› lit@sfbg.com REVIEW If fiction is truth masquerading as lies and the ever-popular memoir is tall tales packaged as transcendent fact, history is the place where dominant culture markets itself and covers the tracks. In recent times, historians like Howard Zinn and Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz have shifted the focus to tell the stories of marginalized, oppressed, dissident, and defiant peoples often erased from the record, but there’s still a lot of catching up to do. Perhaps it’s time to employ additional tactics, as coeditors T Cooper and Adam Mansbach have in A Fictional History of the United States (with Huge Chunks Missing). The anthology of stories progresses like a typical history textbook (in chronological order, that is), yet its goal is not to give us the facts but rather to widen the cracks in the official story until it breaks open. Some of the strongest pieces in A Fictional History are the most preposterous. In Ron Kovic’s “The Recruiters,” it’s 1968 and two Marines arrive at a high school auditorium, climb onstage, and start singing a song: “Oh, if you lose your penis in a war/ And you can’t make love with sexy girls no more/ Then don’t blame it on the old Marine Corps.” It turns out these Marines did indeed lose their penises in Vietnam, not on the battlefield but in a pool game, playing against a man who wielded a machete in place of a cue. Confused? “We made a bet,” the Marines declare. “It was a COMMITMENT.” A more over-the-top indictment of US military arrogance, masculinity, and the myopia of team loyalty could hardly be squeezed into the six pages this story occupies. Alexander Chee’s “Wampeshau” describes Chinese settlements of explorers and concubines in the area occupied by the Narragansett Indians nearly 300 years before the founding of the United States: “To be an explorer is to practice the art of getting lost.” But these settlers also practice the art of flying. That’s right, “the secret to it … is that even the wind will help you if you agree not to linger.” This is certainly a refined band of travelers, and in their observations about the newly arrived British settlers destined to replace them lies a prescient warning: “They are like the opposite of ghosts, so alive it has made them numb.” Sarah Schulman’s “The Courage to Love” brings us inside the psychoanalytic method, seen through the eyes of Anna Fuchs, a German Jewish refugee psychiatrist in post–World War II New York who once “waltzed with Jung and made Freud jealous.” As Anna conducts a final supervision session for one of her students, their spinning conversation (and Anna’s interior wanderings) manages to take on the Nazi Holocaust, Jewish assimilation, and parental violence while foreshadowing current Israeli military aggression. A contentious session explodes into a debate about the nascent medicalization of psychiatry — a conversation that’s even more relevant in our own era, when the right prescription is seen as the answer to even the most complicated emotional traumas. Not all of the pieces in the book are quite so rigorous. The opening story, “The Discovery of America,” by Paul La Farge, wallows in a self-satisfied joy over all things random, which could be an interesting challenge to the notion of “discovery” if it weren’t for phrases like “America remains to be discovered.” “The New Century,” Neal Pollack’s take on media whores and the Monica Lewinsky scandal, lacks any insight beyond the obvious (the media are only interested in sensation these days, etc.). More successfully, in a humorous take on racism and white guilt, the Civil War and drag, Kate Bornstein recounts the tale of Sassy Sarah, formerly known as Huckleberry Finn, a slender girl working the brothels of New Orleans under Union occupation. Coeditor Mansbach describes a 1905 zookeeper’s friendship with an imprisoned African man exhibited with the apes in a story whose final line is perhaps the most scathing indictment of colonialism in the whole book. Before you start browsing your favorite search engine for Marine recruitment chants, flying Chinese explorers, Anna Fuchs, drag prostitution, and zookeepers, though, it may be helpful to read the final story in A Fictional History, Daniel Alarcón’s “The Anodyne Dreams of Various Imbeciles.” This one takes place in the future, 2011 to be exact, during a war inside the United States, where the President has been injured in a hunting accident (!) and his leg amputated to prevent infection. Part fable and part cautionary tale, “Anodyne Dreams” evokes revolution but refuses to deliver the specifics — Denver is a stronghold of resistance, but why Denver? Instead of blueprints for sabotage, Alarcón treats us to an endless array of antiquated statistics about amputations throughout history, details contained in letters to the President from the doctor he’s already executed. Nowhere is the tension between randomness and revelation more evident, and perhaps this is just the challenge to history that is needed. SFBG A FICTIONAL HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES (WITH HUGE CHUNKS MISSING) Edited by T Cooper and Adam Mansbach Akashic Books 300 pages $15.95 Readings by T Cooper, Adam Mansbach, and contributor Valerie Miner Sept. 17, 6 p.m. Cody’s Books, 2 Stockton, SF (415) 773-0444, www.codysbooks.com Readings by T Cooper, Adam Mansbach, and contributor Daniel Alarcón Sept. 18, 7 p.m. Book Passage, 51 Tamal Vista Blvd., Corte Madera (415) 927-0960, www.bookpassage.com Sept. 20, 7 p.m. Diesel, a Bookstore, 5433 College, Oakl. (510) 653-9965, diesel.booksense.com Mattilda, a.k.a. Matt Bernstein Sycamore (www.mattbernsteinsycamore.com), is the editor most recently of That’s Revolting: Queer Strategies for Resisting Assimilation.
Volume 40 [2005–06]
Enchanté
› paulr@sfbg.com
“You’re not getting older, you’re getting better” is one of those things you say to someone who’s getting older and not better and is sensitive to the decline because of yet another birthday. (Birthdays beyond the 30th are at best memento mori, at worst a cumulative curse. After 30, one should count them by 10s.) Yet y-n-g-o-y-g-b is not just a mollifying phrase to be found on a Hallmark card; sometimes it is actually true. Many of the grander wines improve with age, up to a point, and so does the occasional well-conceived restaurant, particularly if the restaurant is a bistro.
“Bistro” is a much-abused term in our gastronomic idiom. Its meaning has been pulled and stretched to cover all manner of restaurants, bound together perhaps by just the faint suggestion of casual hipness. But even in America, where language is treated as cavalierly as food additives and war, words do retain core meanings, and the core meaning of bistro remains French. A proper bistro is quintessentially a neighborhood restaurant, well established and appealingly scuffed, with a brief menu of mostly traditional (French) dishes at moderate prices.
Le Charm is a proper bistro, though it is in San Francisco, not Paris, and when it was opened in 1994 by Alain Delangle and Lina Yew, its neighborhood was a little iffy. The SoMa of that time was already beginning to don its new Loftland identity, but the donning was uneven, and large swaths of the area were still grubby and gritty enough to make opening a nice restaurant a bold proposition. These days … well, SoMa is far more residential than a decade ago, and in that sense le Charm, the neighborhood restaurant, now has a neighborhood to belong to and neighbors to serve.
The wait has been kind to the restaurant. Although the space was recently remodeled, it has a look of woody permanence, with golden oak trim, cinnamon-colored walls, and a trellised garden set with tables. My basic impression, from years ago, was clatter, but while the restaurant now is hardly quiet, steps seem to have been taken to curb the noise. The floor is carpeted, and this alone makes a big difference.
Le Charm has been, from the beginning, a prix fixe haven, and while today’s bill of fare is fitted out with a full complement of à la carte choices, the prix fixe — $28 at dinner for three courses — continues to fascinate. Usually I succumb to this fascination, since the latter menu is full of the sort of earthy standards that make French food approachable and even lovable, from onion soup to blanquette de veau, and the fixed price means you need not worry about the bill, unless you go nuts with the wine. (Le Charm’s wine list is brisk, moderately priced, and surprisingly tilted toward California bottlings.)
But I do not always succumb, particularly when in dessert-forswearing mode, as we all must be from time to time. I was, moreover, interested in the mosaique ($8), an à la carte offering that turned out to be a kind of chilled vegetable terrine, wrapped in a skin of leek and cut into large, roughly triangular flaps. The terrine consisted of snow peas, sun-dried tomatoes, spinach, and shiitake mushrooms, while the leek skin was tender enough to be cut with an ordinary knife.
I also wanted lentils, and that meant the boudin blanc au foie gras ($19), stubby lengths of mild white sausage cut on the bias and given a Stonehenge arrangement around a moody hillock of Puy lentils, with interpolations of peeled, seeded tomato quarters.
Across the table, another story was unfolding, a $28 tale in three chapters that opened with a salad of cubed red beets set in tatsoi greens (decent, but more about looks than taste) and ended with an orange crème brûlée topped with slices of mandarin orange. In between there was a plot twist: the restaurant’s justly famous chicken-liver salad substituted for a selection from the standard, and weightier, main courses, with a corresponding discount of a few bucks. (I was surprised to see the possibility of duck confit passed over by someone I had long understood to be an insatiable duck-confitista.)
The chicken-liver salad — buttery chunks of meat with the mildest breath of liver flavor, scattered like boulders across a meadow of mixed greens — might work a bit better at lunch, when less heft is desirable, at least for those who need to remain conscious for the remainder of the workday. (A friendly warning here: the garden, in good weather, provides an al fresco experience you might have some trouble pulling yourself away from.) I was disappointed to find no croque monsieur on the midday menu, but quiche lorraine ($9.50), an egg tart stuffed with ham and cheese, wasn’t a bad substitute and was also served whole: a disk the size of one of those personal pizzas you can get at Roundtable.
Tart lovers of the sweet tooth variety will appreciate the tarte tatin, which at $4 is something of a steal and is also excellent — not the usual state of affairs for restaurant tartes tatins, too many of which have runny caramel and mushy apples. Le Charm’s version features shapely hemispheres of firm fruit, bronzed and slightly translucent, as if formed from amber, along with viscous caramel and flaky pastry. The formula is simple, really (tarte tatin is much easier to make than ordinary, American-style apple pie), yet a well-made one never fails to charm. SFBG
LE CHARM
Dinner: Tues.–Thurs., 5:30–9:30 p.m.; Fri.–Sat., 5:30–10 p.m.; Sun., 5–9 p.m.
Lunch: Mon.–Fri., 11:30 a.m.–2 p.m.
315 Fifth St., SF
(415) 546-6128
www.lecharm.com
Beer and wine
AE/MC/V
Noisy
Wheelchair accessible
The Suitcase
PREVIEW In its 21 years of existence, the theater company Darvag has brought classic Iranian dramas dating back to the 1950s as well as contemporary works by some of the country’s major playwrights to Bay Area stages. With The Suitcase, Darvag simultaneously draws from within and digs close to its origin: the play (translated from Farsi into English by Bella Warda) was written by a founding member of the company. An older play by Windows playwright Farhad Ayeesh, who has written and directed four pieces for Darvag, Suitcase is billed with the subtitle: “An Iranian Tragicomedy with Global Reverberations.” In interviews, Ayeesh has spoken about the absurdist elements within his work in general and this play in particular. Darvag first premiered Suitcase in 1985, but needless to say, the play’s exploration of a nameless transitory space in which each traveler carries a piece of luggage seems especially pertinent to the present moment. (Johnny Ray Huston)
THE SUITCASE Sept. 2–24. Thurs.–Sat., 8 p.m.; Sun., 7 p.m. Intersection for the Arts, 446 Valencia, SF. $18. (415) 626-2787, www.darvag.org, www.theintersection.org
Breema karma
› le_chicken_farmer@yahoo.com
CHEAP EATS This Cheap Eats restaurant review is a thank-you note to a guy named John. He bought all the tokens for a Thai temple brunch for me, Bernie, and Laura last Sunday. And technically it should have been the other way around, me tokening him, because he’d just breema’d me.
If you don’t know what breema is, I don’t know what to tell you. They bend, push, and dance on you, kind of like a massage, only you’re lying on the floor and it’s all very musical. Then you’re hungry and all relaxed and shit. I love it and am lucky to have two friends, Bernie and Laura, who are practitioners. And now John. Three friends.
If you don’t know who John is, he lives in Oakland, used to have chickens, still has a Ping-Pong table, two cool kids, couple watermelons on the counter, a big empty room with pillows along the walls, and lots of rugs. I think he might be the Big Cheese of Breema, because 1) he’s crazy good at it, and 2) he taught Laura, who I think taught Bernie, who used to practice on lucky me.
I have no interest in learning anything per se (like Latin), but I do like to receive. Massage, breema, packages, sensory information, tokens … At a Buddhist temple in Berkeley on Sunday mornings, you turn these tokens into Thai food. It’s a madhouse. Lines out the yinyang, no more meatballs, no more fish balls, nowhere to sit, general confusion … and still you gotta love it.
Know why? Because it’s different. It’s something else. It’s outside. The food’s pretty good, and at a dollar a token, five tokens for a big bowl of noodle soup, the price is pretty reasonable.
The soup line was way shorter than the meat line and the vegetarian line, and anyway soup seemed really really good to me. So that was where I stood. They had three different choices of noodles: wide, skinny, and skinnier. But they were out of everything else.
“No meat,” the serverguyperson said when I came to the counter.
“Fish balls,” I said.
“No fish balls,” he said.
I was just about to think I was in a Monty Python sketch when he gestured toward the adjacent vegetarian buffet and said, “Vegetable only. Fifteen minutes for meat.”
“I’ll wait,” I said and stepped to the side. But I’d already been waiting in lines and wandering between them like a lost little chicken farmer, and the next couple people behind me conceded to vegetable soup, and I had to admit that the noodles, the dark broth with the little load of color on top, looked dang delicious.
After this I was going to play at a block party barbecue in Albany for food and tips, and then after that I was invited to another barbecue back in the city. I did the math. Meat plus meat equaling meat meat meat, I broke down and went with veggies for brunch.
So now I had this nice bowl of steaming vegetable soup and no idea where all my friends were. In the process of looking for them, wandering around like a lost little chicken farmer, I discovered on a remote fringe of the mayhem a no-line-at-all fried chicken station, and the chickens looked great, but I was all out of tokens.
Also found: a stage with colorfully dressed musicians playing traditional Thai stuff to tables and tables of happy eaters. No friends and no room for me and my soup, not there, not in the main part of the pavilion, not in the alley …
My soup was starting to get cold. I was dying of hunger. Buzzards were circling. I looked at the sky, looked at my feet, kicked the bleached bones and tumbleweeds out of my path, and pushed on.
Here they were! Sitting cross-legged on the grass and sidewalk out front, eating stuff. Although I tasted some of everything, and everything was good, I think my favorite thing (because I’d never had it before) was this little fluffy doughy doodad cooked with coconut milk and stuffed with green onions.
But Bernie, bless him, had scored one of the last fish ball soups, and I managed to mostly eat that. Thank you, Bernie. The fish balls were wonderful. SFBG
WAT MONGKOLRATANARAM
Sun., 9 a.m.–2 p.m.
1911 Russell, Berk.
(510) 849-3419
No alcohol
Credit cards not accepted
Noisy
Wheelchair accessible
WITHOUT RESERVATIONS
› paulr@sfbg.com
We tend to trust what we see, and when what we see is a computer printout, specifying in meticulous detail what we just had for dinner, we tend to trust it all the more. How can such a miracle machine as the computer ever be wrong? Being wrong is a human thing; it is an errant scribble on one of those pale green tablets on which servers write down orders at less technologically advanced establishments (unless they are show-offs working from memory). Or it is bad arithmetic. Most people, I am sure, have had the experience of being delivered a hand-written check they could not decode — and when you can’t decode it, you just shrug your shoulders and pay it, hoping the errors, if any, aren’t too egregious.
Tidy computer accountings of restaurant activity would seem to be altogether an improvement over ballpoint primitivism: a brave new world. And yet, and yet … it behooves us not to fall asleep. Computers might be infallible, and to the extent that computers replace human beings as trackers and toters-up of bills, the likelihood of error is diminished. But it is not eliminated, as I discovered recently when sifting through the bill at one of the city’s more tech-savvy restaurants: a dollar too much for this item, a dollar too much for that one — and, to be fair, a dollar too little for a third.
A dollar here and there would not seem to make all that much difference — just a couple percentage points of the total bill. But any effective strategy of overcharging must be subtle, in amounts small enough not to be noticed or worth disputing, and it should be balanced by the occasional undercharge, to give the impression of randomness or lack of guile. Customers must be granted the occasional victory, so that they do not become disillusioned or even angrily suspicious.
I asked for menus to recheck the numbers, then summoned our server to point out the discrepancies. The matter was quickly straightened out, with apologies. Possibly these were innocent mistakes, bad numbers entered into the machine by some harried human in a hurry. But as we left, I glanced around at a big dining room full of people accumuutf8g charges on an unseen computer somewhere, and I wondered.
Pwned
› annalee@techsploitation.com
TECHSPLOITATION Last night, for about the 30,000th time, I pondered whether I should be shredding the stubs of my phone and cable bills before throwing them away. I always keep my credit card statements for a year or two. That shit just seems too scary personal to toss. But what about the other stuff? If someone were to root through my building’s trash bin and find my (unshredded) cell phone bill, they’d know the numbers of everyone I’d called during the past month. Other bill stubs are less revelatory, but someone could still use them to cancel my gas and electricity or order me the most expensive cable package.
But I just can’t muster up the amount of paranoia that would be required to properly eliminate all those pieces of paper with my personally identifiable information on them. And good shredders (not the lame one-sheet-at-a-time ones) are expensive. So every month I leave massive amounts of personal data in the bins outside my back door.
And that’s not all. I also save chat sessions on my computer and SMS messages on my phone. Sure, I fear clutter in the real world, but I also have a highly developed sense of sentimental value. So I keep the little electronic blips my friends write, thinking that one day I’ll be glad to read them again. Some of those blips are e-mails that I keep stored in the vast server fields of a major Web mail provider, which means that system administrators can look at them — and worse, this Web mail provider can hand them over to the government without telling me.
Don’t even get me started on the kinds of personal information I leak about myself in my writing. A dedicated asswipe could, just by combing over my old columns, figure out the general location of my house in San Francisco, my sexual orientation, the kind of relationship I’m in, what kind of computer I have, which ISP I use, where I’ve worked, where I shop, and who my friends are.
All my digital data is, of course, far more vulnerable than those hard copy phone records I dump every month. At least my trash bin is localized: to steal or tamper with my information, somebody would have to break into my building and jump inside the trash bin. But to steal my e-mail? Or read my columns obsessively for personal details? A naughty person could do that from anywhere. Prying members of an HR department could run a background check on me from the comfort of their Aeron chairs.
So what the hell is wrong with me? Why would I compromise my own privacy, knowing full well what the consequences could be? I’ve already confessed to a few reasons: laziness, inability to hoard tiny pieces of paper, sentimentality, chronic column writing. The less frivolous answer is that I’ve weighed the alternatives — shredders, constant data wiping — and chosen to take the risk. I don’t want to be forced to hide everything about myself. If some potential employer doesn’t like my blog, that’s an employer I don’t need. If the government wants to persecute me for what’s contained in my stored messages, then I will fight back as best I can or leave the country.
It’s not as if I don’t protect myself. I never store any data in my Web mail account that I’m not prepared to share with sysadmins and the government. I overwrite data that I want to delete on my computer, which means it can’t be retrieved using typical law enforcement forensics. I rarely enter anything but fake information into online forms. I download and send my e-mail via SSL, which prevents people from reading it while it’s moving over the network. Am I safe from the National Security Agency or a very determined hacker? No. But neither am I leaving myself wide open to identity theft and surveillance.
When somebody breaks into your computer and looks at your private data, geeks say that your computer has been “owned.” And if your computer is utterly taken over, all its information plundered egregiously, you’ve been “pwned” — a bit of geek slang that comes from some dork who made a typo on IRC back in the day. I know that I’m pwned by the government, pwned by Google, pwned by my reliance on Windows OS. But they haven’t pwned my brain, OK? I’m still going to write the truth about myself and the world; I’m still going to throw away bill stubs like a normal person.
Say it loud and clear: we will not be pwned! If that isn’t a 21st-century protest cry, I don’t know what is. SFBG
Annalee Newitz is a surly media nerd who was thrilled to discover that the Wikipedia entry for “pwn” includes a section on pronunciation.
Too bad, Dad
› andrea@altsexcolumn.com
Dear Andrea:
I’ve prided myself on having a good relationship with my daughter, and we have always been able to talk about anything, but I was shocked when she asked me about anal sex. I was at a complete loss. She’s only 14 and it never crossed my mind that she would even know what that is, but I guess it’s not like it used to be. She said it’s the “cool” thing to do at her school and that most of her girlfriends have had it. I don’t want her to think that she can’t come to me about things. I could give her the “if your friends jumped off a bridge” speech, but then again, well … at least I wouldn’t have to worry about her getting pregnant. LOL. How should I handle this? Should I be supportive or honest or just refer it to another female like my sister or one of my coworkers?
Love,
Puzzled Pop
Dear Pop:
Sorry. Unless you’re raising her alone in a supermodern ranch house on a lonely and distant planet, she could have asked someone else, but she didn’t. You’re up, and I’m afraid you’ll have to be both honest and supportive. It should help to hear that “supportive” does not mean “Butt sex? It’s no biggie. Get with the program, kid.” Plus, if she came to you for advice, chances are good that she’s not already doing it and liking it or else what would she need your advice for?
We do hear (where have you been?) that these kids today spend more time having anal sex and attending blow job parties than they do on soccer, MySpace, and homework combined. There was a moment there when it seemed every possible media outlet featured a scarifying exposé of rampant oral gonorrhea among kids at elite suburban middle schools or rings of barely pubescent girls selling their anal favors for Bubble Yum. Much of this stuff is clearly exaggerated for effect, extrapolated from precious little data to garner ratings, sell magazines, or whip up a panic among parishioners or PTA members.
There is, however, some measure of truth along with the disinformation, if fairly nonpartisan bodies such as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Johns Hopkins are to be believed. Every study conducted in the last decade or so has shown at least some increase in the number of young (in some cases, very young) people having oral and anal sex. In some cases, these are the very kids who sign abstinence pledges, promising not to “have sex” until marriage, another downside to using “sex” to mean penis-vagina intercourse. It allows for all sorts of weaselly usage, from the presidential “I did not have sex with that woman” to the willful misinterpretation of decent scientific data by groups like the Heritage Foundation and Focus on the Family.
I did have a point here: do not assume that she’s wrong or exaggerating when she tells you that anal is the “in” intercourse at her school. It may not be as prevalent as she thinks or reports (at least some of her girlfriends are lying), but it is happening.
It would be useful to know what your daughter actually asked you — I’m having a hard time believing she requested your blessing to start taking it up the butt, so what did she need from you? I’m going to go with the most likely possibility, that she mostly just wanted you to listen while she processed her own thoughts and feelings, and surely you, Mr. Sensitive Dad, could handle that much without having to palm the poor child off on your secretary or the mailroom girl?
Chances are your daughter also needed some information about what people actually do with their butts and stuff, since adolescents, even adolescents who affect a world-weary air and claim intimate knowledge of whatever arcane subject is under discussion, are notoriously vague about the nitty-gritty details. I think it’s perfectly legit to outsource this part, but only this part, probably by recommending one of the sex education Web sites specifically targeted to teenagers. I like Scarleteen.com, but it really doesn’t matter as long as you don’t just point her at the Web and tell her to go look up “anal + teen,” OK?
Let the professionals handle the “does it hurt?” and “will I like it?”-type questions, but as her dad you don’t get to shirk the harder parts, where you ask her what she’s heard, how she feels about it, whether her friends are pressuring her, and what she will do if they do pressure her. I would hope you’ve already talked to her about respecting herself and her body and not doing anything until or unless she really wants to, and then only once she’s educated herself about risks and how to avoid them. If you haven’t, well, for God’s sake, man, she’s 14. She has all kinds of excuses for stupid and irresponsible behavior. What’s yours?
Love,
Andrea
Cutting taxes the right way
EDITORIAL Finally the Democratic Party in California is starting to talk seriously about tax policy. It’s an important change in the political winds, and if state treasurer Phil Angelides can get beyond the tepid-to-hostile press and use his promise of a middle-class tax cut to gain ground on Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, it may signal the end of decades of regressive and deeply harmful economic policy.
Schwarzenegger, who knows he’s in a tough race, has been trying to smear Angelides by saying that the Democratic candidate is pushing for tax hikes. Yes, he is — tax hikes on the likes of Arnold Schwarzenegger (and Phil Angelides), people with incomes of more than $500,000 a year. For the record, these are people who have seen their taxes drop dramatically under the Bush administration and are the direct beneficiaries of an alarming national trend of wealth concentration among the richest Americans.
Angelides isn’t talking about radical tax hikes; all he wants to do is restore the top state income tax rate to the level it was under Republican governors like Ronald Reagan and Pete Wilson. Still, raising taxes never plays well in the polls, so Angelides is now doing what he needed to do from the start of his campaign: he’s proposing to cut taxes on middle-class working families.
It’s a risky strategy: pundits on the right will accuse him of “class warfare,” and the details of his plans will get obscured by negative political ads and lousy media coverage. But it’s the right approach: he’s actually talking about shifting the tax burden upward, about changing the national trend in tax policy, about giving the majority of the voters tax breaks and paying for it by making a few wealthy people pay more.
But if it’s going to work, he needs to be a lot clearer on exactly how the dollars pencil out — and he needs to offer more than what seems like a relatively modest tax cut. Right now, his plan calls for $788 million in tax reductions for families earning less than $100,000 a year and $5 billion in tax hikes for the wealthy. He’s also offering to find $1 billion in state waste.
For a family living on $46,000 a year, the program would amount to $660 a year in tax relief.
We understand that the tax cuts have to be lower than the tax hikes — the state is deeply in debt, and there are all sorts of badly needed social programs that ought to be funded. But in the end, his plan sounds pretty mild: there’s a lot more than $1 billion in waste, corporate tax loopholes, and uncollected revenue out there, and a California family earning $46,000 a year, facing the insane housing market and rapidly rising energy costs, could use a lot more than $50 a month in extra cash.
Let’s remember: the transfer of wealth from the middle class to the rich (and especially the very rich) that’s taken place in the past two decades is unprecedented in the postwar era and quite possibly unprecedented in American history. A few bucks here and there aren’t really going to make that much difference. If Angelides is serious, he should revise his plan to at least double the tax cuts for the middle class, hike the tax credits for low-income families — and pay for it by creating another tax bracket altogether, for Californians who earn more than $1 million a year.
But this is an excellent start — and Angelides deserves tremendous credit for opening a discussion that should have taken place years ago. SFBG
Cops out of their cars
EDITORIAL The politics of crime can be tricky for the left: progressives are against far-reaching and punitive crackdowns, against police abuse, against the pervasive financial waste in law enforcement … and sometimes can’t come up with answers when neighborhoods like Hunters Point and the Western Addition ask what local government is going to do to stop waves of violence like the homicide epidemic plaguing San Francisco today.
So it’s encouraging to see Sup. Ross Mirkarimi, a Green Party member representing District 5, taking the lead on demanding more beat cops for the highest-crime areas in town. Mirkarimi’s not pushing a traditional reactionary approach of suggesting that the city hire more police officers and lock more people in jail; he’s advocating a simple — and decidedly progressive — approach to the issue. He wants the cops out of their cars and on the streets. On foot.
The idea of beat cops and community policing isn’t new at all; in fact, it’s the modern approach of highly mobile officers in cars, dispatched by a central computer and radio system in response to emergency calls, that’s a relatively recent trend. Police brass love it — they can cover more ground with fewer troops — and a lot of patrol officers like it too. They have that big metal car to protect them from potentially hostile criminals, and they don’t have to interact every minute of every day with the people on the streets.
But cops walking the beat are a proven deterrent to crime — and that’s not merely because of their visible presence. Properly trained and motivated community police officers can forge ties with merchants, residents, and neighborhood leaders. They can figure out where problems are likely to happen. They can become an asset to the community — not an outside occupying force that residents neither trust nor respect.
It’s a crucial change: right now, one of the biggest problems the San Francisco Police Department faces in solving homicides is the unwillingness of witnesses to come forward, in part because of a general mistrust of police. When there’s a killing, homicide detectives appear as if out of nowhere, demanding answers; it’s little wonder nobody wants to talk to them.
We recognize that beat patrols won’t solve the homicide crisis by themselves. That’s a complex socioeconomic issue with roots in poverty and desperation, and a couple of folks in blue on the street corner can’t alleviate decades of political and economic neglect.
And we also realize that it can be expensive to put officers on foot — they can’t respond as fast, and it takes time to develop community ties. But Mirkarimi isn’t asking for a total overhaul of the SFPD’s operations. He’s asking for a modest pilot program, a one-year experiment that would put two foot patrols a day in the Western Addition, focusing on areas with the most violent crime. The ultimate goal, Mirkarimi says, is to create a citywide beat-patrol program.
It won’t be easy: the department seems to be pulling out all the stops to defeat Mirkarimi’s proposal, which will come before the Board of Supervisors on Sept. 19. The Police Commission needs to come out in support of Mirkarimi’s proposal and direct Chief Heather Fong and her senior staff to work to make it effective.
The supervisors, some of whom worry that beat patrols in high-crime districts will mean less police presence in other areas, should give this very limited program a chance. Nothing else is working. SFBG
EDITOR’S NOTES
› tredmond@sfbg.com
I was out of town when Sue Bierman died Aug. 6, her car crashing into a Dumpster near her Haight Ashbury home, in the neighborhood she loved. I was out of cell phone range and had no real Internet access, and the papers in Upstate New York didn’t carry the story. So I didn’t learn until I got home that San Francisco had lost one of its most vibrant, funny, warm, and passionate political voices.
Bierman, a native of Fremont, Neb., arrived in San Francisco in 1950. She was part of the first generation of urban environmentalists and was there at the birth of a movement that would change American cities forever.
The city that Sue Bierman adopted as her home was still largely a human-scale metropolis, a town coming out of World War II with a mix of blue-collar industry, a thriving waterfront, and a diverse population.
Her tenure as an activist tracked almost perfectly with the postwar assault on San Francisco by greedy real estate developers, speculators, and politicians who carried their water. She was part of the infamous freeway revolt, the successful effort by Haight residents to block a new elevated freeway that would have soared over part of Golden Gate Park. She was an early member of the anti–high rise crew that realized how intensive downtown development was going to turn San Francisco into another Manhattan. And when the late mayor George Moscone appointed her to the Planning Commission, she was a lonely voice for sanity through 16 years of development madness.
I first met her in 1983 when I was a young reporter covering planning and she was the only member of the commission who would ever come out against any major high-rise project. Over and over, she lost 6–1 votes.
When she was elected supervisor in 1990, she was not only a staunch environmentalist and neighborhood advocate but one of the few on the board at the time who really understood public power: as she would constantly remind her colleagues, she came from a state where electricity could never be sold by private entities for private profit.
And through year after year of brutal defeats, she kept not only her spirit but her sense of humor — and her personal warmth. She had none of the bitter anger that a lot of us took from that era. In fact, even when I criticized her both in private and in print for her loyalty to Willie Brown, she remained a friend. She never once had a harsh word to say to me.
A part of San Francisco passed when she died.
In other news: Supervisor Bevan Dufty insists he hates negative politics and won’t attack other candidates. And yet, the following appeared in Matier and Ross on Aug. 20:
“The campaign is barely under way, and already the mud balls are being lobbed. In this case, it’s a 1995 news clip from the Chicago Tribune describing how [Dufty opponent Alix] Rosenthal, then a 22-year-old senior at Northwestern University, abruptly resigned as student body president rather than face an impeachment hearing over a campaign finance scandal.
“Her sin: Exceeding the campaign spending limit by $26.06.”
Well, somebody dredged that up and leaked it to the press. Anyone you know, Bevan? SFBG
A memorial service for Bierman is set for Sept. 3 from 2 to 4 p.m. at Delancey Street Foundation, 600 Embarcadero, San Francisco.
Fall Arts Intro: Autumn leaves
La-di-dah di-dah-di-dum, ’tis autumn, and after reaching a decision with birdielike precision, the birds have made a beeline for the south. Yet nonfeathered friends of the Bay Area might also have to fly in order to cover all the art openings, concerts, stage shows, movies, and more in store over the next few months. Lyrical nostalgia aside, we’re doing our best to help you fall forward, rather than backward — these pages showcase the highlights (and also target some weak and wack spots) of the coming season.
As autumn leaves start to fall (somewhere with trees), we thought the time was ideal to check back in on 2004 Goldie winner Keegan McHargue. It’s fitting that the Mission-based McHargue will be part of a show in Paris this fall — his work charts colors beyond the reds and golds of Johnny Mercer’s and Jacques Prevert’s wildest transatlantic-and-romantic imaginings. (Johnny Ray Huston)
Big Idi, little Idi
› cheryl@sfbg.com
Most of 2006’s blockbusters (wannabe and otherwise) have already blown by in a sugary cloud of Sour Patch Kids dust. Poseidon’s already on DVD; The Da Vinci Code was totally boring; X-Men: The Last Stand killed off Professor X (or did it?); Superman Returns was stomped on by Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest; and Snakes on a Plane did only so-so business despite widespread prerelease hyperventilation. Frankly, my teeth hurt and I’m ready for some meatier cinematic fare — especially the 10 picks that follow. As always, release dates are subject to change.
The Black Dahlia Serial homage artist Brian DePalma has been in a rut lately. His recent efforts include the underwhelming Femme Fatale, Mission to Mars, and Snake Eyes. But lest we forget, he’s also the guy who brought us Scarface and The Untouchables — and Phantom of the Paradise, though that may be my own personal bias speaking. His latest noir draws from a James Ellroy novel, itself based on Hollywood’s most famously unsolved murder case (pre-O.J., that is). The Black Dahlia stars Josh Hartnett, Hilary Swank, and Elizabeth Short look-alike Mia Kirshner as the starry-eyed dame headed for sliced-in-half doom. (Sept. 15)
Mutual Appreciation Just because a movie isn’t opening at the Metreon doesn’t mean you can’t count down the minutes until it arrives. Writer-director Andrew Bujalski’s Funny Ha Ha was the most honest film about postcollege malaise in aeons; his latest, Mutual Appreciation, about a musician adrift in New York City, has earned excellent festival reviews and looks to extend this talented young filmmaker’s winning streak. (Sept. 29, Red Vic)
The Last King of Scotland In a stroke of genius casting, Forest Whitaker stars as the bloodthirsty yet oddly charming Ugandan dictator Idi Amin. James McAvoy (Mr. Tumnus from The Chronicles of Narnia) plays his personal physician. This based-on-true-events drama can’t possibly surpass Barbet Schroeder’s creepy 1974 doc Idi Amin Dada — but it’ll probably best 1977’s made-for-TV Raid on Entebbe (with Yaphet Kotto as Amin). In any case, a new Amin movie is reason enough to fire up the Revolutionary Suicide Mechanized Regiment Band. (Sept. 27)
Jesus Camp Yep, it’s all about a summer camp for right-wing, conservative, evolution-hating, antiabortion, born-again Christian kids. I doubt there will be many Meatballs moments. However, this doc from Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady (The Boys of Baraka) has earned praise for its unbiased filmmaking — this kind of subject matter speaks for itself, as demonstrated by 2001’s Hell House. (Oct. 6)
The Departed Martin Scorsese shifts Infernal Affairs’ cops ’n’ crooks action from Hong Kong to Boston, with Matt Damon and Leonardo DiCaprio as deep-cover operatives working opposite sides of the law. It’s a killer premise based on a proven hit, with a stellar team behind it — plus, Jack Nicholson plays gangster number one. How can The Departed miss? (Oct. 6)
American Hardcore Black Flag, Minor Threat, and other 1980s hardcore punkers have their say in this doc by Paul Rachman (a onetime music video director), based on Steven Blush’s exceedingly detailed 2001 book American Hardcore: A Tribal History. Rachman and Blush conducted 100-plus interviews over five years and strove to keep the filmmaking process as appropriately DIY as they could. Also, the trailer fucking rocks. (Oct. 13)
Marie Antoinette Speaking of rocking trailers, by now we’ve all patted our dainty, Marc Jacobs–clad feet to New Order every time the clip for Sofia Coppola’s latest unspools during the coming attractions. If not, perhaps you’ve hefted the 25-pound Vogue featuring Kirsten Dunst and her period-appropriate Bride of Frankenstein ’do on the cover. No? OK, well, it’s the director’s follow-up to her Oscar-winning Lost in Translation, and even if the French pooh-poohed Marie Antoinette at Cannes, a new Coppola movie is an indisputable must-see for fans and haters alike. (Oct. 20)
Fast Food Nation You can’t accuse Richard Linklater of being in a filmmaking rut. His last three releases? The wildly diverse Before Sunset, Bad News Bears, and A Scanner Darkly. Following Scanner, his second film of 2006 offers a narrative take on Eric Schlosser’s nonfiction best-seller about the dark side of the fast food industry. Helping you never look at Happy Meals the same way again (if Super Size Me didn’t already do the trick) is an ensemble cast that includes Patricia Arquette, Ethan Hawke, Greg Kinnear, Catalina Sandino Moreno, and Bruce Willis. (Nov. 17)
For Your Consideration A new Christopher Guest mock doc (this one’s about Hollywood awards shows and features all the usual suspects) is one more reason to give thanks to the movie gods — especially since it’s getting a Thanksgiving week release. Tofurky leftovers fit so nicely in a Remains of the Day lunch box. (Nov. 22)
The Fountain Six years is too long to wait for a new Darren Aronofsky film (after his 1998 breakthrough, Pi, and 2000’s unforgettable Requiem for a Dream). But wait we have, and The Fountain — starring Hugh Jackman and Aronofsky ladylove Rachel Weisz as trippy, time-spanning sweethearts — has finally arrived. His upcoming slate includes an adaptation of Lone Wolf and Cub due in 2008. Promise? (Nov. 22) SFBG
Ficks’s most anticipated fall ’06 picks
Inland Empire David Lynch is the reason why I fell (and still am) in love with the cinema. For 30 years, he has continuously made the most creative and hauntingly beautiful films in the world. His new film is shot entirely on high definition cameras and runs close to three frickin’ hours. Lynchian faves Laura Dern and Harry Dean Stanton are back, and there’s even a small role by Michael Paré of Streets of Fire fame! (Premieres at the New York Film Festival in September.)
Old Joy Bonnie “Prince” Billy (Will Oldham) shines in Kelly Reichardt’s precious Northwest gem that perfectly captures what it’s like to be a man-child in your late 20s and early 30s. This tiny transcendental treat follows two friends on a camping trip outside of Portland and allows you to tag along with their slow entrance to growing up — and apart. They don’t make films like this anymore. In fact, have they ever? (Opens Oct. 20)
What Is It? Crispin Glover’s disturbing directorial debut contains an entire cast of actors with Down syndrome, an overabundance of snails, breasts, and Nazi paraphernalia, and was filmed on smoky sets that are a true flashback to the experimental, exploitative 1970s. It screened at Sundance two years ago, and I’ve been dying to get traumatized ever since. (Trailer at www.crispinglover.com; Oct. 20–22, Castro Theatre)
Jesse Hawthorne Ficks programs the “Midnites for Maniacs” series (which is hosting the What Is It? screening) at the Castro.
www.midnitesformaniacs.com
Yay Area five-oh
› johnny@sfbg.com
“Before Vanishing: Syrian Short Cinema” A series devoted to films from Syria kicks off with a shorts program that includes work by Oussama Mohammed. (Sept. 7, PFA; see below)
The Mechanical Man The PFA’s vast and expansive series devoted to “The Mechanical Age” includes André Deed’s 1921 science fiction vision of a female crime leader and a robot run amok. The screening features live piano by Juliet Rosenberg. (Sept. 7, PFA)
“Cinemayaat, the Arab Film Festival” This year’s festival opens with the Lebanon-Sweden coproduction Zozo and also includes the US-Palestine documentary Occupation 101: Voices of the Silenced Majority, which looks at events before and after Israel’s 1948 occupation of Palestine.
Sept. 8–17. Various venues. (415) 863-1087, www.aff.org
“Global Lens” The traveling fest includes some highly lauded films, such as Stolen Life by Li Shaohong, one of the female directors within China’s Fifth Generation.
Sept. 8–Oct. 4. Various venues. (415) 221-8184, www.globalfilm.org
“MadCat Women’s International Film Festival” MadCat turns 10 this year, and its programming and venues are even more varied. Not to mention deep — literally. 3-D filmmaking by Zoe Beloff and Viewmaster magic courtesy of Greta Snider are just some of the treats in store.
Sept. 12–27. Various venues. (415) 436-9523, www.madcatfilmfestival.org
The Pirate The many forms and facets of piracy comprise another PFA fall series; this entry brings a swashbuckling Gene Kelly and Judy Garland as Manuela, directed by then-husband Vincente Minnelli. (Sept. 13, PFA)
“A Conversation with Ali Kazimi” and Shooting Indians Documentarian Kazimi discusses his work before a screening of his critical look at Edward S. Curtis’s photography. (Sept. 14, PFA)
“The Word and the Image: The Films of Peter Whitehead” The swinging ’60s hit the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts as curator Joel Shepard presents the first-ever US retrospective dedicated to the director of Tonight Let’s All Make Love in London. Includes proto–music videos made for Nico, Jimi Hendrix, and others. Smashing! (Sept. 14–28, YBCA; see below)
Edmond Stuart Gordon of Re-Aminator infamy makes a jump from horror into drama — not so surprising, since he’s a friend of David Mamet. Willam H. Macy adds another sad sack to his résumé. (Sept. 15–21, Roxie; see below)
Anxious Animation Other Cinema hosts a celebration for the release of a DVD devoted to local animators Lewis Klahr, Janie Geiser, and others. Expect some work inspired by hellfire prognosticator Jack Chick!
Sept. 16. Other Cinema, 992 Valencia, SF. (415) 824-3890, www.othercinema.com
Kingdom of the Spiders Eight-legged freaks versus two-legged freak William Shatner. I will say no more.
Sept. 17. Dark Room, 2263 Mission, SF. (415) 401-7987, www.darkroomsf.com
Landscape Suicide No other living director looks at the American landscape with the direct intent of James Benning; here, he examines two murder cases. (Sept. 19, PFA)
La Promesse and Je Pense à Vous Tracking the brutal coming-of-age of scooter-riding Jérémie Renier, 1997’s La Promesse made the name of Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne, but Je Pense is a rarely screened earlier work. (Sept. 22, PFA)
Muddy Waters Can’t Be Satisfied Billed as the first authoritative doc about the man who invented electric blues, this plays with Always for Pleasure, a look at New Orleans by the one and only Les Blank. (Sept. 22–26, Roxie)
Rosetta and Falsch The Dardenne brothers’ Rosetta made a splash at Cannes in 1999; Falsch is their surprisingly experimental and nonnaturalistic 1987 debut feature. (Sept. 23, PFA)
loudQUIETloud: A Film About the Pixies A reunion tour movie. (Sept. 29–Oct. 5, Roxie)
American Blackout Ian Inaba’s doc about voter fraud made waves and gathered praise at this year’s San Francisco International Film Festival; it gets screened at various houses, followed by a Tosca after-party, in this SF360 citywide event.
Sept. 30. Tosca Café, 242 Columbus, SF. (415) 561-5000, www.sffs.org
Them! “Film in the Fog” turns five, as the SF Film Society unleashes giant mutant ants in the Presidio.
Sept. 30. Main Post Theatre, 99 Moraga, SF. (415) 561-5500, www.sffs.org
“Zombie-Rama” Before Bob Clark made Black Christmas, Porky’s, and A Christmas Story, he made Children Shouldn’t Play with Dead Things. The ending is as scary as the title is funny.
Oct. 5. Parkway Speakeasy Theater, 1834 Park, Oakl. (510) 814-2400, www.thrillville.net
“Swinging Scandinavia: How Nordic Sex Cinema Conquered the World” Jack Stevenson presents a “Totally Uncensored” clip show about the scandalous impact of Scandinavian cinema on uptight US mores and also screens some rare cousins of I Am Curious (Yellow). (Oct. 5 and 7, YBCA)
“Mill Valley Film Festival” Why go to Toronto when many of the fall’s biggest Hollywood and international releases come to Mill Valley? The festival turns 29 this year.
Oct. 5–15, 2006. Various venues. (415) 383-5256, www.mvff.org
“Fighting the Walking Dead” Jesse Ficks brings They Live to the Castro Theatre. Thank you, Jesse. (Oct. 6, Castro; see below)
Phantom of the Paradise Forget the buildup for director Brian de Palma’s Black Dahlia and get ready for a Paul Williams weekend. This is screening while Williams is performing at the Plush Room.
Oct. 6. Clay Theatre, 2261 Fillmore, SF. (415) 346-1124, www.thelatenightpictureshow.com
Calvaire Belgium makes horror movies too. This one is billed as a cross between The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Deliverance — a crossbreeding combo that’s popular these days. (Oct. 6–12, Roxie)
Black Girl Tragic and so sharp-eyed that its images can cut you, Ousmane Sembene’s 1966 film is the masterpiece the white caps of the French new wave never thought to make. It kicks off a series devoted to the director. (Oct. 7, PFA)
“Animal Charm’s Golden Digest and Brian Boyce” Boyce is the genius behind America’s Biggest Dick, starring Dick Cheney as Scarface. Animal Charm have made some of the funniest movies I’ve ever seen.
Oct. 7. Other Cinema, 992 Valencia, SF. (415) 824-3890, www.othercinema.com
Madame X, an Absolute Ruler Feminist director Ulrike Ottinger envisions a Madame X much different from Lana Turner’s — hers is a pirate. (Oct. 11, PFA)
“The Horrifying 1980s … in 3-D” Molly Ringwald (in Spacehunter), a killer shark (in Jaws 3-D), and Jason (in Friday the 13th Part 3: 3-D) vie for dominance in this “Midnites for Maniacs” three-dimensional triple bill. (Oct. 13, Castro)
“Dual System 3-D Series” This program leans toward creature features, from Creature from the Black Lagoon to the ape astronaut of Robot Monster to Cat-Women on the Moon. (Oct. 14–19, Castro)
“Early Baillie and the Canyon CinemaNews Years” This program calls attention to great looks at this city by Baillie (whom Apichatpong Weerasethakul cites as a major influence) and also highlights the importance of Canyon Cinema. (Oct. 15, YBCA)
“War and Video Games” NY-based film critic Ed Halter presents a lecture based on From Sun Tzu to Xbox: War and Video Games, his new book. (Oct. 17, PFA)
Santo Domingo Blues The Red Vic premieres a doc about bachata and the form’s “supreme king of bitterness,” Luis Vargas.
Oct. 18–19. Red Vic, 1727 Haight, SF. (415) 668-3994, www.redvicmoviehouse.com
“Monster-Rama” The Devil-ettes, live and in person, and Werewolf vs. the Vampire Women, on the screen, thanks to Will “the Thrill” Viharo.
Oct. 19. Parkway Speakeasy Theater, 1834 Park, Oakl. (510) 814-2400, www.thrillville.net
“Spinning Up, Slowing Down”: Industry Celebrates the Machine” Local film archivist Rick Prelinger presents six short films that epitomize the United States’ machine mania, including one in which mechanical puppets demonstrate free enterprise. (Oct. 19, PFA)
The Last Movie Hmmm, part two: OK, let’s see here, Dennis Hopper’s 1971 film gets a screening after he personally strikes a new print … (Oct. 20–21, YBCA)
What Is It? and “The Very First Crispin Glover Film Festival in the World” … and on the same weekend, Hopper’s River’s Edge costar Glover gets a freak hero’s welcome at the Castro. Sounds like they might cross paths. (Oct. 20–22, Castro)
I Like Killing Flies And I completely fucking love Matt Mahurin’s documentary about the Greenwich Village restaurant Shopsin’s, possibly the most characterful, funny, and poignant documentary I’ve seen in the last few years. (Oct. 20–26, Roxie)
“Miranda July Live” Want to be part of the process that will produce Miranda July’s next film? If so, you can collaborate with her in this multimedia presentation about love, obsession, and heartbreak.
Oct. 23–24. Project Artaud Theater, 450 Florida, SF. (415) 552-1990, www.sfcinematheque.org)
The Case of the Grinning Cat This 2004 film by Chris Marker receives a Bay Area premiere, screening with Junkopia, his 1981 look at a public art project in Emeryville. (Oct. 27, PFA)
The Monster Squad The folks (including Peaches Christ) behind the Late Night Picture Show say that this 1987 flick is the most underrated monster movie ever.
Oct. 27–28. Clay Theatre, 2261 Fillmore, SF. (415) 346-1124, www.thelatenightpictureshow.com
Neighborhood Watch Résumés don’t get any better than Graeme Whifler’s — after all, he helped write the screenplay to Dr. Giggles. His rancid directorial debut brings the grindhouse gag factor to the Pacific Film Archive. (Oct. 29, PFA)
“Grindhouse Double Feature” See The Beyond with an audience of Lucio Fulci maniacs. (Oct. 30, Castro)
“Hara Kazuo” Joel Shepard programs a series devoted to Kazuo, including his 1969 film tracing the protest efforts of Okuzaki Kenzó, who slung marbles at Emperor Hirohito. (November, YBCA)
“International Latino Film Festival” This growing fest reaches a decade and counting — expect some celebrations.
Nov. 3–19. Various venues. (415) 454-4039, www.utf8ofilmfestival.org
Vegas in Space Midnight Mass makes a rare fall appearance as Peaches Christ brings back Philip Ford’s 1991 local drag science fiction gem.
Nov. 11. Clay Theatre, 2261 Fillmore, SF. (415) 346-1124, www.thelatenightpictureshow.com
“As the Great Earth Rolls On: A Frank O’Hara Birthday Tribute” The birthday of the man who wrote “The Day Lady Died” is celebrated. Includes The Last Clean Shirt, O’Hara’s great collaboration with Alfred Leslie.
Nov. 17. California College of the Arts, 1111 Eighth St., SF. (415) 552-1990, www.sfcinematheque.org
Sites and Silences A shout-out to A.C. Thompson for his work with Trevor Paglen on the well-titled Torture Taxi, which helped generate this multimedia presentation by Paglen. (Nov. 19, YBCA)
“Kihachiro Kawamoto” One of cinema’s ultimate puppet masters receives a retrospective. (December, YBCA)
“Silent Songs: Three Films by Nathaniel Dorsky” The SF-based poet of silent film (and essayist behind the excellent book Devotional Cinema) screens a trio of new works. (Dec. 10, YBCA)
CASTRO THEATRE
429 Castro, SF
(415) 621-6120
www.castrotheatre.com
PFA THEATER
2575 Bancroft, Berk.
(510) 642-5249
www.bampfa.berkeley.edu
ROXIE FILM CENTER
3317 16th St., SF
(415) 863-1087
www.roxie.com
YERBA BUENA CENTER FOR THE ARTS (YBCA)
Screening room, 701 Mission, SF
(415) 978-2787
www.ybca.org\ SFBG
Discs, man
› a&eletters@sfbg.com SEPT. 5 Criss Angel, Criss Angel: Mindfreak (Koch) Tell us this recording by TV’s erect-nippled goth heat-throb and full-tilt-boogie cheesenheimer is only an illusion. Audioslave, Revelations (Epic) Their politics check out, though an unboring album will be a revelation. Beyoncé, B’Day (Music World Music/Sony Urban Music/Columbia) The result of a two-week break for artistic freedom, but a Clive Davis overseer might have helped — she sounds like a stressed-out laser on the leadoff single. Grizzly Bear, Yellow House (Warp) Inspired sounds with bite by Brooklyn DIYer Edward Droste, whose queerific perspective brings a burly new hue to his moniker. Iron Maiden, A Matter of Life and Death (Columbia) Count on the barbed Bruce Dickinson to come with confrontation on this wartime studio outing. The Rapture, Pieces of the People We Love (Strummer/Universal UK) Danger Mouse coproduces the new piece from dance punk ex–San Franciskies. Tony Joe White, Uncovered (Swamp/Sanctuary) The original blue-eyed soulster gives it another poke, accompanied by Eric Clapton and Michael “Yah Mo B There” McDonald. SEPT. 12 Basement Jaxx, Crazy Itch Radio (XL) Still all they’re jacked up to be? Black Keys, Magic Potion (Nonesuch) The rock duo ain’t dead. Merle Haggard, Hag: The Best of Merle Haggard (Capitol/EMI) Go back to the origins of the Bakersfield sound and travel through “Okie from Muskogee” all the way up to the anti–Iraq War present. Junior Boys, So This Is Goodbye (Domino) Whether you compare them to old New Order or current Booka Shade, their follow-up to 2004’s Last Exit is already garnering raves. Jordan Knight, Love Songs (Trans Continental/Element 1/EMI) Love Handles might be a better title, though at least Brigitte Nielsen isn’t a guest vocalist. Deborah Gibson does have a cameo. Mars Volta, Amputechture (Universal) Cedric Bixler-Zavala and Omar Rodriguez-Lopez may bring it live, but can they pull off another concept album? Pigeon John, Pigeon John and the Summertime Pool Party (Quannum Projects) He claims to be dating your sister. Justin Timberlake, FutureSex/LoveSounds (Jive) He and Timbaland use Beastie Boys– or Mark E. Smith–like crackly megaphone vocal effects on the first single; the album title seems both very ’90s and very OutKast wannabe. TV on the Radio, Return to Cookie Mountain (Interscope) David Bowie and Blonde Redhead’s Kazu Makino bake it up for the increasingly dance-pop Brooklynites. Xiu Xiu, The Air Force (5RC) An army of three hones a pop attack, with backup from producer Greg Saunier of Deerhoof. Yo La Tengo, I Am Not Afraid of You and I Will Beat Your Ass (Matador) Fighting words and lengthy psych jams from the indie softniks. SEPT. 19 Clay Aiken, A Thousand Different Ways (RCA) The long wait for the Claymates is over. Bone Thugs-N-Harmony, Bone Thugs-N-Harmony (Koch) They were twisting tongues long before Twista. Who’s your favorite: Layzie or Bizzy or Wish or Flesh or Krayzie? Bonnie “Prince” Billy, Then the Letting Go (Drag City) Does this title refer to shaving — or inhibitions? Chingy, Hoodstar (Slot-A-Lot/Capitol) I once saw a bunch of people at 16th and Mission dancing around a boom box blaring “Holiday Inn.” DJ Shadow, The Outsider (Universal) The North Bay’s Josh Davis comes out of the shadows, hepped to the hyph of guests Keak Da Sneak and Turf Talk. But ditch that Urb stylist. Fergie, The Dutchess (Will.I.Am/A&M/Interscope) And you thought pop music couldn’t be more heinous than the Black Eyed Peas? The microwaved hollabacks of the atrocious “London Bridge” are here to prove you wrong. Hidden Cameras, Awoo (Arts & Crafts) Peekaboo, I see you. Kasabian, Empire (RCA) The band named after Linda Kasabian testify on their own behalf with a new album. Jesse McCartney, Right Where You Want Me (Hollywood) Past his TRL sell-by date? We shall see. Mos Def, Tru3 Magic (Geffen) Somewhere between his first solo album and his second, Mos Def started to act like he knew he was cute. Here’s hoping he thinks of music as his true love rather than a step on the road to Hollywood. Pere Ubu, Why I Hate Women (Smog Veil) But at least a few women still love Ubu. Misogyny evidently rules for the post-punk belligerents. Bobby Valentino, Special Occasion (Disturbing Tha Peace/Def Jam) Ludacris’s R&B man speeds up enough to record a sophomore album. Zutons, Tired of Hanging Around (Deltasonic) The Liverpool antsy-rockin’ roots trendoids try their luck on this side of the puddle. SEPT. 22 Thermals, The Body, the Blood, the Machine (Sub Pop) PPP (post-pop-punk) protesting a purely protestant panorama. SEPT. 26 Emily Haines, Knives Don’t Have Your Back (Last Gang) Unsheathe ’em? A Metric cutie ventures out alone. Janet Jackson, 20 Y.O. (Virgin) And acting it. Sean Lennon, Friendly Fire (Capitol) Son of John returns with help from Cibo Matto’s Yuka Honda. Ludacris, Release Therapy (Disturbing Tha Peace) If the first single, “Money Maker,” is anything to go by, Luda better watch out, because he’s skating dangerously close to Hammer-like lame flossin’. Scissor Sisters, Ta-Dah (Universal) Good news: guest appearance by Bryan Ferry. Bad news: cameo by Elton John. Either way, there’s no justice when they are more popular than the Ark. Sparklehorse, Dreamt for Light Years in the Belly of a Mountain (Astralwerks) Get a stomachful of Tom Waits alongside sound-alike Mark Linkous. Mario Vazquez, Mario Vazquez (Arista) Question: What is better than a beauty-school dropout? Answer: An American Idol dropout — especially one who has been spotted at la Escuelita. He gets bonus points for having the cutest messed-up teeth. Wolf Eyes, Human Animal (Sub Pop) Bagging some inhuman noise. OCT. 3 Beck, The Information (Interscope) Nigel Godrich does the knob twist and fader jive on this new dispatch from “Loser” man. Tim Buckley, The Best of Tim Buckley (Rhino/Elektra) Further proof that “Song to the Siren” is eternal. Decemberists, The Crane Wife (Capitol) Colin Meloy is still finding inspiration in the most unexpected crannies: here, in a Japanese folk tale. The Hold Steady, Boys and Girls in America (Vagrant) Someone can’t help waving a flag. Jet, Shine On (Atlantic) Substitute “Music” for “Money” in the title of the first single, “Put Your Money Where Your Mouth Is.” The Killers, Sam’s Town (Island) Bet they don’t bargain-shop at Sam’s Club. Gladys Knight, Before Me (Verve) Still sounding great while some of her contemporaries rasp and squawk, she covers legends like Ella Fitzgerald, Billie Holiday, and Nina Simone. Lady Sovereign, Public Warning (Def Jam) After “9 to 5” (not a Dolly Parton cover), she drops her debut. Will she hit it big or wind up MIA? Monica, The Makings of Me (J) Add a little bit of Twista, some T.I. for extra heat, a touch of Missy, and Dem Franchize Boys, and you’ve got the makings of a Monica album. Robin Thicke, The Evolution of Robin Thicke (Star Trak/Interscope) Move over, Jon B, and make way for the son of Alan Thicke. OCT. 10 Blood Brothers, Young Machetes (V2) Fugazi player Guy Picciotto and Sleater-Kinney producer John Goodmanson get Bloody. Melvins, A Senile Animal (Ipecac) We didn’t use the s-word first. Robert Pollard, Normal Happiness (Merge) Is there happiness after a decade-plus beer haze? Young Jeezy, The Inspiration: Thug Motivation 102 (Def Jam) The Snowman has recorded 62 tracks for this opus. OCT. 17 Badly Drawn Boy, Born in the UK (XL/Astralwerks) Could BDB have a Broooce fixation? Diddy, Press Play (Bad Boy/Warner) If Danity Kane are anything to go by, it’s officially past time to press eject when it comes to Mr. Combs. Jeremy Enigk, World Waits (Lewis Hollow/Reincarnate/Sony BMG) One wonders how God figures in the latest by the Sunny Day Real Estate and Fire Theft chief. Fantasia, TBA (J) Following in the footsteps of greats such as Patty Duke and Joan Rivers, she recently starred in a TV movie about her own life. Fat Joe, Me Myself and I (Terror Squad) He’s big enough to refer to himself at least three different ways. Frankie J, Priceless (Columbia) Having even survived a cover of Extreme’s “More than Words,” the li’l guy returns to sing more sweet-verging-on-extremely-saccharine nothings. JoJo, The High Road (Blackground/Universal) The li’l pop dynamo and Xtina-to-be with Lindsay Lohan–like looks has sung for our current president, which seems more like visiting an inferno than taking the titular route. Nina Simone, Remixed and Reimagined (RCA/Legacy) More modern folks start fussing with Dr. Nina. Snoop Dogg, Blue Carpet Treatment (Doggystyle/Geffen) Stevie Wonder, the Game, and R. Kelly hop a soul plane. Squarepusher, Hello Everything (Warp) More spastic jazz-dappled emanations from Tom Jenkinson. OCT. 24 Brooke Hogan, Undiscovered (SoBe Entertainment/SMC) The daughter of Hulk Hogan puts all those dark-haired and dark-skinned girls in their place in her first video — after all, no one is more soulful than a putf8um blond. A surefire sign of the apocalypse or just another day in Bush-era pop culture? The Jam, Direction Reaction Creation (Polydor UK) Paul Weller and pals get the big box-set treatment they deserve. John Legend, Once Again (C) Ever heard “My Cherie Amour”? Apparently the billion people who bought the clumsy and far-more-prosaic “Ordinary People” haven’t. The Who, Endless Wire (Polydor) And then there were two. The first studio album since 1982 includes Greg Lake, partially filling in for the deceased John Entwistle, and Ringo spawn Zak Starkey, cospotting the late Keith Moon. OCT. 31 The Clipse, Hell Hath No Fury (J) Famlay and friends return, but what will it be like now that the producer who hit it big with them — a certain Pharrell — is so over-overexposed? Barry Manilow, The Greatest Songs of the Sixties (Arista) Will he cover “Gimme Shelter”? The mind boggles. Meat Loaf, Bat Out of Hell III: The Monster Is Loose (Virgin) Breathe easy — the legal tussle between the Loaf and Jim Steinman over the title phrase is through. Paul Wall, Get Money, Stay True (Atlantic) The Houston metal mouth gabs again. NOV. 7 The Game, The Doctor’s Advocate (Geffen) Not that Dre needs one, even if everyone and their moms wonder what the hell happened to the long-awaited and eventually cancelled Rehab. Lucinda Williams, The Knowing (Lost Highway) Bill Frisell and Dylan sidekick Tony Garnier guest on the latest disc by the proud princess of rasp. NOV. 14 Marques Houston, Veteran (T.U.G./Universal) No longer “Naked,” he returns for 106th and Park duty wearing his stripes. Maroon 5, TBA (Octone/J) You have been warned. Joanne Newsom, Ys (Drag City) The sprite of the harp, produced by pigfucker Steve Albini. DEC. 19 Akon, Konvicted (SRC/Universal) Will we want to shoot up or shoot ourselves when Eminem appears on Senegalese ex-“kon” Aliaune Thiam’s “Smack That”? SFBG
Checking the tour and festival circuit
SEPT. 1
Broke Ass Summer Jam 2006 Living Legends revive the ’90s Mystik Journeymen event, which centered on their mag, underground West Coast acts, and a certain DIY drive. One Block Radius, Mickey Avalon, Dub Esquire, Balance, and surprise guests turn out and turn it up. Historic Sweets Ballroom, 1933 Broadway, Oakl. www.collectiv.com.
SEPT. 7
Vashti Bunyan We all want to look after the folk legend — discovered by Andrew Loog Oldham and championed by Devendra Banhart — as she stops in the Bay during her first US tour. Great American Music Hall, 859 O’Farrell, SF. (415) 885-0750.
SEPT. 8
Mary J. Blige and LeToya Is the latter hit-minx biting Blige’s leather laces? The tour coined “The Breakthrough Experience” just might say it all. Concord Pavilion, 2000 Kirker Pass Road, Concord. (415) 421-TIXS. Also Sept. 10, Shoreline Amphitheatre, 1 Amphitheatre Pkwy., Mountain View. (650) 541-0800.
Gigantour Megadeth’s Dave Mustaine has more than “Symphony of Destruction” on his mind. The man builds — namely, a tour showcasing the long-tressed, rock-hard Lamb of God, Opeth, Arch Enemy, and others. McAfee Coliseum, 7000 Coliseum, Oakl. (510) 569-2121.
Japanese New Music Festival Noise legends Ruins and psych ear-bleeders Acid Mothers Temple perform individually and together in, oh, seven configurations. Bottom of the Hill, 1233 17th St., SF. (415) 621-4455.
SEPT. 9
Matisyahu The Hasidic toaster catches the spirit with the nondenominational Polyphonic Spree. San Jose Civic Auditorium, 145 W. San Carlos, San Jose. (415) 421-TIXS.
SEPT. 16
Elton John Hold still, this could be painful. The Caesars Palace fill-in for Celine Dion ushers in The Captain and the Kid (Sanctuary), the sequel to Captain Fantastic and the Brown Dirt Cowboy. HP Pavilion, 525 W. Santa Clara, San Jose. (415) 421-TIXS.
Zion-I Getcher red-hot underground Bay Area hip-hop right here at a show including the Team and Turf Talk. Fillmore, 1805 Geary, SF. (415) 346-6000.
SEPT. 20
Kelis A drab new look and a will to rise above “Milkshake.” Fillmore, 1805 Geary, SF. (415) 346-6000.
SEPT. 20–21
Guns N’ Roses Word has it that the Chinese democrats sold out in minutes. Warfield, 982 Market, SF. (415) 775-7722.
SEPT. 22–24
San Francisco Blues Festival Little Richard and Ruth Brown carouse at the 34th annual getdown, which includes New Orleans tributes and a Chicago harmonica blowout. Fort Mason, Great Meadow, Bay at Laguna, SF. www.sfblues.com.
SEPT. 28
Tommy Guerrero The artist-skater-musician wears many hats — this time he tips a songwriting cap to laidback funk with From the Soil to the Soul (Quannum Projects, Oct. 10) and tours with labelmates Curumin and Honeycut. Mezzanine, 444 Jessie, SF. (415) 625-8880.
SEPT. 29
M. Ward The former South Bay teacher looks forward with his Post-War (Merge) and tools around the state with that other MW, Mike Watt. Fillmore, 1805 Geary, SF. (415) 346-6000.
SEPT. 30
Download Festival Load up on indie-ish artists like Beck, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Muse, and the Shins. Shoreline Amphitheatre, 1 Amphitheatre Pkwy., Mountain View. (650) 541-0800.
Supersystem The NYC-DC indie funksters wave A Million Microphones in your mug. Rickshaw Stop, 155 Fell, SF. (415) 861-2011.
OCT. 1
Godsmack Much yuks were had over Arthur magazine’s recent editorial slapdown of frontperson Sully Erna. Concord Pavilion, 2000 Kirker Pass Road, Concord. (415) 421-TIXS.
OCT. 2
Mariah Carey Emancipated and on the loose via the “Adventures of Mimi” tour, alongside Busta Rhymes. Watch out, all you ice cream cones. Oakland Arena, 7000 Coliseum Way, Oakl. (415) 421-TIXS.
OCT. 3
Celtic Frost The notorious ’80s metalists join hands with Goatwhore and Sunn O))) and skip with heavy, heavy hearts. Fillmore, 1805 Geary, SF. (415) 346-6000.
OCT. 6–8
Hardly Strictly Bluegrass How now, our favorite free cowpoke (folkie and roots) hoedown? Elvis Costello is the latest addition to a lineup that counts in Ramblin’ Jack Elliott, Iris DeMent, Billy Bragg, Emmylou Harris, Gillian Welch, Allison Moorer, Richard Thompson, T Bone Burnett, Chip Taylor, and Avett Brothers. Golden Gate Park, Speedway Meadow, JFK near 25th Ave., SF. Free. www.strictlybluegrass.com.
OCT. 13
Clap Your Hands Say Yeah Blogged to the ends of the earth — and to the detriment of our frayed nerves — the NYC band huddles with Architecture in Helsinki. Warfield, 982 Market, SF. (415) 775-7722.
OCT. 16
Ladytron The beloved, wry Liverpool dance-popettes reach beyond the “Seventeen” crowd. Fillmore, 1805 Geary, SF. (415) 346-6000.
NOV. 5
Rolling Stones They’re baaack. Van Morrison makes a mono-generational affair. McAfee Coliseum, 7000 Coliseum Way, Oakl. (415) 421-TIXS. (Kimberly Chun)
Fallin’ out
› superego@sfbg.com
Club me. Club me hard. And party me even harder, Miss Autumn — you with the burgundy hair, the tiger-striped jumpsuit, and the White Russian teeth. This is a great time to fall out in the Bay: the weather gets warmer, the nights get longer, and there’s a new crop of fresh-faced, low-tolerance Berkeley students and their future careers to fiddle with. How naughty. Do let’s dive into some fall party highlights, shall we?
Big club news first. Crusty favorite 1015 Folsom (www.1015.com) just underwent a massive remodel and is looking to rebrand itself as a more welcoming, less tired niche spot. So far the calendar looks full of the usual Paul Oakenfold–wacky techno stuff of yesteryear, but there’s an outreach going on to draw in more, er, post-1998-type fare, and the remo looks fabu, so here’s hoping.
1015 is spacious, but the brand-new Temple (www.templesf.com) in the old DNA space is holy fucking cosmic. With five dance areas, underground “catacombs,” and various VIP rooms (including one you get to through a secret door in the women’s john), there’s gonna be a lot of sublebrity scandal reeking from this joint when it opens in September. I’m still all about small, but I’m mysteriously drawn to this place already. Something spiritual? Nah, I just wanna egg all the Hummers.
Also on its way is Slide (www.slidesf.com), an upscale underground speakeasy-style lounge soon to be launched by some of clubland’s wealthiest players. It really is underground — you get to it by going down a slide. Lord knows how you get out. But it’ll be fun watching people try. Look out for beaver cams, skirt wearers.
If you’re gay or a fan of the gay or a pervert nun — and who isn’t on a Thursday — you’ll squeal like a stuck pig that one of San Francisco’s literally balls-out faves, Revival Bingo (www.revivalbingo.com), the raucous fundraiser hosted by the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, will rise from the dead on Sept. 7 and will continue to rise on the first Friday of every month at 7 p.m. at Ellard Hall in the Castro.
But Sept. 7? You may be just too hungover from the SF Symphony Opening Gala (www.sfsymphony.org) Sept. 6 to wet your bingo tip. OK, OK, I admit this isn’t exactly a clubby event, and maybe I’m pumping it because I want free press tickets. (Oh yes, I’ll be blogging it on www.sfbg.com.) But I’m tired of standing behind the velvet ropes year after year watching San Francisco’s impeccably accoutred master class promenade down the red carpet to enjoy the Michael Tilson Thomas–led aural fireworks inside. I’m a faggot, dammit. I wanna be in the sparkly parade!
Which brings us to the biggest party weekend of the year: Sept. 23 and 24. That’s when, for the third year in a row, the technolicious LoveFest (formerly the Love Parade; www.sflovefest.org) and the leatherific Folsom Street Fair (www.folsomstreetfair.com) share a weekend of mayhem — LoveFest all day Saturday and Folsom all day Sunday. These are both ginormous institutions that draw hundreds of thousands of visitors each. And oh lord, you should see the outfits. LoveFest boasts hundreds of top-notch live acts, including Massive Attack, Grandmaster Flash, and DJ Shadow, plus a really rickety parade of hilariously homemade floats up Market. Folsom boasts hundreds of top-notch bare buttocks and several hundred lower-notch other parts as well, plus this year it’s woken up to the whole alternaqueer thing, programming a ton of trash-drag live acts and even SF’s favorite musical curmudgeon, DJ Bus Station John, to get your chaps sweaty. Throw on a beer-stained bunny suit and hit up both events.
Finally: “Mass Culture has forced the majority’s subconscious into accepting a monotonous mindset pervaded by ignorance and inaction,” quoth the press release for Be the Riottt (www.riottt.com), the eclectic Vice-meets-Misshapes electro-fash throwdown Nov. 11 at the Bill Graham Civic Auditorium. Riott’s answer? Have an enormous concert featuring some of the biggest international draws in postironic attitudinizing. The Rapture, Metric, Clipse, Diplo, and about 20 other acts (plus, I suppose, thousands of neon Vans and white-framed sunglasses) will stoke the frozen grins of the sans blague generation. I’ll be there with a Cher tambourine. Go team! SFBG
SF Opera under the glass
› a&eletters@sfbg.com
There is no lack of world-class talent in the upcoming fall season, but as far as the portentous tenants in the Civic Center are concerned, the new season’s repertoire stands out as an exercise in artistic tepidness. Perhaps still traumatized by the Bush economy’s brutal impact upon the arts, the San Francisco Opera and Symphony and other big Bay Area arts presenters are taking few chances. Projects with even the subtlest hints of experimentation this season — such as the SF Symphony’s multimedia production of Charlie Chaplin’s City Lights — are being served to the public in carefully marketed packages, brandishing favorite performers with tried-and-true creative teams that have been thoroughly tested over the years.
So as the curtains go up next week, the best performance to watch may well be the one that is taking place offstage: David Gockley, the SF Opera’s new general director, heads his first full season as the top choice for the job. With the company’s somewhat contentious regime change (Pamela Rosenberg vacated the lead post last season), Gockley knows that his every move is being scrutinized by the opera world.
Rosenberg was the only woman leading a major American opera company during her tenure at the SF Opera, boldly introducing on the War Memorial stage the US premieres of major contemporary works such as Olivier Messiaen’s massive St. Francis of Assisi, György Ligeti’s Le Grand Macabre, and the world premiere of John Adams’s Dr. Atomic. Even while facing the funding challenges of a deflated economy, Rosenberg chose to focus the company’s resources on creating the daring, provocative concept-driven productions that are common in Europe. Instead of squandering her production budgets on expensive star singers, Rosenberg brought a fertile artistic sensibility to the company that was wholly fresh and exciting.
Yet the lack of recognizable marquee names combined with the high level of abstraction in her productions displeased the opera’s more conservative, traditional constituencies. Typically, the anti-Rosenberg camp was made up of Metropolitan Opera–jealous patrons and the shrill, mercilessly critical traditionalists who prefer museumlike productions — the kind of stagings populated with ornate period costuming and opulent sets that are often mere vanity vehicles to glorify star singers. So, faced with the criticism of diva-starved patrons and the prospect of having to devote an enormous portion of her time on the job to fundraising, Rosenberg chose not to renew her five-year contract with the SF Opera when it expired.
Attempting to find a less polarizing replacement, the SF Opera’s search committee came up with Gockley, the highly respected former general director of Houston Grand Opera. Chief among Gockley’s strengths is the rapport he has with top talent in the field, paired with a proven ability to entice them into high-profile collaborations.
“I would like to pursue a policy of bringing more of the most prominent stars back to San Francisco, similar to the kind that the public enjoyed during the [Kurt Herbert] Adler and [Terence] McEwen years,” Gockley said in a phone interview last week. “People expect that of a great international company — to provide the big personalities and the most glamorous performers.”
Yes, the divas are back, though certainly not in the abundance suggested by the opera’s tacky marketing campaign launched during the summer season. But what could be the rationale behind the extreme conservatism of SF Opera’s 2006–07 season, in which the most modern entry is Richard Strauss’s Der Rosenkavalier (1911) and the production rosters are populated by stalwart traditionalists such as Michael Yeargan, Thierry Bosquet, and John Conklin? “This year is not mine,” Gockley pointed out, indicating that it was planned by his predecessor before his arrival.
Not unlike Rosenberg, in Houston, Gockley was also known as an innovator and risk taker. In the heart of Bush country, he ushered in Adams’s Nixon in China, a momentous premiere in the history of American opera. A few years later, his controversial commission of Stewart Wallace and Michael Korie’s Harvey Milk was picketed by the religious right.
So what does he have in store for those who actually like more daring theatrical statements?
“Nothing this year,” he said dryly. “But we have already announced a world premiere by Philip Glass [an opera based on the Civil War battle of Appomattox] for next season and will announce the new season in January. Much as I did in Houston, we will have a blend of some core and peripheral repertory work, new works, and premieres — done with great singers and great musical and theatrical values.”
In all fairness, Gockley has the difficult job of being all things to all people during this transitional phase. Of course, this is only the beginning, and before he has the buy-in from all the locals, this former Texan will still have much to prove. SFBG
CHING CHANG’S TOP CLASSICAL AND OPERA PICKS
HENRY PURCELL’S KING ARTHUR
Philharmonia Baroque and Cal Performances join forces to present Purcell’s 1691 dramatic masterpiece in a new, fully choreographed staging by Mark Morris. The original cast from the production’s UK premiere is featured. (Sept. 30–Oct. 7. 510-642-9988, www.calperfs.berkeley.edu)
HILARY HAHN AND THE SF SYMPHONY
More than any so-called diva, violinist Hilary Hahn provides compelling evidence of the divine with her mesmerizing gifts. Appearing with the SF Symphony, Hahn is the soloist in the rarely heard Violin Concerto by Eric Wolfgang Korngold, a composer of forbidden music during the Nazi era. (Dec. 6–8. 415-864-6000, www.sfsymphony.org)
RICHARD WAGNER’S TRISTAN UND ISOLDE
Soprano Christine Brewer’s rendition of Isolde’s orgasmic, transcendent “Liebestod” at the end of this five-hour opera will be well worth the wait, while iconoclast David Hockney’s colorful sets will be mere icing on the cake. Thomas Moser sings Tristan, and Donald Runnicles conducts. (Oct. 5–27. 415-864-3330, www.sfopera.com)
THOMAS ADES
In the rarest of opportunities, the brilliant British composer and pianist Thomas Ades pays a visit to San Francisco to play a recital of his music at Herbst Theatre. Ades created a sensation when, as a fresh-faced 23-year-old composer, he premiered his opera Powder Her Face (containing the now-infamous fellatio scene) in Britain in 1995. (Dec. 9. 415-392-2545, www.performances.org)
This ain’t no Artforum
KIMBERLY CHUN 1. “Binh Danh” Questions of history, identity, and collective and individual memory are probed via the Stanford MFA graduate’s spectral “chlorophyll prints,” created through a process he invented in which found photos are reproduced on the surface of fragile leaves. Sept. 7–Oct. 14. Haines Gallery, 49 Geary, SF. (415) 397-8114, www.hainesgallery.com 2. “Counter Culture” Several generations of hipsters, freaks, and freethinkers have been documented by Bay Area photographer Larry Keenan, who snapped Brian Jones, Allen Ginsberg, Bob Dylan, and countless beautiful people back in the day. The onetime Concord High School art teacher’s work appeared in the Whitney’s “Beat Culture and the New America: 1950–1965.” Sept. 6–30. Micaela Gallery, 333 Hayes, SF. (415) 551-8118, www.micaela.com 3. “Howard Finster: Image + Words = God” The late REM album art poster boy and ironclad, gilded-winged folk art visionary made more than 46,000 images limned with text during his lifetime — quite a feat, since he began to paint “sacred art” in 1976 under orders of an angelic vision. Expect works on loan from the collection of local artist and Finster friend Eleanor Dickinson. Nov. 11, 2006–May 13, 2007. California Palace of the Legion of Honor, Lincoln Park (near 34th Ave. and Clement), SF. (415) 863-3330, www.thinker.org 4. “Home Ec: New Work by Sarah Applebaum, Elide Endreson, Sherry Koyama, Christina La Sala, Julia Petho, and Allen Stickel” What qualifies as women’s work when the faces of celebrity fry cooks tend toward the studly and knitting has acquired a cool cachet? Local artists such as California College of the Arts faculty member La Sala and the Lab staffer Koyama explore the seismic shifts in home economics. Sept. 8–28. Michelle O’Connor Gallery, 2111 Mission, SF. (415) 990-7148 5. “Packard Jennings: Lottery Ticket” Those forever dreaming about what they’d do if they won the lottery will get an unexpected bonus when they lay their money down at select stores in four SF districts: a faux scratcher created by Jennings, hiding an unusual local treasure in the community. Nov. 1, 2006–Jan. 31, 2007. Southern Exposure, 2901 Mission, SF. (415) 863-2141, www.soex.org 6. “Charles Linder: Crazy Horse” Horses — broken, thieved, and gimped out — are the leitmotif when the SF artist transforms a target-practice 1965 Mustang into a gallery thoroughbred … of sorts. Sept. 8–Oct. 14. Gallery 16, 501 Third St., SF. (415) 626-7495, www.gallery16.com 7. “Particulate Matter” For the Mills College Art Museum’s new wing, Guardian critic Glen Helfand curates a debut exhibit composed of many parts and informed by political consciousness. LA artist Karl Haendel, known for dramatic installations of drawings culled from media images, makes his Bay Area debut, as does German photographer Florian Maier-Aichen, who exhibits digitally enhanced and tension-wracked landscapes. Sept. 9–Dec. 10. 5000 MacArthur, Oakl. (510) 430-2164, www.mills.edu/campus_life/art_museum 8. “Perfectly Good; Friendly Fire” No dumping on artists-in-residence Noah Wilson and Kim Weller. The former photographs rediscovered found objects; the latter dreams up a 3-D installation of life-size Archie Comics icons for this teenage — and industrial — wasteland. Sept. 22–23. SF Recycling and Disposal, 503 Tunnel, SF. (415) 330-1415, www.sfrecycling.com/AIR 9. “Donald Urquhart: No Axe to Grind” Camp icons like Dors, Dusty, and Davis, refigured as “Aubrey Beardsley doodles through high school algebra” scrawls, are part of the London artist’s past as a King’s Cross club owner. Sept. 9–30. Jack Hanley Gallery, 395 Valencia, SF. (415) 522-1623, www.jackhanley.com 10. “We All Live Paper Nest: The Paper Nest Project” Paper hoarders celebrate the messes they call nests, those baby blankets of ephemera that they turn to for security, inspiration, and creativity. Curators Tan Khanh Cao and D. Scott Miller make a seven-foot-diameter paper nest shot through with meaning, while writers and musicians such as Kwan Booth of Black Futurist Movement and Walter Kitundu perform at the Sept. 16 reception. Sept. 15–17. Luggage Store Annex, 509 Ellis, SF. www.luggagestoregallery.org. SFBG