The Duplex Planet
The Duplex Planet is a zine edited and published by David Greenberger since 1979. It contains transcriptions of his interviews with elderly residents at a Boston, Massachusetts, United States, nursing home.
Adaptations
Duplex Planet has subsequently found larger audiences in other forms, including book collections, spoken-word recordings, and a series of concerts.
Music and Theater
1001 Real Apes, a theatrical presentation, features monologues drawn from the pages of The Duplex Planet, with music composed and performed by the critically acclaimed instrumental ensemble Birdsongs of the Mesozoic.
A series of CDs titled Lyrics by Ernest Noyes Brookings continues to be issued, featuring a wide variety of notable musical acts (XTC, Brave Combo, Morphine, Ben Vaughn, Peter Holsapple, The Young Fresh Fellows, Robyn Hitchcock, Dave Alvin, Yo La Tengo and over a hundred others) performing songs set to the poems of Duplex Planet regular Brookings.
Visual arts
Comics
Cartoonist Dan Clowes illustrated material from Duplex Planet in some early issues of his comic book Eightball.
Shortly thereafter, Clowes' publisher Fantagraphics Books began publishing Duplex Planet Illustrated, a comic book featuring adaptations of Duplex Planet material drawn by a variety of alternative comics artists, including Peter Bagge, Drew Friedman, Dan Clowes, Jim Woodring, Chris Ware, and James Kochalka. Duplex Planet Illustrated ran for 15 issues, from 1993–1995. Selections from the comic were published in a trade paperback, No More Shaves: A Duplex Planet Collection (ISBN 1560972572), in 2003.
Exhibits
"An Exact Spectacular", an exhibit of drawings and sculptures by some of the magazine's subjects, has traveled to museums and colleges.
Radio
A series of personal commentaries drawn from Greenberger's experiences airs regularly on National Public Radio's All Things Considered.
"The Duplex Planet Radio Hour," with music composed by NRBQ's Terry Adams, was presented at Arts at St. Ann's and recorded for New York Public Radio.