TUNEabomber musical satire ticks down the seconds until KC Fringe Fest premiere

Michael Wysong (left) and John Lampe (right) // Courtesy AnnaBeth Crittenden

Four years ago, Manhattan-based actor and musician John Lampe had the dumbest idea his friend had ever heard.

What started as an absurd pun thought up at a bar in 2019—and then a subsequent drunk text to friend and fellow theater professional Michael Wysong—has since transformed into a two-man musical comedy and “deranged cabaret act” coming to the KC Fringe Festival July 22.

Written, performed, and self-produced by the pair, the show is a response to one central question: What if the Unabomber never wanted to be an eco-terrorist; he only wanted to be a musical theater star—the next Bob Fosse, if you will.

John Lampe in a TUNEabomber performance // Courtesy AnnaBeth Crittenden

The 65-minute musical comedy is set at a parole hearing for the Unabomber (Ted Kaczynski), played by Lampe, and includes a performance by Wysong as his attorney and piano accompanist.

“When we first wrote the show, we thought we’d be the only people who ever wanted to hear it,” Lampe said. “But as more people see it and hear it, it turns out that thankfully, we were wrong.”

At their first full TUNEabomber show in April 2022, the duo was shocked to find a line formed outside their small Manhattan theater venue. Their debut had completely sold out.

The genesis of the show can be traced back to long before the fateful TUNEabomber text, about seven years ago when Lampe and Wysong met when working at a rehearsal studio and black box theatre space in Midtown in Manhattan.

“We found out that we have the same stupid sense of humor,” Wysong says. “And that we both know way too much about obscure American political history and musical theater.”

These commonalities, along with Lampe’s experience as an actor and director and Wysong’s as a musical theater composer, would prove to be a perfect storm for the political satire-packed, cabaret-inspired show spotlighting a musical theater-obsessed TUNEabomber.

In sharing the same sense of humor, the pair often joke about outlandish new show ideas they never consider as a real possibility—a McDonald’s parody play has been discussed at length, for example. But for some reason, this one stuck.

It started off as a fun after-work pastime, writing a few songs here and there and messing around.

“Then we thought, ‘This is kind of fun. Maybe we just keep doing this,'” Lampe says. “And then before we knew it, we had eight, nine, then 10 songs and thought, ‘Oh crap, did we just accidentally make a show?'”

That was fall 2019. The following months, years, and pandemic would be filled with writing and rewriting the show, trying on new ideas and songs.

Oftentimes, writing sessions started with a 6-pack of beer and locking themselves in a rehearsal studio.

“Those writing sessions were such a fever dream. It’s such an absurd thing that we did that I don’t remember much of that,” Wysong says. “Though I do remember one of the fights that we’ve been having since day one about me wanting a dream ballet in the show. But John is not a dancer—which I think would make it even better.”

@tuneabomber_musical Critics are calling the TUNEabomber the “bomb dot com” #newmusical #musicaltheatre #theatre #newmusic #tedkazcinsky #tedkazcinsky #tuneabomber ♬ original sound – Tuneabomber

Though the dream ballet is still on Wysong’s wishlist, the show has evolved and gone through many changes as they’ve performed and tweaked it in the past few years.

The current version of the TUNEabomber has 12 songs paired with choreography from their newly appointed director Liz Power. Though they estimate they’ve written upwards of 20 songs in the process, discarding some along the way when they didn’t fit the show anymore and constantly tinkering with jokes and other elements of the show.

But the biggest change to the TUNEamber came earlier this month with the news of Ted Kaczynski’s death in prison.

“My first thought was ‘thank you for the free PR Ted,'” says Lampe. “I joked that I’ve never been more popular than the day that he died. Because everyone who knows that we’ve been working on this show, or people who have seen it, were texting, calling, and emailing me about it.”

Courtesy AnnaBeth Crittenden

This was accompanied by a wave of realization about the extra work likely ahead. This was especially felt by Wysong, who says they had just gotten the script to a great place right when the news was flooded with Unabomber headlines.

“I was watching cartoons when I get the news alert, and I threw my phone, because I was like, ‘Fuck, now I have to rewrite.'”

But this twist wasn’t something the pair hadn’t prepared for, and after a roundtable with their director, they determined how they would reframe elements and add a layer to the preexisting show.

“We rewrote a little bit, and we do handle the death, but in sort of an unexpected way,” Wysong says.  “You’ll have to see it to find out.”

Wysong and Lampe say they have been lucky to encounter many along the way that are as “sick and twisted” as they are and find enjoyment in what they liken to Liza with a “Z “starring the Unabomber.

This is the perfect show for a new niche they have since discovered through TikTok: the Comedy/True Crime/Musical Theater Venn Diagram, which is very real according to Wysong. Full of deep-cut musical theater jokes and dark satirical comedy, the intersection of this Venn diagram is the zenith TUNEabomber’s target demographic.

Anyone interested in joining in on their niche sense of humor and appreciation of absurdity can catch the TUNEabomber July 22 to July 29 at the KC Fringe Festival.

Wysong and Lampe, who are from Western Kansas and St. Louis, respectively, are excited about what feels like a homecoming to them.

“When I was 18 years old, I was seeing theater at the Unicorn, at the KCRep, and the Spinning Tree Theatre,” Wysong says. “I have so much respect for the Kansas City Theatre scene, and that I get to come and do a show in Kansas City, makes me very, very, very, very happy.”

To purchase tickets for TUNEabomber at KC Fringe, click here. For more information on the show visit their site or the KC Fringe site.