MAD DADDY! (Historical Fiction/BIO/Dramedy)

The story is anchored in the late-sixties, and told from Pete’s funny, poignant, and often tortured perspective, with flashbacks and imaginings from 1939 through the 1950s. Above all Mad Daddy! is an audacious, raucous entertainment—full of period music—based on true events.

Early on we learn Pete never received love or encouragement from his distant, critical father. Perhaps that’s what sparked Pete’s obsessive compulsion to succeed, damn the costs. Or it may have been the day Pete created his alter ego and on air persona, MAD DADDY—who rhymes everything in a ‘50s Beatnik patois. Whatever the reason, Pete lived a life of constant churn, stress, and crisis.

One sunny fall morning in 1968, Pete’s faced with a new dilemma. He’d recently been fired from his New York rock radio job, and is offered a new gig at the adult “middle of the road” music station. The caveat: Pete’s not allowed to perform his Mad Daddy schtick, or play any rock music there. Pete reluctantly takes the job, but sees it as a career ender, realizing his act is now considered an outdated novelty.

Pete's shade persona, Mad Daddy, goes ballistic, and hounds Pete, saying that it was he who brought Pete to New York City and the pinnacle of rock ‘n’ roll radio fame. Pete’s lucidity snaps and he can no longer control his “second self.” Alone, sullen, and schizophrenic, Pete argues incessantly with himself through Mad Maddy.

It’s also the day when several of Pete’s past ghosts pop into his addled brain for an intervention. They each arrive at Pete’s New York City apartment to help him review the memories of his life. Pete’s first visited by YUMIRA, a wise Sensei and father-figure Pete met when stationed in Japan. Next, Pete’s first love, DOLOROUS, appears, as does the famous deejay and music promoter ALAN FREED. Record store owner LEO MINTZ shows up, too. Mintz is convinced he “discovered” Pete languishing in Akron, and brought him to incredible fame in Cleveland radio, which also boosted Pete’s meteoric rise in New York.

When all the ghosts vanish, Pete again finds himself alone with Mad Daddy, who tells him to quit his new NY “adult music” radio job, and move his tired rock ‘n’ roll act to LA. Mad Daddy then threatens to blast Pete’s sleeping wife, LISA, with a shotgun to facilitate the new scheme.

Horrified at this prospect, a ferocious physical fight ensues between Pete and Mad Daddy. Pete thinks he’d prevailed over his alter ego, as Mad Daddy lies bloodied on the floor. But Mad Daddy rises again with the gun. A muzzle flash comes from the bathroom. Pete dies. The violent, tragic, but true ending is a cautionary tale about the fragility of the human mind, warped by life, skewed perspectives, and out of control ambition.

NOTE: The screenplay was adapted from the IP book: "MAD DADDY: Myers, Mintz, the Moondog and How Cleveland, Ohio Changed Rock Radio." By Janice & Mike Olszewski. (Copyright © 2024, All Rights Reserved), and written for the screen by Bob Pondillo.