Nasser wrote the play last summer after learning about the steady state theory in Astronomy 4. After researching the eccentric proponents of this theory (which rivaled the Big Bang theory in the late 1940s), Nasser wrote a fictitious plot to explain how the theory came about. In Nasser's work, theorizing about the origin of the cosmos began when astrophysicist Fred Hoyle sneezed in astrophysicist Thomas Gold's pudding.
"There is really silly weaving of dessert and science and math. It's a very silly play," Nasser, who also plays Gold, said. He added that the three scientists were "just as funny if not funnier" in real life.
"Latif uses their personalities, exacerbates a little and sort of makes them caricatures of themselves," Pat Martha '05, the play's stage manager, said.
Nasser asked Neel Tiruviluamala '05 and Andrew Dahl '05 to join him as cast members to present the play in Fringe festivals in Ottawa, Des Moines, Kansas City and Minneapolis, as well as performances in Providence and at Dartmouth.
"I was going to spend the winter in Russia, doing a play with some Dartmouth grads at the Moscow Art Theater School and I figured why not follow up one crazy, financially non-lucrative theater adventure with another," Dahl said.
To finance the adventure, Nasser received funding from the Office of the Dean of the Faculty, the Hopkins Center and, most recently, Programming Board. Thanks to Programming Board funding, every audience member at Dartmouth will receive a free bowl of pudding.
The foursome first took the show to the Ottawa Fringe Festival from June 18 through the 25th, performing six times.
"The first show, there were only 10 audience members," Martha said. "Every show more came, and by the last few there were 30-40 people."
As the size of the audience grew, the play "changed astronomically," Dahl said. "Latif is constantly doing rewrites and I'm always looking to see what works in front of an audience and what only works on the page."
Nasser agreed. "I think there is no better way to develop plays than to just keep doing it. It's good because we get lots of feedback. It's really exciting. I think we can objectively say it's getting better and better," he said.
With the freedom of the Fringe festivals comes great responsibility.
"It's been a lot of fun to create this play because the four of us are in charge of everything," Dahl said. "I've played the roles of actor, director, lighting designer and stagehand in a week's time."
"Pat is not just the stage manager. He is the P.R. guy, the tying-the-set-to-the-roof-of-the-car guy, the planning-trips guy," Nasser said. "We actually act as our own really poor theater company. It's a huge undertaking."
The foursome's hard work paid off in Ottawa. "Our play is holding its own despite containing no sex, no drugs and no vulgarity, which speaks highly of it. It's fun and silly and just so fun to do," Martha said.
When asked about the message of the play underneath its silly exterior, the cast agreed it forces the audience to question the image of a "faceless" scientific world.
"Science is human in ways you don't think it's human," Nasser.
Speaking of the personality of his character, Hoyle, Dahl said, "He's just less interested in the nuts and bolts of cosmology and more interested in coming up with flashy, attractive theories."
"There are great theories and then there are these guys. And yet at the same time they are so passionate, and that is a really beautiful thing," Nasser added.
"It's also about puns," Dahl said. "Lots and lots of puns."
And surprises. When asked the flavor of the free pudding, Nasser refused to comment. "Some things are best kept a secret," he said.
"The Star Chamber" will be performed this Friday and Saturday in the Bentley Theater at 8 p.m. Admission is one dollar at the door.
