Larry, Cat in Space (2:30 p.m.) Fito, Gato en el Espacio (3:30 p.m.)

Setup

1. Planetarium entrance light off.


2. Sound board: sliders up for CD, DVD, and output; down for all others.


3. Video projector: monitor select line 1, input select line 1, to enable show DVD (video at DVDLARRY.CUE line 422, DVD-FITO.CUE lines 310 and 427). Unplug XP from line 1 for brighter video.


4. CD: entry music.


5. DVD: Larry—Cat in Space/FITO in show (left) DVD player. You should see one rectangular button on the monitor; brightness and contrast down to prevent audience from seeing it. Debris on the disk might cause a disk player in the corner of the monitor and a red circle with a line. Animation (right) DVD player is not used.


6. Zeiss: audience faces south, crescent Moon 45° up on meridian. At lines 41–44 of DVDLARRY.CUE, make sure Moon does not interfere with portrait of Diana.


7. Spice computer: DVDLARRY.CUE (no dash) or DVD-FITO.CUE (with a dash).
   1. Line 45 highlighted: Zeiss latitude motion to get crescent moon on meridian above Diana portrait.
   2. Line 64 highlighted: slew hard right, halfway up dome (not too low), speed 9:30 or 10:00 on dial. Leave slew in automatic. (Slew left at lines 265–272, right at 299–310.) Zoom is not used.
   3. Line 80 Time 1:31.50 highlighted: wait for audience to enter.


8. Audience entry sequence.

Show

Launch the show by aiming the DVD remote at the show DVD and pressing ENTER. After the gold rectangle disappears, video projector brightness and contrast up. Zeiss whites and blues down gradually. Planetarium entrance light off.

There it is—the Moon.

• “There it is—the Moon. Fascinating!” (“Ahí la tienen: La Luna. ¡Fascinate!”) Stars on as soon as dome becomes dark.
• “My name is Larry.” (“Yo soy Fito.”) Stars off.

Me, I like to go out with my humans

• “Me, I like to go out with my humans and look at the sky.” Stars on.
• “I guess I forgot to tell you that I live on the Moon now.” Zeiss Moon on.
• “I remember the day she came home and told us all that she’d gotten her job.” Moon and stars off.

Back to watching the sky…

• “…looking for some small visionof Diana in her new home.” Stars on as sky darkens around full moon (184 15 Fade 0 LAMP:ABC; line 185 in Fito).
• “A little over to the left of the crater in the middle there.” Laser point Mare Imbrium (line 186).
• “Dear Mom and Dad, Here I am on the Moon.” Stars off.

Blastoff!

• Roar with red cove lights (249 5 Fade 100 LAMP: BC): Latitude control hard counterclockwise to attract attention to the Zeiss.
  Boost the roar in the Spanish version.
• “I wanted out! Out!” Stars on.
• “In fact, I felt kind of dizzy.” Stars off; halt latitude motion. By this time, the Zeiss north arm should be back to north.

I sniffed around and found some food…

• “…and listened to the strange noises…” Stars on. Slow diurnal motion from left to right as space plane slews from right to left.
• “I hoped all these strange words meant that I was on my way to see Diana.” Stars off.

“Outside” looked very strange.

• “In fact, ‘outside’ looked very strange.” Faint starts with slow diurnal motion.
  Fito: video projector brightness and contrast must be up for video Earth. (English uses Earth chord at line 309.)
• “Then I saw lots of little white points of light.” Brighten stars.
• “All of a sudden, the vibrating stopped…” Halt dirnal motion on “stopped”. Then stars off.

There was a window in the boarding area…

• “…and we stood before it for a long, long time” Stars bright, Zeiss Moon panorama (HP HP PA PC) dim.
• “As we turned to leave, I noticed a group of people…” Stars and panorama off.

The door opened with a hiss…

• “…but I wasn’t scared by it this time.” Stars bright, Zeiss Moon panorama (HP HP PA PC) dim.
• “I think it has a lovely sound.” Before credits appear, slide down DVD sound on sound board, DVD PLAY/PAUSE to pause the DVD. For Fito, do the southern constellations and Magellanic Clouds. Before end of credits, turn down video projector brightness and contrast to prevent rectangle from reappearing at end of DVD.

Mirror image

Glenn says that one of the slides of the full moon is in backwards. He doesn’t know precisely which slide, but it’s the one associated with the line on the cuesheet “When LIGHTS FADE leaving only FULL MOON, stars on.”) Don’t know that anyone would notice this—on the other hand it’s a fairly simplified pic of moon features and the “lady in the moon” is looking the wrong way…

A militarized Moon with a “commander”

The Moon is populated entirely by Midwesterners. Diana, the Roman moon goddess, doesn’t need her clothes—everyone on the Moon wears the same uniform. Confusingly, Larry sees an earth chord (line 309), but the “space plane” flies all the way to the moon without stopping at a “space station”.

Larry replaces Our Place in Space and Viaje a los Planetas. Larry premiered on Friday, October 6, 2006; Fito on Sunday, October 29, 2006 (no one showed up). Thanks to Jack Nicholson for voicing the cat (“Whatsamatter? Never seen a cat before?”).

Links

1. Larry home page at Loch Ness
2. Cheat sheet
3. Script in English
4. Larry is the remote descendant of You will go to the Moon by Mae and Ira Freeman.
5. Differences between DVDLARRY.CUE and DVD-FITO.CUE (listed by diff). The English version has an Earth chord (LoCate 5 STEP: F, lines 76, 309); the Spanish version has video (line 310). The titles, signs in the mob scene, and closing credits are also different.

¡La Luna necesita gatos!