Going Once… Going Twice… Lyceum SOLD! To Somebody Who Apparently Has a Better Lawyer Than the Previous Owner

FIPS received an email from the Lyceum announcing that the building had finally been sold at auction, but that “…we hope to get it back as the legal dust settles.” What exactly is this “dust?” How will it settle? This dust has been swirling, Pig-Pen-like, around the Lyceum for like 10 years. Sometimes the dust takes the form of endless, incomprehensible emails from the Lyceum’s owner, Eric Richmond. For example, the most recent one was 900+ words, virtually none of which form sentences that make any sense to me. And it includes a melodramatic turn of phrase that might more likely be applied to the trial of an accused serial killer -- “[Judge] Craig's odd and blinkered decisions and her blatant denial of due process raise chilling concerns” – than to a judge ruling on a real estate case.

These missives bother me most of all from my viewpoint as an editor. SO MANY WORDS. SAYING SO LITTLE. The emails should come with a travel-pack of fucking Advil. I would be happy to take a red pen to this tangle of words that don’t come together to form meaning, but I DON’T KNOW WHAT THE FUCK HE’S TRYING TO SAY.  I begged for a clear, 5-bullet explanation in my previous post, and to give Richmond some credit, he took the trouble to comment, trying harder to explain. TO NO AVAIL. Trying harder doesn’t make it clearer. It’s like YELLING at someone who doesn’t speak your language and thinking volume will make him understand. I specifically requested bullets.

I’m offering up a little pro bono editorial work; I’ll give the 5 bullets, if only to help save A Charlie Brown Christmas for future generations. How about: [NOTE: the following attempted synthesis of the diarrheic ramblings of the email in no way reflects FIPS’ or this author’s opinions. Because this author doesn’t really fucking understand it, and is just kind of making this up.]

• The Brooklyn Lyceum has been fucked over by a court system that doesn’t have jurisdiction to rule on this case.

• The case is something about architects being dickheads.

• The Brooklyn Lyceum alleges fraud, perjury, and misrepresentation during the ruling. I don’t know what the ruling is.

• The Brooklyn Lyceum thought they could get some new partners to help out but some rich assholes beat them to it.

• The Brooklyn Lyceum did a bunch of crowd-sourcing, and learned that maybe there’s some conflict of interest with a judge and some other guys, and that’s so uncool, man! If you know any more secret nefarious chilling details about any of this, let us know! It’ll go in our next incomprehensible babblemail.

And please, in the next email (we know there’s another one in your word processor), ditch that hideous dated lizard clip art. It besmirches the entire aesthetic of the building, which along with Charlie Brown, is pretty much why anyone wants to keep the Lyceum open at this point.

Oh, and of course there’s a petition. 263 nice people have signed it. Including people from Switzerland, Germany, and Las Vegas. Everybody loves that fucking Xmas special. I’ll be out scouting a new venue for the show. It kind of has Bell House written all over it…