On November 11th 2004, 14-year-old Conrad Cliff jackhammered into the water main at The Royal Galleria near Belmont, California. Twenty-three people drowned. Three people were electrocuted in the arcade. Two people were fatally bitten by a hammerhead shark that escaped from the mall's aquarium. And the teenager responsible was never found. No body. No trace. Blair Van Auken was with Conrad at the mall that day but refused to speak about the incident for 18 years. Until now. This is a 6 part series on madness, machines, and melancholy in the MallScape of America. This is MallWalk.
Thursday, May 23rd
at The Balboa Theater; 3630 Balboa St. San Francisco, CA 94121
featuring Chopping Mall and Phantom of the Mall: Eric's Revenge
hosted by Blair Van Auken
27 Mar 2024
Live Reading Saturday 3/30 at 2 PM at the Balboa Theater
Blair Van Auken will be representing MallWalk in a live reading at The Balboa Theater in San Francisco this weekend, Saturday, March 30th, at 2PM as part of the Unnamed Footage Festival. If you happen to be a listener in The Bay Area we'd love to see you.
2 Dec 2023
Ep. 6: Negative Space
After the flood, Blair shouts Conrad’s name into the void and befriends the silence that answers.
26 Nov 2023
Ep. 5: The Hammerhead
Confused animals thrash in the flood waters. We try our best, as Dr. Peter Kimley suggests, to tell the story from the shark’s perspective, among many others. No matter our angle, the scene is wet confusion, horror, and death. Is God watching from above, as His waters prevail over the mall? Or is that just the eye of another survivor, clinging to life in the false sky? And when Conrad finally reaches the dead avenue from which he began, what is his plan? Or was there ever a plan? For any of us?
18 Nov 2023
Ep. 4: The Trap Door
Conrad finds himself within the body of the mall, at the bottom of the strange portal. Is it delusion or epiphany? Either way he emerges from a cloud of smoke and chooses his weapon for the final deluge. Multiple witnesses tell of that moment; the whir of the jackhammer, the burst of the pipe, the wall of water. Details seem spurious but accounts rarely differ. Meanwhile, Blair tries to seize the moment, against the nature of his flighty mind, until the moment drops from the sky and seizes him.
11 Nov 2023
Ep. 3: Otranto
The dark of the movie theater, the light of the arcade, our two boys’ melancholic quest bifurcates into love and death, romance and oblivion. Blair navigates the sudden fortune of teenage affection as Conrad obsesses over an arcade cabinet from the 80’s. Little is known of the lost game Otranto, but our research presents some clues to its content. Dark dungeons, living paintings, giant knights, and an ill-fated tragedian who shares a name with ours. Moments before madness, before finding further depths into which we might descend.
5 Nov 2023
Ep. 2: The Crucible of Creation
Having successfully evaded security, our tragedians arrive at the mall’s central fountain, which is mocked up with lights to look like fire. There they brave a multi-character convergence with an old man mid-flashback, a mischievous set of bowlers, and Blair’s crush from the escalator. Chaos looms by the food court, and in the dust out back, just shy of the megaplex, where wicked beacons call.
5 Nov 2023
Ep. 1: Escalator Down
The now dead mall once known as The Royal Galleria occupies the whole of Blair Van Auken’s memory. He strives through the fog of years to recall the start of that November day when he and his best friend, Conrad Cliff, came down from the K-Mart on the long escalator toward the carousel. Signs of Conrad’s deteriorating mental state were evident from the beginning, but Blair ignored these warnings and turned his focus on a girl who smiled at them. Conrad and Blair’s mutual melancholic exercise carried them through the mock Medieval mall, down the North Hallway, toward fate.
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Apple Podcasts (US)
5.0 / 5
10 ratings
Spotify
4.8 / 5
19 ratings
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