Peter Glantz, based in Providence, R.I. since 1994, is a filmmaker and theater artist known for his inventive music videos (for Andrew W.K., Lightning Bolt, and Lavender Diamond, to name a few), the tour film Lightning Bolt: The Power of Salad, and several other works of note, including an award-winning political documentary (Beyond the Spin) and a controversial TV commercial that was censored by Viacom. Glantz also founded the experimental theater collective trutheatertheater, a Providence troupe of “actors, silkscreeners, puppeteers, noisemakers, musicians, videographers and illusionists” that staged shows in parks and abandoned buildings, and was an active participant in Providence’s now-legendary Fort Thunder DIY artist community in the late 1990s. This week, he brings his latest intriguing project, Being Impossible, to Baltimore’s Annex Theater for a three-day run.

City Paper : Tell me a little bit about the concept of Being Impossible.

Peter Glantz: The basic story is about a guy who has been given an assignment to go to the sun. He’s sort of a scientific genius—a whiz kid—but he doesn’t want to build big, expensive, wasteful projects to get there. So he decides to do experiments in getting to the sun in a way that isn’t physical—by projecting himself, his spirit, into the sun. It’s a series of experiments in trying to do that, and it takes place over the course of a thousand years.

CP : A thousand years? How long is this show?

PG: One hour. Every night is different. There’s always room where I can add or change or do a different scene. There’s a fair amount of interaction. It’s a solo performance—I’m going to be the only live performer. But it will also have videos that are part of telling the narrative.

[The Baltimore musicians] Twig Harper and Dan Deacon provided original unreleased material that I’m going to mess with and bring to the show. And Lightning Bolt just recorded, two days ago, a new 11-minute track. I probably won’t include all 11 minutes, but I’ll blend it into the atmosphere of the scene, and music is a big part of it. Becky Stark [of Lavender Diamond] has some music in it too.

What I really love about doing live theater is being in a room with people and connecting with them. In the past, I used to be more controlling over performances. I used to prerecord all the dialogue and the music, so it was almost completely done before we started. What I really love is live performance, so I got rid of the prerecorded dialogue and got something more flexible, more exciting and dynamic. The Annex Theater is a real DIY theater, but it’s a space that’s welcome and inviting to the general public as well. It has the energy of an unannounced space, but it also has the energy of something bigger.