The alien

George, now in a suit, enters a presidential stage while singing “Frankly, Sinatra has nothing on me!” Once he gets to the centre stage podium, he raps, metamorphosing into a friendly alien.

Character AlienActorGeorge Karkour

Different aspirations manifest in the shower for different people, one of them can sometimes be without a doubt, public speaking, and to a higher degree, presidenting. The metamorphosis of George into an alien is a stunning outcry, one telling of the disconnection between the youth and our politicians. It’s also a critique of the world order and the singer’s frustration with it. For a moment, alas ephemeral, The Shower Song has turned political.

We see the alien again in the paradisiacal red planet, where he lovingly observes the adoption of two characters (Little José and Rocky) who have been brought in thanks to The Shower Song spacecraft. The red planet is a signifier of a “higher human level”, one where love and peace reign. This can only be achieved if our politicians make social issues like sexism, racism and homophobia a top priority. This is the meaning of the presidential scene: George is addressing our politicians with a literal cry of help in his song: “Being president of the USA, reconfiguring my DNA, rapping every single day, shouting help, help, help, mayday!”

P.S. The drawings are pre-production sketches that were based on the director’s vision and inspiration. In function, they were a guiding force that helped carve the filmed scenes’ composition. At times, you might notice discrepancies between the sketch and the actual scene, and this happens for various reasons: some things look better a certain way in practice, limited resources limit the possibilities or even, the director has honed the idea, or decided to change the meaning entirely. For most of The Shower Song though, the scenes have come out spot-on identical to the vision.