Shel Silverstein

And here's an interesting historical side note.

The author of the book is a guy named Shel Silverstein, right? And I went down the rabbit hole.

I'm like, who would write a book like this? Various reports I found that I, again, bless the internet, shared that this was not a very nice guy.

Didn't really seem to love kids.

That is pretty good.

This is giving me some like Shel Silverstein, you know, where the sidewalk ends vibes, but creepy.

Yeah.

So now I'm going to share with you the story that pretty much everyone I've ever had tell me that they were traumatized by this.

do is ever going to be operatic.

There's no way I'm singing a Shel Silverstein poem about being eaten by a boa constrictor in an operatic timbre or in style.

But the reason opera is important is it has a community that cares and supports it.

Now, at Central, where I go to school, it's very big of operas for everyone.

Marie Laveau, son.

Apparently, Shel Silverstein had something to do with making this song.

Did you know that? That sounds about right.

Yeah.

So I'd read it start to finish.

But I also loved Shel Silverstein because his books were so...

Even though they weren't graphic novels, it was more spot illustration.

Everything was so illustrated.

Lorca and Shakespeare and, you know, everything else and all the new plays I've done, all the great plays I've done.

But here, I fell closest to Shel Silverstein.

He was the writer that, for some reason, I could just wear his material like a little sweater.

I could put it on and go, oh, I just get this.

The second time I heard it, I was like, I don't need to hear that again.

The chorus is is one of the I surprised Shel Silverstein didn't read it because wrote it because it's it's a very silly song.

The chorus is Yabba Dabba Doo.

The king is gone and so are you.

The director, Greg, is called Mr. B., He sings with children at the public school 22.

And he sang the song The Giving Tree, which is of course a book by Shel Silverstein.

And when I tell the story of the book and I show them the song by Plain White Tees and I show them the video clip that's made, there are so many connections in the song lyrically and visually in the video clip with the story.

And you can talk about the story.