“Fatboy”
Written by John Clancy
Showing: A Red Orchid Theatre, 1531 N. Wells St., through March 2
Tickets: $20, $25
Contact: (312) 943-8722; aredorchidtheatre.org

By Lawrence Bommer

CFP theater editor

Insulting the audience reaches new lows in “Fatboy,” a scatological 90-minute grungefest by John Clancy. This 2004 recipient of a Edinburgh Fringe First award now enjoys a suitably obnoxious Midwest premiere at A Red Orchid Theatre. Inspired by the same go-for-broke outrageousness of Alfred Jarry’s seminal expressionist classic “Ubu Roi,” here the title monster embodies every infantile desire to destroy and dominate that real-life tyrants exercise with impunity. The question posed at the bitter end: If we find the Fatboys of the world so repellent, why do we enable them with our apathy and complacency?

Carnivorously played by Chicago favorite Steve Pickering in padding that literally inflates Fatboy’s pomposity, the rotund horror announces that he deserves and intends to boss the world. No one will thwart his right to rule. Enduring and exchanging constant put-downs from Fudgie (a toxically hideous Jennifer Engstrom), his hideous and horny harridan-spouse, he proceeds to crush the skulls or snap the necks of anyone blocking his path to power. Accused of war crimes, he bribes a vapid judge (Doug Vickers in a vaudeville-sharp stock turn) and slaughters the sole Jewish witness against his atrocities (sadsack John Luzar). His greed as insatiable as his appetite, Fatboy eats the land bare and orders his hilariously humble slave (a truly self-effacing Mark Vallarta) to slaughter anyone who could besmirch his name. Meanwhile, his hatemate Fudgie schemes to supplant him.

But we know her vainglorious reign will be just another scorched-earth policy. Clancy’s grotesquerie ends with the actors doffing their costumes but staying in character. Pickering sardonically issues his last sarcasm: None of this is real. As long as we’re happy we’re absolved of all our guilt by association and co-conspiracies. We should be content to acquiesce as the world’s Fatboys do our dirty work.

It’s a bitter epiloque for a nasty play about unconditional consumption and unchecked narcissism. Its very refusal to pull punches creates a kind of giddy pleasure. In Guy Van Swearingen’s unapologetic staging no blow is too low, and the trash talk takes on its own glorious excess. For all his crimes against humanity, Fatboy is nothing if not honest. Every time a character indulges in an idealistic remark there’s a terrible pause, then everyone bursts out laughing. No illusions, theatrical or moral, are sheltered here, least of all the audience’s detachment from the obscenities depicted.