SAN NARCISO, Calif. (Bennington Vale Evening Transcript) -- The Tank Players announced Friday the scheduling of two new original productions, which have been in the works since February. The musical plays, which will run through September 2 at the Buffum Plaza Arts Center in Santa Calcetines, promise San Narciso’s theater patrons the same innovative, experimental and somewhat surreal performances they have come to expect from director Randolph Driblette and his troupe. “Both productions are, of course, re-imaginings of other well-established storylines, which is our forte,” Driblette said. “We do not invent, we reinvent and reevaluate and pervert the superficial to get to the unintended truth of the thing. Like T.S. Eliot, The Tank Players believe that the human mind cannot conceive of so many original thoughts. Therefore, we connect nothing with nothing until we strip away the opinions, leaving only atoms and empty space.”

The first play takes as its basis the long-running British science fiction series “Doctor Who.” In The Tank Players’ “Jigga Who,” a time-traveling gangster who refers to himself only as “The Jigga” journeys across the universe, other dimensions and history itself to duel hostile aliens through foul-mouthed and sexually explicit rap battles. The second feature is based entirely on the Disneyland attraction “It’s a Small World.” In Driblette’s retelling, audience members see not the ideal, sanitized world of Walt Disney, but the globe divided and fractured through tumultuous geopolitics. Every song in the musical, Driblette verified, is “It’s a Small World,” performed in different musical stylings for three hours.

Details regarding show times and tickets can be found in the Community Events Calendar. A full synopsis and review of each play will be posted next week.