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A special performance of Loudspeaker, directed by Ian Stigliani, was recorded as an MP3 file for presentation in Zephyr 2003. The actors are Doug Hundley and Jody Gehrman. Intro and outro music was selected by Steve Oliveria who also served as sound engineer.
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The Script
(SFX) Theme music for a radio show. Then down and out.
SUZANNAH. Hello everyone and welcome to the Web of God, the program dedicated to Internet innovation as it applies to Christian life. I'm Suzannah Neuman and today's guest is Russell LaMont Sterten, founder of a new web site: speakdirectlytogod.com. Welcome to the show, Mr. Sterten.
RUSSELL. An honor to be here, Suzannah.
SUZANNAH. How did you get the idea for speakdirectlytogod.com?
RUSSELL. Well, ten years ago I stopped at a filling station in the Mojave desert, and that's when God spoke directly to me.
SUZANNAH. God spoke to you while you were stopped for gas.
RUSSELL. Yes.
SUZANNAH. Where did God's voice come from? I don't think you'd want a burning bush next to a gas station.
RUSSELL. (laughs) That's a good one, Suzannah. No, God spoke to me from out of the nozzle on one of the pumps.
SUZANNAH. The Lord truly does move in mysterious ways.
RUSSELL. He told me to gather together all the styrofoam coffee cups and old stereo speakers I could lay my hands on.
SUZANNAH. An unusual request, wouldn't you say?
RUSSELL. Perhaps, but I knew not to question the will of God. If Noah had questioned the will of God, where would we be today?
SUZANNAH. Yes, I see what you mean. So you set about collecting styrofoam coffee cups and stereo speakers.
RUSSELL. That's right.
SUZANNAH. Without any clear idea of what God wanted you to do with them.
RUSSELL. Faith is the strongest force in the universe, Suzannah.
SUZANNAH. How did you go about accumulating these items?
RUSSELL. For the cups, they mainly come from church socials. Over the years I managed to put together slightly over one million styrofoam coffee cups.
SUZANNAH. And God also told you to collect old stereo speakers?
RUSSELL. Yes. I'd drive the pick-up into the city ahead of the garbage trucks and collect old stereo speakers that folks threw out when they got their new stereo speakers. Generally it'd take about two, three hours to get a truckload.
SUZANNAH. And you collected how many of these speakers over the years?
RUSSELL. Close to a hundred thousand in all, and I was able to snug 'em together speaker-side-up on the styrofoam raft.
SUZANNAH. The styrofoam raft?
RUSSELL. The cups. Glued 'em together -- waterproof glue -- into a large square...size of five football fields. I towed the whole shebang to a spot smack dab on the equator.
SUZANNAH. God told you to do this.
RUSSELL. No, Suzannah. He just give me those initial instructions back there at the filling station. Wasn't till later I figured out what His Divine Plan was.
SUZANNAH. And what would that be?
RUSSELL. The world's largest loudspeaker, so it'll be easier for God to hear people when they pray. Ya see, there are places along the equator where the sun shines every day -- for the same number of hours each day.
SUZANNAH. I'm not sure I follow you.
RUSSELL. That's how the loudspeaker gets its power. On the sides of the raft I got solar panels. Use them to separate the hydrogen outta the seawater. Then the hydrogen gets burned in the fuel cells to run the amplifiers, which are hooked up to the speakers. Cost a pretty penny, but we're pretty darn sure we'll get our money back and then some.
SUZANNAH. How big a sound do a hundred thousand speakers make?
RUSSELL. Our loudspeaker has the same decibel level as a hydrogen bomb, Suzannah. Now I imagine God would notice a hydrogen bomb goin' off at the equator, wouldn't He?
SUZANNAH. I, yes, I guess He would. Let's see now, all this information can be found on your web site: www.speakdirectlytogod.com?
RUSSELL. That's right. That's all one word -- speakdirectlytogod.
SUZANNAH. Mr. Sterten, tell us more about the actual procedure for speaking to God.
RUSSELL. It's done from your home telephone. Once your membership is authorized at the web site and we have your credit card number, we send an email telling you when to call to offer up your prayer.
SUZANNAH. (nurturing doubt) So I would call in and talk live to God at a highly amplified level through some stereo speakers floating along the equator on a styrofoam raft in some undisclosed ocean on planet Earth.
RUSSELL. That pretty much sums it up.
SUZANNAH. How much does this cost?
RUSSELL. A dollar a word.
SUZANNAH. A dollar a word.
RUSSELL. That's right. Short words, long words, all the same. You could just say "Hallelujah!" and we'd put a one-dollar charge on your credit card. Just sign up at the web site and then call 1-800-PRAY LOUD. I guaran-damn-tee ya God's gonna sit up and take notice.
SUZANNAH. That's the phone number, 1-800-PRAY LOUD?
RUSSELL. That's right.
SUZANNAH. And each prayer costs $1 per word?
RUSSELL. That's the base rate, yes. "Hallelujah Lord", that would be $2. "Praise the Lord", $3. Maybe you just want to repeat the original Lord's Prayer from the Bible. That'd be $67 if you end it with "...the power and the glory forever, amen." But if you're one of them that says "...the power and the glory forever and ever, amen," that'll cost you $69.
SUZANNAH. Who do you expect your customers to be?
RUSSELL. We're getting the message out to religious individuals of all kinds, but our research people tell us our core base will mainly be Baptists and Muslims.
SUZANNAH. Now that presents a potential dilemma: What if there are two prayers, say back-to-back, and one is from Saddam Hussein and the other is from George Bush, and they are asking God for opposite things?
RUSSELL. I'm glad you brought that up. We have a deluxe option for $2 a word. If you choose the deluxe option, we run your prayer through an echo chamber. Now that's a real attention getter. That's the sort of thing that could give a guy the edge in a tight situation. We have other options as well.
SUZANNAH. Such as.
RUSSELL. If you're shy about praying loudly to God yourself, you can email us your prayer, and we'll have it delivered to God by one of our celebrity prayer readers.
SUZANNAH. For instance?
RUSSELL. For $3 a word you get Regis Philbin.
SUZANNAH. Umm-huh.
RUSSELL. Jerry Falwell will read your prayer for $5 a word. Seven-fifty gets you John Ashcroft. He's very passionate. And if you can pay top dollar, ten bucks a word, you get your choice of Charlton Heston or James Earl Jones. We expect our better-off customers will want Mr. Heston and the echo chamber. But the basic rate for a prayer of any length, done in your own voice, is a rock-bottom $1 a word.
SUZANNAH. Why do you believe God will answer these prayers?
RUSSELL. It's not for me to question the mind of God, Suzannah. I am His obedient servant, I have followed His instructions, and, my heavens, it just makes sense, doesn't it, that the louder you pray, the better off you'll be? (pause) Of course, sincerity plays a part as well.
SUZANNAH. Sincerity?
RUSSELL. Say you want the captain of the football team to ask you out.
You need your sincerity to come through in your prayer. This is where adverbs can be highly beneficial. Words like "totally" and "really" and "truly" and "honestly" and "desperately?" The more adverbs you use, the more God's gonna realize you are really, truly, honestly, and totally sincere. And at this low price it doesn't make a lotta sense to be stingy with your adverbs, now does it? For longer prayers we offer a variety of lovely gifts.
SUZANNAH. Tell us about the gifts.RUSSELL. A 500-word prayer qualifies you for the Big Book of Very Loud Prayers. We'll be reprinting this book every month and it'll feature the very best loud prayers from the previous month. For a thousand-word prayer, we'll send you a toaster oven.
SUZANNAH. Your business is currently operational?
RUSSELL. Up and running for a week now.
SUZANNAH. And you amplify people's prayers 24 hours a day?
RUSSELL. Twenty-two, actually, Suzannah. We shut down two hours every morning for routine maintenance.
SUZANNAH. What kind of maintenance?
RUSSELL. Well, we get quite a number of birds that fly over while the prayers are blasting up, and they mostly just die and fall outta the sky and onto the speakers. We have this Ecuadorian fella climbs around and scoops 'em up. Fish, too. They don't handle the noise too well. They float to the top and we harvest 'em in nets. Brings in a little walkin-around money.
SUZANNAH. (unbelieving) So by operating this loudspeaker through which people pray to God, you are simultaneously slaughtering fish and birds?
RUSSELL. And dolphins.
SUZANNAH. That doesn't bother you?
RUSSELL. Collateral damage. All for the greater good. If you're gonna eat sausage, you gotta butcher a few pigs, right? (pause) Muslims don't listen to this show do they?
SUZANNAH. No, but you see you can't... (to audience) That's all the time we have, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for tuning in.
(SFX). Theme music.
SUZANNAH (cont'd). Don't you see? The fish, the birds, they're God's creatures, too.
RUSSELL. (barely audible) Maybe so, but tell me this, Suzannah: Why do you think he made so many of them?
(SFX) Theme out.
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