There May Not Be a There There, or Gold
‘Donogoo,’ a 1930 Farce About a Financial Scheme
Alexis Soloski
June 24, 2014: Psst! Wanna buy some collateralized debt obligations? How about a nice credit default swap? Wait! I’ve got just the thing: shares in a plan to exploit the gold reserves of Donogoo-Tonka, that lush South American Eden. In Donogoo, a 1930 French farce by Jules Romains, revived by Mint Theater Company, Lamendin (James Riordan), a down-on-his-luck Parisian, concocts a plan to attract investors to those fabled plains. You could call Lamendin’s plot a pyramid scheme, but Donogoo doesn’t boast a single pyramid. As one shrewd adventurer asks, “Does the place exist?” “That depends,” Lamendin replies, “on what you mean by ‘exist.' " Donogoo, it transpires, is the mistake of a geographer, Le Trouhadec (George Morfogen), a pompous sort who won’t acknowledge the error in his mapmaking. Lamendin has sworn loyalty to Le Trouhadec, so he resolves to make the error right. And to make some money, too. If he can attract enough interest in Donogoo, he believes that he can somehow will the place into existence.
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