Sam Singleton Atheist Evangelist in Patriarchs and Penises at the Westport Flea Market

Sam Singleton Atheist Evangelists live performances draw a surprisingly diverse audience--not only the expected “true nonbelievers” and “philosophical and theological types” but, a lot of people who just like to laugh, according to tour manager Cari Park, who describes the two-act comedy as a theater piece rather than a stand-up act. Park describes the scene: “The stage is black and bare except for a pulpit, a small altar bench, three rickety folding chairs, and a coat tree, all starkly white. Brother Sam, in his signature frock coat, blue vest and matching spectacles, conducts the crowd through a hilarious and hair-raising tour of his childhood among “the tongues-speaking, snake-handling, frothing-at-the-mouth holy rollers,” and subsequent “reversion to the atheistic state into which we all are born,” before ending Act I with a mercilessly satiric deconstruction of the role of God in American life.” She notes that the second act has Brother Sam teaching a “biblically accurate but somewhat irreverent “Bible class” in which Brother Sam satirically details the symbolic use of penises throughout the Scriptures. “Nobody ever told me that what ties the whole book together, its narrative thread, is penises,” he says. “Don't look for Richard Dawkins or Sam Harris,” says Park. “This is comedy. From the subtlest irony to the most flagrant ridicule, it never fails at its purpose, which is to provoke both thought and laughter. Like Brother Sam says, “If anybody can use some laughs and encouragement, its atheists.” The performance itself lasts a little less than two hours including a 15 minute intermission.
In Act I Brother Sam recounts a childhood among “tongues-speaking, snake-handling, frothing at the mouth holy rollers from the Ozarks,” and his subsequent “reversion" to atheism. Act II has Brother Sam leading a Sunday School class dedicated to the role of the penis throughout the Bible. Patriarchs and Penises contains a dizzying number of provocative ideas, expressed in language which, if not exactly of the everyday variety, is remarkable in its clarity and authenticity. That Brother Sam crams so many laughs into so much substance is what makes Patriarchs and Penises an experience like no other.