The story of 'Them'
by Ishmael Houston-Jones
from Artforum
The first time I heard about Chris Cochrane was also the first time I saw him play, at a club called 8BC in a destroyed building on Eighth Street between avenues B and C. They had liquor there, but it was more of an arty club. I thought his music was incredible. It wasn’t so much punk rock but it was punk-influenced. There was a lot of musicianship.
When I first met Dennis Cooper he was reading at some club on the West Side. There was a buzz about him before his arrival in New York; people were really excited. I didn’t know him at all. He’d been publishing Little Caesar out in LA and there was a performance place called Beyond the Baroque out there that he was the leader of. When I heard him read, I was shocked that literature could upset me so much. It was something from Tenderness of the Wolves. And after I said, “Do you want to work with me?” And he said, “Sure,” even though he didn’t know who I was. ...
That was probably 1985, and at the time there was a whole community around PS 122. It was artist-run in those days. I would go to the Kitchen in SoHo, but PS 122 was in my neighborhood and it was sort of a clubhouse. The art and dance worlds then weren’t as geographically spread out, nor were they quite as professionalized. (Dancers today have much greater facility, I’ve noticed.) It was very downtown Manhattan–centric. We never went to Brooklyn. Now the scene is very dispersed. To see edgy or interesting stuff you really have to travel. It’s not terrible. It’s a different mode of relating, and thus a different kind of community today.
“Them” comes out of a long tradition of my one-word titles. I think it’s actually the name of a 1950s horror film about giant ants, which has nothing to do with the piece. The first line Dennis reads is, “I saw them once. I don’t know when, or who, they were.” Them evolved over time. There was a short version in 1985 at PS 122, essentially a work in progress. It was Chris, Dennis, myself, dancer Donald Fleming, and the actor Jonathan Walker; and the institution’s director, Mark Russell, asked us if we wanted to expand it. ...
Like many of my dance works, Them is a highly scored improvisation. The movements are not illustrative of any of the other elements: The music, the dance, and the text happen along three parallel tracks. Near the end there’s this looping section where two guys are on a mattress. They push each other up, then push each other down. After that they disappear and a dancer, who used to be me, is brought out by a figure in black and thrown blindfolded onto a mattress and an animal carcass is thrown on top of him and there’s this wrestling scene and then it ends.
The mattress and animal carcass were a sort of acknowledgment of AIDS. People were dying—friends, people we knew. There was panic. The carcass on the mattress came from a dream my friend had. In it he woke up and he was lying next to his own dead body; he would try to throw it out of bed, but it kept coming back on top of him. It’s also about my fear of death. I still can’t change a mousetrap. I’m really squeamish around dead things. ...
There was a time when the Meatpacking District used to be an actual meatpacking district. There were buildings filled with animal carcasses. I remember I had my mind set on having a goat, and I went around to all these places and none of them had one. There was this place that had mostly pigs, but there was one goat, really beautiful, with all its fur still on. I couldn’t go back to get it until 4 AM, so I brought one of my dancers with me and we put it in a bag—it looked like a human body. We took it in a cab back to my place on Suffolk Street. At the time the building was really hot and I tied it with an electric cord and hung it out the window overnight. The next day I put it around my shoulders and carried it to PS 122, just in time for the dress rehearsal. We’re not sure where we’re going to get the goat this time around.
DC & Ishmael, mid-80s
'Them': tickets & info
Ishmael interviewed about 'Them' @ Time Out
Ishmael Houston-Jones Website
Chris Cochrane @ Myspace
THEM AND NOW @ The New Museum
Rehearsals @ The New Museum
Cast: Joey Cannizzaro, Felix Cruz, Jeremy Pheiffer, Niall Noel, Jacob Slominski, Arturo Vidich, Enrico D. Wey, Ishmael-Houston Jones, Chris Cochrane, Dennis Cooper
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p.s. Hey. Let's see ... oh, I hate to do this, but I'm going to send out a quick request for any guest hosted posts you guys might have in mind or might want to piece together quickly. I realized yesterday that, due to my traveling and how busy I'm going to be while in New York, there's a real chance that I'm going to run out of new posts next week or the week after. So, if you have anything you can send me, please do. Worst comes to worst, the blog might go on hiatus for a few days while I restock. But I'll do my best to keep things going. ** L@rstonovich, Hey. Yeah, if you guys hit that spooky house, let me know what's what 'cos, you know, I love that stuff, obviously. How is the sleep pattern experiment holding up after the weekend? Sounds good to me. I'm an early to early guy myself, as you know. ** Bill, It would have been cool if Blood Manor had a Paladino ghoul. It was apolitical, but nice. Well, nice, okay, that's weird. Good. It was good. Thanks a lot for the link to the Thek/ Hujar show. I didn't know anything about that. It's a definite, and I'll let you know what and how it is. ** David Ehrenstein, Hey, David. Hm, I have to say, based on that trailer, Gus' new one looks really uninteresting, to me at least. I didn't detect anything special about it at all, but maybe that was somebody's idea of a crowd pleasing teaser. ** Lee Deville, Hey, man. Where I live in Paris is kind of like that too. Not really hellish, though. Lively and mixed up, more like. An abutted, in between, star-shaped feeling area, I guess. I'm really glad you came and then came back. I look forward to getting to know you. ** Allesfliesst, That does sound like a really great experience. I've taken a quick look at Mats Leiderstam's work on that site, and it does look very interesting. It deserves a lot more time, and i'll give it that later. Yeah, a day on cruising areas would be completely fantastic, of course. Whenever and if ever the time and interest combine for you, I'd be really honored, man. ** Pilgarlic, Netherworld is consistently voted the best spooky house in the US by Halloween-centric sites. I've been jonesing heavily to attend it for years now. You're going, I take it? If it spins any stories, do share. You posted where you 'shouldn't'? Hold on, I'll ... avoid egg creams and vendor hot dogs and Times Square crack, check. No problem on the second one since I'm vegetarian, but ... egg creams? I know that term, but what is such a thing? I'm thinking egg nog, but that can't be right. On the crack warning, I'll do my best, but, dude, my need for crack is so vast, that ... well, I'll just do my best. ** Pisycaca, Hey, pal. Yeah, it's a strange and deep and thorough feeling, the loss, but it's good I'm here and too busy to dwell within. It's not like my busyness will kill the feeling, but maybe having it filter out rather than rush over me is for the best. Who knows, right? I'm really glad you guys are having a great time. Very cool about your band's gig. Any chance someone could video it and upload the video somewhere 'cos I'm, you know, most curious. Lots of love to you guys! ** Andrew, Spacey cool kids are awesome. Spacey adults, less so maybe? Anyway, I'm somewhat de-spaced now and kind of vaguely in whatever the New York State of Mind is supposed to mean. You should know that the performers in spooky houses don't touch. They can't. It's against the rules. I think it's because you could sue the spooky house if they did. So, you're in the clear to go if you're so inclined. Which of course I recommend. I think you're totally right about why some escorts have crazily low rates for their services. And about the expensive ones too, actually. Good thinking, A. My guess on the bad English is that they use translation services, in most cases anyway, yeah. But it's their bad English. I never use babelfish on any of their texts. They come that way. ** Eli Jurgen, I hear you. France has no spooky houses either. It's a crime, a serious crime. You should go to Spookers. Please? I want to hear about it. If memory serves, three guys who've been featured in the escort posts have subsequently shown up here and commented. But they were proper English speakers. No, wait, I think one had wonky English. He popped up in the last or second to last SPD. And one of the guys from the slave posts is now one of this blog's most beloved d.l.s. I'll let him identify himself if he wants to. ** Steevee, I don't know, I think maybe if Paladino had hit me, and if it made the news, and if the Gawker and TMZ type places tracked down my books, and if that got out in the media, hitting me might have won him the election, ha ha. ** JW Veldhoen, Dude. Oh, Kuiper, that's nice. Everyone I knew in Holland whose name was Kuiper was a cool guy. Yeah, let me get through getting 'Them' rehearsed and teched and up and running, and I'll be fairly good to go except at night, I guess. Me, fast company? Where do you find these people, John. That's wild. I walk fast, but that's about the extent of my fastness. And people from LA eating people alive?! Seriously, where do you find these people, ha ha? ** Sypha, Yes, I happened to see your end of year reading list on, uh, Facebook, I think, and the Bieber book definitely stood out. I guess you heard that he supposedly punched some poor 12 year old kid in the face this weekend. ** Robert-nyc, Thanks, Robert! I'm really glad you came too. It was very nice to see you even for a quick flash. Thank you so much for the tip on that Steampunk Haunted House. I am absolutely and unequivocally going to go. It sounds wonderful! If you come see 'Them, let me know or say hi afterwards or something, okay? ** Plexus, Gabe! A walkthrough 'Frisk' opera, hm. I can totally see that. Maybe without the singing or without operatic singing anyway. I want to make a spooky house so badly. Why won't some billionaire give me money to make a spooky house? It would be guaranteed to make the billionaire even richer and probably get him a very long prison sentence too. Making my own spooky house and directing/ writing a porn film are two of my greatest dreams in life, but no one with money seems to think they're good ideas. It's kind of tragic. Anyway, how was your weekend, Mr. Gabe? What did you eat and write and watch and, I don't know, uh, dream? Love, me. ** OscarB, I know. I wish we could do a spooky house cross-country US tour. Next year? Either that, or, if we're both still at the Recollets, we simply have to do a spooky house in the basement, or at least in that ridiculous so-called gallery. The internet connection is still shit? You should talk to Chrystel because, like I told you, she did track down the internet hog on one occasion like this, and it did get, uh, better. ** David, Hopefully the mask will just become a part of who you are like a mustache or something? ** 'Stoopid Slapped Puppies', Hi, Nick! Is it okay to say I've missed you a lot? Yeah, I'm in New York for 2 1/2 weeks to do the performance/ dance piece that the post today kind of documents. Well, the less marked out seasons is very LA, so it's what I'm most accustomed to, and I suppose it's my favorite mode. I moved to Holland from NYC, so the change wasn't so radical except for the almost endlessly gray Dutch skies. Moving to NYC from LA was the shock. You like summer, don't you? So, is the vaguely yearlong summer appealing to you. How are you doing there? What are you doing? I'd really love to know what's going on with you, if you don't mind sharing. Yeah, I've thought about you and your grandfather while I've been going through my dad's death's early days. It's so strange. I feel like it's going to focus into something, but, then again, I feel like it never will become one clear feeling. Lots and lots of respect to you too, my dear friend. ** Tigersare, You're here in NYC? Did I know that was going to happen? Wow. Damn, that is awful timing re: your gig and our opening night. If you get some free time, I should be pretty in clear during the days once 'Them' is up and running on Thursday. I'd love to see you, obviously. ** Trees, Hi, T. I think the spooky house that most intrigues me is the one where you follow clues and drive spookily, I presume, to get to it just 'cos I've never done one like that before. Wow, that's wild about you waking up in the hospital. I guess it probably sounds more intense than it was since you sound chipper about it. 'Writing and so on': good, of course. ** _Black_Acrylic, Ah, it's here at last. Ahem. Everyone, here's _B_A with an important announcement: 'The autumn issue of Yuck 'n Yum is finally online and available for your delectation: LINK. There's some photos of the launch here and also the Ben 'Jack Your Body' Robinson playlist (with video links) is here. It's really a complete omnibus edition of stuff there.' By now, you all must surely know that YnY is the zine among zines, so click those things and start the feast, yes? From what I've seen of Sophie's work, your thoughts and analysis seem really right on. Yeah, she seems very, very interesting. Thanks a million, Ben. ** Creative Massacre, Hey. Yeah, it was Blood Manor I checked out. It was quite good. There are two more NYC spooky houses to go now. Okay, Slaughter on Second Street didn't seem like god's gift to horror or anything, yeah. I'd go, though. But I'm a diehard. I'm not huge on 3D spooky houses either, although BM had a 3D section that was surprisingly trippy and kind of nice. ** Will Decker, Yeah, I'm used to living out a small backpack, but I only own like three shirts and a few pairs of socks that aren't ghosty with holes, so it's not so bad. Is your imprisoned friend due to get out soon or fairly soon? Sounds like you're getting all ready for the rabble rousing aspect of living in Chicago at least. Thanks for the link about the French strikes. Yeah, I'm following it closely, as you can imagine. It's turning out to be quite a serious strike. I'm really sorry I'm missing it. I also hope it's resolved in some way before I head back, though, since there might not be enough fuel in France to get my plane to land there the way things are going. ** Inthemostpeculiarway, Hey. Yeah, the cheese was cooked into the ... hm, I don't know. Could have been tofu. Usually, they mix a bunch of things together to make the patties. I was obsessed with Egypt as a kid too. I wanted to be an archeologist until I realized how incredibly tedious the job is. That's intense about your friend's friend being admitted to the mental hospital, but, yeah, you've have made it sound like that might be kind of appropriate for temporary purposes at least. My weekend ... On Saturday, I tried to work on my novel. It was still very slow. I met up with d.l.s Misanthrope and Nb, and we had quite good Mexican food at the kind of legendary restaurant Lupe's, yum. Then we came back to where I'm staying and hung out and were joined by d.l. Alan for more hanging out. Finally we cabbed to 23rd Street and 6th where we met d.l. No more teenagekicks and his boyfriend, and then we walked north and west to 10th Avenue and got in line for Blood Manor. The wait in line was about maybe two hours, but there were costumed ghouls and fire eaters and stuff to keep us unbored. Alan had to leave to meet up with someone, unfortunately and, well, fortunately for him too. Blood Manor was very good. I'd give it a solid B or maybe even a B+. It was on the 7th or 8th floor of a warehousey kind of building. It was prettily done, not scary to me, but I'm never scared. I took some photos, and, if they're not blurry, I'll show them to you. Then we had very good pizza at this place called Patsy's, and I went 'home' and slept. On Sunday, I worked on my novel for the most of the day. It went better if not yet fantastically. Then there was a final 'Them' rehearsal at the New Museum, and that went pretty good. I didn't read the texts all that well, so I need to practice some more, I think. After that, I had dinner with Misanthrope and Nb at this kind of awful Mexican restaurant that I kind of love called Panchitos, and then they visited with me here until I got sleepy and sent them packing. That wasn't a very colorfully written report because I'm running late, but it wasn't a bad weekend really. How's Monday? ** Frank Jaffe, Hey, Frank! Oh, that does sound like it was so much fun. I'm kind of really jealous, but not in a creepy way. Friday for NYC, eh? Great! Can't wait to see you, Frank! ** Bollo, I will ask Scott. In fact, I'll send him a message, Why not? Nice weekend there. Colorful and productive. Thanks for the tips on the gallery shows to see. I definitely don't want to miss those. I'll tell you what others goodies I find when I make the trek. This weekend, maybe. Thanks, Jonathan! ** Tonyoneill, Hi, Tony! Yeah, it was big fun, the spooky house. I want to hit the other two big NYC ones, if you're free and game to go along. Damn, Wednesday evening is the 'Them' dress rehearsal, so I can't see your reading. That sucks. I'd really like to. But I'll call or text you in the next few days once the pre-'Them' craziness is over, and let's definitely do a lunch or whatever. ** Man, I'm posting this really late. I'm sorry about that. I thought I'd pass along some prelims re: 'Them' to you today for what that's worth. Okay, see you tomorrow.
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