never stopped believing, but he also never stopped inventing, placing Santa in contexts that Hallmark cardmakers would never dream of or approve, whether spiriting polio-stricken children to the Island of Good Health in his elf-powered cloud train or knocking out the Emperor Hirohito with a single red-gloved punch.
We invite you to join us for what promises to be oddest piece of holiday entertainment since Santa Claus conquered the Martians.
-Curtis Luciani and Kaci Beeler