{photo: Doug Tompos, the actor playing Buckminster Fuller in our upcoming Studio theater production of R. Buckminster Fuller: THE HISTORY (and Mystery) OF THE UNIVERSE.}

In the midst of getting Guys and Dolls ready to head for the stage next week, we also began rehearsals for R. Buckminster Fuller: THE HISTORY (and Mystery) OF THE UNIVERSE. Doug Tompos (pictured above) joins us from Los Angeles to play the title role. In addition to guest appearances on The West Wing and Frasier, Doug was in the original Broadway cast of City of Angels, Angels in America at American Conservatory Theater in San Francisco, and Of Mice and Men at South Coast Rep.

During the meet and greet, it was fascinating to hear from the other Doug (Jacobs, the show’s author and director) talking about his discovery of Bucky in the late 1960’s. He was rowing crew and studying theater at the University of California (Santa Barbara, I believe) - when his brother told him he had to come hear ‘this guy’ speak. Doug told him he was too busy, but his brother insisted that it didn’t matter, because ‘this guy speaks all day long’. So Doug Jacobs squeezed into a small room to hear Fuller holding forth on the great ideas of the universe.

He said that for the first fifteen minutes or so he was thinking, “I am lost, I’m not getting this.” But then after awhile a stretch of the talk would start to become clear - and he began to get excited. So Doug (Jacobs) came back twice that same day to hear the ideas of this great synthesizer in person.

Jacobs became struck by the fascinating connections Bucky was able to discover between very different and disparate ideas - and that he was always trying to help his audience understand how they were a product of their history, and were always moving into the future.

It is going to be a fascinating performance.

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