Bowie had plenty of theater experience during the years before “Space Oddity”, but he had not revisited it since.
In 1979, a young theater director named Jack Hofsiss brought Bernard Pomerance’s play The Elephant Man to Broadway at the Booth Theater. In 1980, Hofsiss approached Bowie with the suggestion that he play John Merrick, the play’s title character and lead. He would be replacing Philip Anglim, the production’s original Merrick. Bowie would be returning to the stage.
One of the play’s signature aspects (across its multiple productions) has been to eschew makeup and prosthetics for the role of Merrick, and instead have the lead actor use bodily contortion and posture to suggest Merrick’s condition. Bowie also spoke in a much higher, broken register for the role. His performance was met with rave reviews. Unfortunately, there are only a few recordings of scenes from the production, much less a recording of the whole production. The show ran from September 23, 1980 to January 3rd, 1981.
John Lennon’s final interview on December 6th included discussion of the play, which he enjoyed. Despite his uncertainty of “which [Bowie] he was talking to” in the past, he spoke highly of his talent as both a musician and actor. Two days later, the unthinkable happened. Some time before, Mark David Chapman had seen The Elephant Man while he was in New York, and had taken a photo of Bowie as he left the Booth Theater the night of Lennon’s murder. Chapman’s original plan was to wait for Lennon at The Dakota. If Chapman didn’t run into him, he planned on going to the Booth Theater instead. He flatly remarked afterward that he could have killed either of them. In the aftermath, Bowie realized that he needed to make some changes to protect himself going forward. He increased his personal security and reduced his availability.