Jawnts: Caramba! It's a 'Drunk Lion'

On Saturday, Plays and Players will host that rarity of rarities: a Mexican lion. And an inebriated one at that.

The production, Drunk Lion, is the work of Oakland, Calif., native Chris Davis, who lived in Mexico for three years and penned this bizarre one-man show upon his return to the United States. "I became obsessed with lions after seeing a snuff film - in a marketplace in Mexico City - of a guy being killed by a lion," says Davis, who split his time between Chiapas and the capital.

Drunk Lion, which runs about 60 minutes, is also strongly influenced by Davis' experiences in cantinas and bars on both sides of the border. He describes a certain kind of hard-drinking man who, emboldened by a drink or eight, will become aggressively gregarious and regale the listener with tales of bravado and sexual prowess. The only props in the play are a chair and three bottles of Negra Modelo beer; at one point he toasts the audience in 17 different languages.

The play is a madcap attempt to reckon with everything from existential angst to unrequited love (as soggily recollected by obnoxious barflys) and the barriers erected by language. Davis has performed Drunk Lion 80 to 100 times: in his apartment, on rooftops, in parking lots, backyard parties, and in bars, "a lot of bars." He's currently performing it at Scotland's Edinburgh Festival Fringe, rustling up audiences through relentless leafleting.

"The story itself is pretty absurd and weird; [audiences] like that they'll never see anything like it," says Davis in a Skype interview. "They laugh through it like a comedy. People from the U.S. are an easy crowd; they laugh a lot." A Hungarian audience, by contrast, was straight-faced, going on bemused.

The showing at Quig's Pub in Plays and Players will be his 26th performance of Drunk Lion this month. "The show is entirely different than it was a month ago," says Davis. "I've learned a lot as a performer." He's glad to bring it back to Quig's, where, he says, he's performed it "many, many, many times before. It's the coolest bar in Philadelphia."

9 p.m. Saturday

At Quig's Pub in Plays and Players, 1714 Delancey St.

Tickets are free, but donations are recommended

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