Shawn Watson: High octane performance.By Susan Tileston
For The SpectatorNova
NewsNow.com
‘Sanuk’ is the Thai word for fun and while there are lots of LOL moments in Spalding Gray’s classic monologue, Swimming to Cambodia, there is also an undercurrent of angst and cynicism. The piece is ostensibly about Gray’s role in the 1987 film, ‘The Killing Fields,’ with enough background on Cambodia’s Khmer Rouge to give context, but it’s also about the author’s hilarious experiences with a ‘Thai stick’ (large marijuana joint) , his inability to leave his New York apartment until he hears a positive word uttered on the radio, a sex show involving a ripe banana, his phobia about being ‘chomped’ by a large shark, encounters on an Amtrak lounge car, and his search for the ‘perfect moment,’ whatever that is.
Let me confess that I knew Spalding Gray slightly in New York City.
Among other things, we went to the same dentist. My husband and I had seen him perform, so I was curious to see how someone other than the author would interpret Gray’s work.
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