Dee Snider trades in rock ‘n roll for puppets

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As the busy entertainer prepares to move westward he juggles time as a family man (“My wife says, ‘You’re a rock star on the outside, but when you walk in the house you’re Dad’”), with being the go-to guy for celebrities when it comes to advice about reality television. “I seem to be a reasonably intelligent guy that they can all call,” he jokingly groans. Snider has appeared on “The Celebrity Apprentice,” “Celebrity Duets,” “Celebrity Ghost Stories,” and “Celebrity Holiday Homes” amongst other reality series.

“I’ve been on way too many shows with Celebrity in front of them. I called my manager and said, ‘Listen, I think I’m done for a while.’” Okay, but what advice did he give to the next contestants on Apprentice? “I told them that the show has dry cleaning! For some reason I thought it was like going to college and I brought 30 pairs of underwear and 30 pairs of socks because I figured I wasn’t going to be able to get to the laundromat. I ended up with drawers filled with underwear with labels sewed in by my wife. ‘Dee Snider’s underwear!’”

With “reality” behind him (for now, at least) Snider is content with seeing Shakespeare’s most reviled play made into a comedy that is easily accessible for teenagers. There is even talk of “Puppet Titus Andronicus” traveling to high schools.

“It helps you understand, because they take a moment to break the fourth wall and re-engage the audience,” he says. “But the puppet part is way more than just [for comprehension]. Hell, when we did “Romeo and Juliet,” Juliet was a human and Romeo was a puppet. Interspecies love is kind of weird and awkward!” Snider laughs at the absurdity of it. “It’s sort of a CliffsNotes of Shakespeare with a lot of jokes written in the margins. I guarantee people will walk away saying, ‘Hey, that was kind of cool.’”

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