Author Topic: Hoax Theory Humor  (Read 5313 times)

Offline 12oh2alarm

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Hoax Theory Humor
« on: July 22, 2015, 08:41:42 AM »
Hello, world!

This is my first post after I signed up a few days ago. I've read the first 140 pages of that members-only thread about that Dutch person that shall remain nameless. Asking myself whether I should laugh or cry, I went with the bright side. The hoax has its humorous side. Humor is a quite traditional way of telling someone an inconvenient truth (think King and Fool).

I'm especially amused by hoax believers claiming Kubrick was hired to film the moon landings on a sound stage. I wonder how that would have worked in practice. Since you won't get a detailed answer from a hoax believer, here is what my imagination came up with. I'm no Shakespeare (not even a native speaker), so feel free to improve and continue the play with additional lines or even whole scenes. It's pure fun to invent and read!

Dramatis Personae:
Armstrong: Astronaut
Kubrick:   Movie Director
Smith:     NASA Quality Control Inspector
Film Crew of Gaffers, Grips, etc.

Location: a secret sound stage in a secret place some time in the sixties
Armstrong is on the ladder of a lunar module mockup.

Kubrick:    Hatch Egress, Take One (shouts) Lights! Camera! Action!
Armstrong:  The Lunar soil looks sort of fine grained. Almost like a powder.
            I'm stepping off the LEM now.
Smith:      Cut! We no longer call it LEM, it's "LM", Ell-emm, Neil!
Armstrong:  I can't pronounce that, I'm gonna say it my way and you guys can
            jump up and down in 1g on your silly wires. Deal with it.
Kubrick:    Can't control those egos. OK. Hatch Egress, Take Two
            (shouts) Lights! Camera! Action!
Armstrong:  The Lunar soil looks very fine grained. Almost like a powder.
            I'm stepping off the LEM now.
            It's one small step for a man, (a door slams) one giant leap for mankind.
Kubrick:    Cut! Who slammed the door? Don't you guys know that the slightest wind
            makes that flag move? Crikey. Another ruined sound track...
            Neil, up that ladder again. Hatch Egress, Take Three. Action!
Armstrong:  The Lunar soil looks very fine grained. Almost like talcum powder.
            I'm stepping off the LEM now.
            It's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind.
Smith:      Cut! Neil, I scripted the famous words as "a man". A MAN!
            Didn't you learn your lines?
Kubrick:    This will cost NASA an extra check, Smith.
Smith:      Waste anything but time.
Kubrick:    Well then. Hatch Egress, Take Four. And Action!
Armstrong:  The Lunar soil looks very fine grained. Almost like a powder.
            I'm stepping off the LEM now.
            It's one small step for... amen. Sorry guys, forgot my line.
            I can't see the teleprompter due to the gold in my visor.
            That super trouper outshines everything. Can't we get rid of
            at least that second light source next to the LEM mockup?

(Prop team removes second light source; places rocks A, B and C, as well as
regolith simulant grains 1 through 3.14E+12 on the coordinates specified by Smith
in NASA-LUNR-SURFC-PROP-HNDBK pages AS-11 through AS-11121314151617. The prop team
arranges the book volumes in a large ring structure, covers the result with moon
dust and calls it "West Crater".  The rest, as they say, is history.)


Kubrick:    (to wire guys) Pull Armstrong up on the ladder. Lets get this done
            before the decade is out.
            Hatch Egress, Take Five (hums famous jazz piece). And Action!
Armstrong:  (quietly to himself) I can do this. I can really do this. A man. A man.
            (Takes a deep breath).
            The Lunar soil looks very fine grained. Almost like a powder.
            I'm stepping off the LEM now.
            It's one small step for a man. One giant leap for a mankind.
Smith:      Holy Gilruth! Cuuuut!
Kubrick:    Smith, I told you I wanted actors, not astronauts. These guys are
            not working in their field of expertise! I specifically requested
            Peter Sellers. How can you expect quality from trained monkeys?
Smith:      We tried what we could. But the actors got suspicious and asked
            how we would keep the hoax under cover. They feared we'd send
            assassins in black robes with samurai swords to kill them. Can't
            blame actors for all that they've made us believe in their movies,
            I guess.
Gaffer:     (to Smith) Uhm, sorry to interrupt you, Mr. Smith, may I point
            you to some inconsistency? The art team has, I believe, screwed
            up the shadows on the back projection.
Smith:      Be more specific.
Gaffer:     Well, our single light source super trouper, shines from the right
            but the painted shadows on the back projection are in a different
            direction.
Kubrick:    Zounds! I got to remember this one for "2001".
Gaffer:     What's more the shadows are parallel, when they should not be. It's
            a simple matter of perspective.
Smith:      Young man, You are one hell of a smart cookie. 400.000 brains in NASA
            and we almost gave a smoking gun away if it weren't for you. Why is
            this fellow not your art director, Kubrick?
Gaffer:     And the painted Earth near the zenith has the continents the wrong
            way. It's spinning retrogr... East to West and the weather patterns
            were not updated according to the latest satellite imagery.
            Then, the terminator has the wrong orientation and should move
            consistent with the passage of time.
Kubrick:    Whoa there! More details I better get correct for the Space Odyssey.
            Terminator? What's a terminator? Sounds dangerous. I should direct
            a movie with that word in the title.
Smith:      Kubrick, where is the art team?
Kubrick:    PTLITC directive #42. Unreliable persons who need to be in on the
            hoax must be "terminated" as soon as their job is done to avoid
            death-bed confessions.
            (quietly to himself) Yeah. Terminator! That's it.

To be continued.
« Last Edit: July 22, 2015, 08:45:33 AM by 12oh2alarm »

Offline Luke Pemberton

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Re: Hoax Theory Humor
« Reply #1 on: July 22, 2015, 08:50:36 AM »
Welcome to the board. I found your play amusing while offering a pragmatic insight into the difficulty of hoaxing the moon landings.

Anyone that looks at the record with objectivity will understand that is was impossible to hoax for a million reasons.
Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former - Albert Einstein.

I can calculate the motion of heavenly bodies, but not the madness of people – Sir Isaac Newton.

A polar orbit would also bypass the SAA - Tim Finch

Offline gillianren

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Re: Hoax Theory Humor
« Reply #2 on: July 22, 2015, 05:37:49 PM »
Oh, Kurbick would never be worried about how many takes he went through.  He routinely did dozens.
"This sounds like a job for Bipolar Bear . . . but I just can't seem to get out of bed!"

"Conspiracy theories are an irresistible labour-saving device in the face of complexity."  --Henry Louis Gates

Offline Allan F

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Re: Hoax Theory Humor
« Reply #3 on: July 22, 2015, 05:44:19 PM »
I wonder how many takes it would be before he could do a 4 hour scene without any cuts.
Well, it is like this: The truth doesn't need insults. Insults are the refuge of a darkened mind, a mind that refuses to open and see. Foul language can't outcompete knowledge. And knowledge is the result of education. Education is the result of the wish to know more, not less.

Offline gillianren

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Re: Hoax Theory Humor
« Reply #4 on: July 23, 2015, 12:25:24 AM »
Even if he could have done it in one, he wouldn't have.  Kubrick wanted to drive all the emotion out of his actors.
"This sounds like a job for Bipolar Bear . . . but I just can't seem to get out of bed!"

"Conspiracy theories are an irresistible labour-saving device in the face of complexity."  --Henry Louis Gates

Offline smartcooky

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Re: Hoax Theory Humor
« Reply #5 on: July 23, 2015, 01:18:32 AM »


R-R-R-Red Alert
R-R-R-Red Alert

Armstrong:  The Lunar soil looks very fine grained. Almost like a powder.
            I'm stepping off the LEM now.
            It's one small step for a man, (a door slams) one giant leap for mankind.
Kubrick:    Cut! Who slammed the door? Don't you guys know that the slightest wind
            makes that flag move? Crikey. Another ruined sound track...
            Neil, up that ladder again. Hatch Egress, Take Three. Action!



Your continuity girl needs firing. If Neil is coming down the ladder, there should not be a flag on the lunar surface!!
« Last Edit: July 23, 2015, 01:21:27 AM by smartcooky »
If you're not a scientist but you think you've destroyed the foundation of a vast scientific edifice with 10 minutes of Googling, you might want to consider the possibility that you're wrong.

Offline Peter B

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Re: Hoax Theory Humor
« Reply #6 on: July 23, 2015, 07:48:46 AM »
Quote
Gaffer:     And the painted Earth near the zenith has the continents the wrong
            way. It's spinning retrogr... East to West and the weather patterns
            were not updated according to the latest satellite imagery.

Haha! Nice one!

And welcome to the board, 12oh2alarm.