Famous Michael

Famous Michael is about a Vietnam vet medic who can't forget the war and the woman who can't forget him.

This book contains the long poem, Famous Michael, originally published by the poetry journal, Abraxas, in 1978, and republished as a chapbook by Samidat Press in 1988; as well as an adaptation, revision and expansion of it into a play.  Famous Michael was staged by Solano Repertory Company in Fairfield, California, in 2008.  Famous Michael won an Arty Award for Best Original Play.  Shannon Kase directed.  The actors, Wallace Ingalls as Michael and Kirsten Lunde as Linda, won Artys for best male actor and best female actor.  

The poem is, at its heart, a dramatic monologue, a genre that inhabits the territory between poetry and theatre. The speaker, Michael, is a Vietnam War vet medic.  Until he left Vietnam, Michael was famous for not getting hurt, but that was never quite true.  The poem follows his progress from graduation, through the war, and to his discharge due to injury.  At the end, he begins training his son for the next war as his father trained him.

The play is an experiment, asking the question, what happens when this poem crosses the border into theatre?  What happens when actors' performances give flesh and blood to the poem's voice, and multi-media underpins  (video, stills, and music) with sounds and images?  The play version starts Michael's story at the moment of President George Bush’s 2003 TV announcement that Coalition Forces have begun invading Iraq.  This triggers a vivid and brutal PTSD flashback.  Michael stands up in his living room and takes off his bathrobe, revealing jungle battle fatigues.  Suddenly it’s 1969 and he's back in the Vietnam War.

The play adds a second character, Linda--the woman who can't forget him--, because, for the author, without her, the play is too heartbreaking, too far down the abyss of terror and despair.  Michael’s Vietnam horror alternates with Linda’s stateside psychedelic discoveries, as she tries to talk to him, fix him, love him.  

At the end of the play, back in the present, a broken-down Michael recalls how his father, a WWII vet, trained Michael for the next war—which turned out to be Vietnam—and how Michael trained his son for the next war—which turned out to be Iraq.  And Linda calls one last time.

Richard Slota is a Vietnam Era Vet (’66 to ’69), who spent his war assisting at autopsies at Fort Benning, Georgia. He cut up, among others, Vietnam vets who came back to ‘The World’, and then died here. From that experience Slota received a dose of PTSD and survivor guilt. The poem and play are the author’s strategy for autopsying  pieces of his survivor guilt. But let’s be clear: this poem and play are about Michael, his courage, pain and humanity; this poem and play are about a decent, moral man who, at the impossibly young age of 18, found himself in a nightmare.

Richard Slota travels frequently from his home in San Francisco, CA, USA, to visit his family in Nigeria and West Africa.  He writes plays, novels, poetry and non-fiction.  He just finished a play set in Nigeria called Babatunde In Hell, about witchcraft, Ebola and kidnapping, and is working on Captive Market, a non-fiction book about kidnapping and ransoms in Nigeria.  His short play, We All Walk In Shoes Too Small, was produced at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, London.  Dream Big and Famous Michael were staged by Solano Repertory Company northern California.  He earned BA’s in Psychology and Theatre Arts and an MA in Creative Writing.  He has 3 grown children and is a member of the Playwright’s Center of San Francisco.