A world built for the lobby.

The show

First conceptualized in the Writer’s Room, “Escape From Planet Death!” is the result of media arts professor Tom Russell and his students’ creative efforts. Before the stage, the story was created for a podcast whose episodes the students wrote, and which Russell edited as the Creative Consultant for the team of writers. Departing almost entirely from the plot of the podcast, Russell wrote the staged version, which audiences can now enjoy in BYU’s Pardoe Theatre starting October 29.

“Escape From Planet Death!” follows the adventures of the crew of the Friendship Delegation as they face off the perils of space travel and build relationships along the way. While the play draws on several sci-fi and comic book tropes, the production does not follow the exact footsteps of any one radio show or graphic novel.

“It’s not really a re-creation of radio shows and sci-fi’s from the 30s through the early 60s as much as a celebration of those things,” said Russell. “We exaggerate some of the cultural conventions associated with previous decades, so in that sense, the show is also satirical.”

South lobby display

Escape From Planet Death satirizes the culture of the science fiction in radio shows of the 1950's. The south lobby display was created to help emerge audiences into the cultural zeitgeist of the time period to help explain the insensitive language used in throughout the show.

North lobby display

Escape From Planet Death 's conceptually followed a group of fans staging a reading of a fictitious radio show. As a shorthand for communicating this fandom the south lobby display was created using the aesthetics of popular fandom incorporating Escape From Planet Death, part of which consisted of creating custom trading cards of characters from the show using costume renderings which were handed out to audience members who stayed for talkbacks