Edgar Oliver reveals a ‘Rip Tide’ of experience and emotion with new play about East Village club

Edgar Oliver: Playwright, Actor, Poet, Performance Artist, Monologuist

Photo by Bob Krasner

The most distinctive thing about Edgar Oliver may be his voice — not just the way that he forms his words as they roll out of his mouth with an unplaceable accent and an somewhat melodic delivery, but also the unique way that he chooses to tell his stories. 

Whether one encounters him reading at a lectern, sitting at a coffee shop or performing a self-written one-man play — as he is currently doing at the Axis Theater — there is no doubt that you are listening to Mr. Oliver.

“Rip Tide,” his latest autobiographical production which is now running at the Axis, is ostensibly about his days as a patron and performer at the now legendary (and defunct) Pyramid Club in its East Village 80s heyday.

In only 60 minutes it becomes much more, revealing some very personal truths in a way that he has not done before.

Although his previous pieces have certainly revolved around his history — especially his somewhat unusual upbringing with his artist sister and a mother who, shall we say, kept the three of them in a world that did not exactly resemble a typical nuclear family — “Rip Tide” goes further into the artist’s actual state of mind.

“It’s the most personal thing I’ve done,” admits Oliver. “It was scary. … It still is.” 

He began creating it about one and a half years ago, writing “some short things” and he “didn’t try to think about how they would go together.”  Despite the fact that he “felt incapable to do the Pyramid justice,” he draws a vivid picture of the unique scene there.

In conversation, Oliver mentions the many Pyramid performers who did not make it into the script, such as Hapi Phace, John Sex, Ethyl Eichelberger, John Kelly, Wendy Wild and Kestutis Nakas and all the other inspirational figures who helped him to become a performer. When he finished the piece, he said that he thought, “Wow, now I’m going…