Sports from the past week.

Past sports article for the week of 4/17/05

Lance Armstrong The Musical II
By Grey Entertainment

When Olympic class cyclist Lance Armstrong announced his intention to write, direct and star in his own off Broadway musical last year no one paid the least bit of attention.
Partially this was due to the unreasoning fear that any sort of attention would lead to a repeat of the disaster known in the entertainment industry as “Wayne Gretsky and The Four Slots”. Another part of it was due to the fact that no athlete has ever produced anything remotely entertaining outside of a courtroom, and that trend is itself dying down.
Somehow, against all odds, “Lance Armstrong The Musical”, as mundane a title as possible, managed to gain public attention, even accolades. How no one can figure out.
Mark Hamill, known world wide as Luke Skywalker, lesser known as one of the better stage acting talents of our time turned down the role as Barkey the Cat, ever desperate for attention Shakira refused to play the part of Mina, the sassy oncologist, and Vanilla Ice turned down the part of Humphrey the oversized Banana and Raspberry Muffin on the mistaken belief he could do better.
Now, everyone except Mark Hamill is regretting their decision.
Somehow, against all odds, predictions and a promise by three nether worldly powers Lance Armstrong is now a critically successful director, stage actor and writer. The overall reaction is best described as hostile, as many other directors, actors and writers, especially those connected with the stage. No one can understand in the slightest how someone like Lance Armstrong, a superlative athlete certainly, can possibly make this much of a sudden success on stage.
Surrounded by rumours of pacts with Devils, Donald Trump and even the Ghost of Frank Sinatra no one has dared confront Armstrong, fearing his Dark Allies retribution.
Meanwhile other notable athletes are attempting to repeat the “Armstrong Trick” as it has become known.
Expectations are high that Tiger Woods, who has been most obscure for the last three years, will succeed, as his ambitions are somewhat more subdued, expecting only to write the dialogue and the score for his production: “Tiger Woods: My Way or the Highway”.
With so many Hockey Players looking for something to do, who would normally be playing hockey this time of year, there are rumours of a new ice show, featuring the most likely players to have been in the Stanley Cup.
According to rumours there would be acrobatics, fighting, music, slugging, puck related tricks, bashing and perhaps even a little smashing.
Unfortunately this production may be held back, for although the bulk of the players are Russian, a significant number are Canadian, and no one knows how to speak Canadian.