Pasadena Babalon
Pasadena Babalon
George D. Morgan
“Pasadena Babalon” is the incredible true story of John “Jack” Whiteside Parsons.
Rocket scientist by day, black magic occultist by night, Jack Parsons led a colorful, yet misterious, existence that brought him in contact with some of the great luminaries of the 30´s and 40′s: Aleister Crowley, Howard Hughes, Ray Bradbury, Theodore von Karman, and Robert Heinlein, to name a few. He was also friends with a young, little-known science fiction writer by the name of L. Ron Hubbard.
Using an eclectic gallery of characters, “Pasadena Babalon” takes the audience on a bizarre journey through early twentieth century Pasadena; from Jack’s boyhood experimentation with magic, to his discovery of an invention that would make space travel possible, to his untimely death from an accidental explosion at the age of 38.
As co-founder of both the Jet Propulsion Laboratory and the Aerojet General Corporation, Jack Parsons should have cemented his reputation in history, yet today very few have ever heard of him.
“Pasadena Babalon” examines the limitations of genius, the impermanence of success, the expansion of sexual boundaries, and the unintended consequences of applied brilliance – all against the backdrop of a world ruptured by the advance of new technologies.
Available
2009
978-1-503-13493-5
Drama
Edição do Autor
George D. Morgan.
Son of Mary Sherman Morgan, inventor of the rocket fuel Hydyne, which powered the rocket that boosted the United States’ first satellite, is an acclaimed author, playwright and screenwriter. He received his B.A. in Creative Writing from the California State University Channel Islands, and his M.F.A. in Performative Writing from the University Of California, Riverside, in the Palm Desert Writing Program.
He’s the author of a dozen plays and musicals, including “Second to Die”, “Nevada Belle”, and “Thunder in the Valley”. Most importantly, he’s also the author of “Rocket Girl”, a play based on the life of the first American rocket scientist (his mother, Mary Sherman Morgan), which premiered in 2008 at Caltech, where he is a resident playwright. This was the first of a trilogy of science-themed plays, the second one being “Pasadena Babylon”, which premiered in 2010 and was a semi-finalist of the Sundance Institute’s Alfred P. Sloan Prize. The trilogy ends with “Capture the Sun”, a play that addresses the 1989 controversy around Stanley Pons, Martin Fleischmann, and the cold fusion.
Morgan is an active member of both the Dramatists Guild and the Writers Guild of America.