Mime, Mayhem, and Middle Names: Old God Is a Fringe Ritual for the End of the World

What do Jeff Bezos, T.S. Eliot, and a white-faced clown have in common? In Old God, a raw, unfiltered solo performance by Vegas veteran and Cirque-trained performer Alec Jones-Trujillo the ancient meets the absurd in a poetic reckoning with collapse, connection, and the cosmic joke of being alive. With no script, just a costume and a mission, Old Godchannels bouffon, satire, and riotous clowning to provoke, disarm, and maybe even heal.

For those unfamiliar with your work can you describe the concept of Old God. 

Old God is a being so old they have forgotten their own name. He’s a somewhat cracked immortal being who has seen so much that nothing is good, nothing is bad. What is, is. And there is beauty in that. 

You’ve got a mime piece called Jeffrey Bezos Has a Dirty Little Secret. What inspired that, and what’s it saying beneath the absurdity?

Bezos was always about the money and never about the books he initially sold on Amazon. His high school graduation speech talks about humanity’s need to become an interplanetary species. Entire cities are carved out—No more shoe stores, board game stores, or markets. Just boxes piling up at your door. Bezos once said all he can think to do with his Amazon winnings is to travel to space. 

He and others (Musk, Branson, many more) quite literally want to squeeze every nickel out of the planet to go live on the moon (which they envision to one day be a giant data center) or in Low Earth Orbit (the better for us poor to look at them), or Mars (which, as someone who lives in Las Vegas, I can tell you the BEST Mars will be is like living on the Vegas Strip in July). 

These are villainous aims, in my opinion. All I want to do is have a picnic and laugh with my friends. Life can be so easy. Let me lay in the grass while I still can.

These are tiny people. And so unconcerned with the heart of humanity. So the mime piece kind of gets into that slowly and after a lot of stupid fun. 

You trained in clown and mime - forms often seen as light or comedic - but Old God explores weighty, existential themes. Was that contrast intentional from the start?

The desire was to blow off steam, I suppose, and explore the energy around heavier topics and themes. I’m not sure how well I could pull that off as “Alec” your fellow human who has opinions on the world. Carlin could do it. We all miss Carlin.

But with the paint and the Grimaldi inspired costume—an image we all sort of know but likely have never seen in person—there is a fun tension. It is something old and new. Known yet unknown. From the past but talking modern. That’s  an exciting contrast.

You’ve performed in Las Vegas and with Cirque - what’s been the highlight of your career?

Hosting the in-your-face hit variety show Absinthe (Caesars Palace, Las Vegas) for over 2,500 shows has been an amazing ride. The show is very loose in terms of script. The character is a bit crass and I’ve been able to go to very edgy places on a weekly basis (6-10 shows a week). 

It’s honestly hard to remember specific moments at Absinthe after so many shows. Time has collapsed for me inside the tent we perform in. So I’ll share this as a representation of a general vibe:

Just last week a 91 year old woman was at the show with her daughter, son in law and two grandchildren. We (myself and co-host Heidi Rider) proceeded to talk about all the incredible sex granny used to have in the 1930s. We went on to celebrate how much life her vagina (not the word we used) has brought into the world. She wiggled her shoulders at us and winked. A huge smile on her face. A 91 year old has been more or less invisible for 30 years and she just loved the play of it and the attention and the crudeness. The entire room applauded her sexual energies and biological fruitings. Her grandchildren were shocked. Her daughter was laughing and wiping away tears. As the show went on (we kept referencing her through out) the family took on a specialness. A pride in their granny. The grandchildren beamed and laughed. It’s safe to assume that this family will be talking about their experience at the show for years and years well after granny moves on. 

This sort of thing happens a lot at Absinthe. And (as is often the case with clown-type comedy) what we said wouldn’t be particularly great on paper. It would likely appear offensive and cheap. But in that show with those people in that moment it’s like we painted a beautiful picture with a toxic pallet.

There’s a lot of chaos and collapse in the show, but also humour and release. What’s the most purely joyful moment for you on stage each night?

There is a part in the show where I ask audience members their middle names and then rhyme them. “Jack rhymes with snack”. But I do it as fast as I can. Eventually it falls apart. Especially with all the Scottish names I’ve never heard before! That part is very dumb and fun to do. And I’m still sort of meeting the audience so that part feels a bit like a handshake. 

You perform without a script, reacting to the room in real time. What does that demand from you as a performer - and what do you think it gives to the audience?

The show was basically 7 bullet points when I first did it. My director, Gabe McKinney, had worked with me for many months finding the character and his general zone. We had about two hours of material but all of it intentionally loose and tailored to how I like to play. 

All the language, for the most part, has been discovered while performing the show. Lines have sort of been remembered and forgotten along the way. I often think of the show as a collaboration with the audience. I want to go as far as I can and be as free as possible all while connecting with the audience. Some shows we get there. Some shows we fall short. I think if I can warm up the audience correctly then we can sort of build it together and get to a real zone.

Hopefully audiences get to feel like they’ve been a collaborator in an experience. That they are pulled into a moment. The word count alone. The amount of images and ideas. It’s exhausting! I think it’s either give over to it or glaze over. It’s not for everyone and plenty of people aren’t enlivened by it. But in all the shows I’ve ever done, audiences in Old God from time to time can hit this high fever pitch that I’ve never felt elsewhere. 

Old God will be at Assembly Roxy at 9.55pm from 30th July - 24th August. Tickets available HERE.