Red, Granny, and Wolfowitz

I’ve decided recently that anything from Misfits Audio is bound to be good.  Distorted Fables:  Red, Granny, and Wolfowitz is another example of their creativity and wiliness to experiment.  Like all of the Distorted Fables, Red, Granny and Wolfowitz is engaged in breaking the fourth wall and in offering very funny reworkings of classic fairy tales.  “Little Red Riding Hood” is forced through the meat-grinder of the Dragnet-like cop show, though everyone involved is rather incompetent.  There’s Metcalf Mahoney, the photographer, and deadpan Detective Mac Adams, investigating a disturbance in the house of Red’s grandmother.  Adams is joined by Detective Nicholls, a bizarre character to say the least.  Granny says she was attacked by a “furball,” which Nicholls interprets literally as something “the size of a softball, maybe slightly larger, soft to the touch, feels nice on your face . . .”  

Nicholls is directed to the wolf lying on the ground in Granny’s house. “His ID proves that this furball is you.”  Granny explains that the wolf has stolen her identity, while Adams implores the Dragnet-type music (which you thought was nondiegetic but was, in fact, diegetic) to stop.  While Red and Grandmother identify the wolf as, well, a wolf, Nicholls points out that “he could just be a mountain man with a long nose.”  Red explains that she was bringing some French crullers—“not the famous Parchesi player”—to her grandmother and being near-sighted, mistook the wolf for her granny. The wolf, when Red had figured out what was going on, tried to escape and ran smack into a wall. “You’ve been watching too many late night detective shows, ma’am.”  

Grandmother explains that she called Red the night before—“nights and weekends are free”—to ask her to come over with some strawberry tarts.  At that point, Adams accuses Granny of luring the wolf over (though I’m still unclear for what purpose) and feeding him mind-altering berry tarts.  At that point, the wolf wakes up and introduces himself as Special Agent Johnny Wolfowitz and says that “This was a simple training exercise.”  He explains that after this he was meant to go visit the Three Little Pigs to investigate their shoddy building practices.  Just when you thought the bumbling detectives were more obtuse than Stephen Fry in Gosford Park, Detective Adams realizes that Wolfowitz is lying and already ate the Three Little Pigs. 

I think what makes these works so funny is that all the characters act contrary to the situation.  You think you know what to expect, and when something completely different happens, you erupt into surprised laughter.  Furthermore, when you start to be convinced by Wolfowitz’s explanation, the detectives surprise you by revealing some aplomb under all that haplessness.  Furthermore, we should be impressed by the fact that Glenn Hascall plays both Metcalf and Wolfowitz and that KD Dehnert plays both Granny and Red!  Tom Chalker played Adams and Delvin Kenser played Nicholls.