Remember that old Abbott and Costello routine, where an argument over who or what was on first lasted an eternity? In case you don’t, that explanation sums it up as best as possible. One large man and one skinny man standing in baseball attire, discussing which players were on what base, without ever actually spitting out names. Zellner’s “Who is on First?” is pretty much the same routine – expect the entire Abbott and Costello dialog is trimmed considerably.
Close your eyes and picture that routine, if you will. Now, instead of one skinny dude and one fat dude, replace that with one male and one female. Each of them is sitting down in a room where the tackiest wall paper ever produced (made out of baseball cards) is covering every inch of the room so you can’t see anything else. That’s it; you can open your eyes now.
It’s hard to say what the Brothers Zellner were trying to say with this piece but whatever it was, the message never got across. Perhaps this was a funny idea that was tossed out at a party, but when executed, it just doesn’t work. The viewer may have a hard time watching the two actors struggle out the dialog and may feel awkward throughout its duration, even though it is only five minutes long.
With that said, the Zellner Brothers have hit enough home runs to make up for this one strike out. Let’s hope they have a Gatorade before their next up at bat.
