Once upon a blue moon, a trio of intrepid travelers left their home Blueniverse and landed in Las Vegas, looking for intelligent life. They found a pyramid-shaped structure where an alien named Carrot Top built a successful outpost, and calculated that a Blue Man Group could draw intelligent beings into a Luxor venue for performative engagements as did the Red Man. The Blue Man Group Theater materialized, a marshmallow supply chain was formed, and the Blue Man Group sent for their intergalactic instruments.
Whether the Blue Man Group gets nutrients and energy from marshmallows has yet to be determined. Inquiries are met with blank stares, but it has been theorized that a Blue Man brain experiences increased bluerotransmitter levels when catching a marshmallow from a distance. It’s as if the marshmallows were flying on a stream of consciousness, pulled by a magnetic force into Blue Man mouths, never to be seen again.
Marshmallow mayhem is an interlude between more raucous segments of the Blue Man Group show. It’s meant to challenge senses of sight and sound, with live music generated by real musicians and unorthodox tones coaxed from percussive instruments discovered or assembled by the three mute mallet pounders. Consider the air-tight calculation it takes to calibrate synthetic polymer pipes to optimal tunings while watching the Blues generate sound waves that disco producer Giorgio Moroder could appreciate, or just sit back and absorb the frequencies.
While the show is monochromatic for much of the evening, the Blue Man Group has a fondness for fluorescence and color, and technique was decidedly not obtained from Bob Ross. Their mouths have more functionality than for marshmallow catching, and demonstration of the method they devised for creating canvases is one of the splashiest parts of the proceedings.
The paint is edible, as are the Twinkies and Cap’N Crunch that serve as far more than junk food to a Blue Man. A Twinkie can help a Blue Man form a connection with an audience member. The sound of crunching cereal produces theta waves that cause neural oscillations, which positively affect cognitive and behavioral functioning. Cream cheese is a particular favorite of Blue Man Group. It is far less expensive than goat cheese.
The performance art concept originated by Chris Wink, Matt Goldman, and Phil Stanton 30 years ago at Astor Place in New York endures because the world becomes a more baffling place with the passage of time. No one is more baffled than a Blue Man. People connect with the characters because their antics tap into the memory of being a blank slate hungry for input and fearless about making mistakes. Then again, some folks come to experience vicariously what it’s like to paint one’s face blue and act weird, and some just for the absurdity of it all. Regardless, there’s a lesson to be learned about the connective tissue that holds us together—and the Blueniversal truths that bind us all.
Luxor, 702.262.4400
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