Frank Melcori is talking about his recent monthlong trip to northwestern India, which inspired his new performance piece, By the Time I Get to Jaipur. As he tells the story he tends to ramble, but you don’t mind because he rambles interestingly. Deep down it’s not rambling at all, but searching. After unhurriedly chewing through such topics as Hindu/Muslim violence in Kashmir, the odd parallels between the heroes of the Iliad and the Bhagavad Gita, and the beautiful old steam locomotives still in use on the subcontinent, Melcori finally gets around to what happened after he bought a legal hashish cookie while browsing through the old quarter of a town in Rajasthan.
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“So it was like eleven o’clock in the morning, and they had this little bookstore. And of all things, I saw The Bridges of Madison County! I couldn’t believe it. So I lay down in my hotel bedroom and took this hash and read the fucker! God, it was so terrible. But I could see why people were into it, you know? And I sat down and wrote the rest of the day and night on this fantasy about how the author of this book tracks down the literary agent in India to show him the manuscript and says, “Hey, I know it’s a piece of shit, and you know it’s a piece of shit, but we’re gonna make a lotta money, let’s do it!’ And the agent says, “I can’t believe you came all the way over here to hassle me with this awful fucking book, just to make money. What about art, blah blah blah.’ And the author says, “Since when do you care about fucking art?”‘
He introduces each vignette on trumpet, picking his way awkwardly through an American pop standard like “Summertime” or “Someone to Watch Over Me.” His trumpet was with him in India too. “I would practice on the roof or go down to the square in a small village to play, and people would gather around. That was a spiritual part of my journey, those simple standard tunes. And in this show, for better or worse, the only honest thing I could do was include this music.” Melcori’s trumpeting is so amateurish that some of the melodies are difficult to recognize. But in the context of the show his awkward, forlorn staccato appropriately illustrates his vision of a well-meaning character fumbling toward the truth even as his interactions with others degenerate into convoluted misunderstandings. Through it all, the character keeps plugging away with adult dignity while regarding the world with almost childlike curiosity.
