Stage

Compassion and fervor in Berkeley Rep’s ‘Black n Blue Boys/Broken Men’

Sue Vaughan
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Compassion and fervor in Berkeley Rep’s ‘Black n Blue Boys/Broken Men’

“I want them to look at me, to look me in the eyes,” states Dael Orlandersmith, using a British accent to portray one of at least ten different characters she plays in her tour de force solo show Black n Blue Boys/Broken Men, at Berkeley Rep through June 23.
 
After 90 minutes, the audience was definitely squirming in its seats. Orlandersmith tackles a barrage of characters, each of whom related in some degree to the subjects of mental, physical, and sexual abuse of boys and men. But despite the challenging material, I do not think many viewers would have wanted the play to be any shorter. (“There was hope in it,” I heard an audience member say as we walked out of the theater.)

Orlandersmith, a Pulitzer finalist for her 2002 Yellowman, embodies a variety of people tied to the many facets of violence: onlookers, perpetrators, victims — and those who are perpetrators and victims. She represents a range of ages and ethnicities: children, a Latino father and mother, an African American hustler (aged 13), Irish parents. Her elocution is impeccable.

 Dressed in plain clothing, she remains onstage for the duration, signaling scene changes by turning and walking from the back to the front of the stage — where she resumes with completely different mannerisms. The stage looks a bit like a large ship plank or the abandoned foundation of a small apartment, very broken around the edges.
 
Huge, industrial-looking lights evoke the prisons, foster homes, crack dens, and seedy spots for sex solicitation that background her stories; they raise and lower for different monologues. Character names are projected along the wall after the first few appear, to help the audience keep track when they are revisited.

One character — a boy taunted in the school yard for being a “trick-baby,” a child of a prostitute  — escapes his abusive family life and becomes a writer (a character that Orlandersmith may have been able to draw most from her own experience as a writer who works to give voice to those who are oppressed by violent circumstances). As an adult, the writer works in foster homes, trying to break the cycle of violence and help children in a way he was never assisted in his darkest days.

But even though he understands why these children act out so badly, they still test his patience and he finds out one of the many corruptions in the foster care system — he does not get in trouble for hitting the child because they are allowed to spank children “who are bad.” When he learns about this rule, the character realizes his mistake; his awareness of his own actions and his need to challenge the system and make positive change inspires hope.

In the playbill, Berkeley Rep artistic director Tony Taccone speaks about Orlandersmith’s grace and understanding in approaching such a dark and seemingly impossible subject. He explains she shows us hope amid desperation and brutality. Although certain characters were much harder to handle than others, each one certainly gave the audience much to consider. Orlandersmith shows us how abuse is cyclical, it is a vicious cycle that is hard to break. Hard, but certainly possible.
 
Black n Blue Boys/Broken Men also addresses bureaucratic problems  — compounded by stereotypes and ignorance — that stand in the way of breaking this cycle of violence. A Latino boy growing up in the Brooklyn projects with his mentally ill, sexually abusive mother and in-denial father meets with a social worker, who tells him “It says here in your case file that you were molested by your mother. But you must be mistaken. Men molest men, women, girls, and boys. Women are mothers, mothers do not molest children — women do not molest their sons.”
 
With this example, Orlandersmith shows we still have some fundamental archetypes that need to be broken down, and double standards between the sexes is one of them. Both men and women can be aggressors. Although her play points out this harsh reality (and the frequent denial of it in our society), she also explores how characters break from their abusive pasts.

Thankfully, Orlandersmith provides enough balance in the play to keep the material from getting too uncomfortable and depressing. My personal favorite character was the “unofficial mayor of Central Park,” whose New York accent and physicality was hilarious and completely likeable.
 
I applaud Orlandersmith for her bravery in tackling this subject, and for her ability to explore her characters so deeply. Black n Blue Boys doesn’t engage in finger-pointing; instead, it presents each character openly. Although she knew certain details might cause revulsion, anger, and shock, this talented writer-performer encourages viewers to draw their own conclusions in the end. It is a truthful, compassionate look at a challenging topic, which, in the words of her final character, “doesn’t have to be all black and blue.”

Black n Blue Boys/Broken Men
Through June 23, $14.50-73
Berkeley Repertory Theatre
Thrust Stage, 2025 Addison, Berk.
www.berkeleyrep.org

The Performant: Interpreting Iraq

Andrew Lam
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The Performant: Interpreting Iraq

Aftermath at Stagewerx attempts to humanize recent refugee experience.

An austere set greets the assembled theater-goers in the black box arena of Stagewerx: a projection of a shop-lined street in the Middle East, a few chairs, an aerial photograph of Iraq perched on an easel, an incongruous television, and a pair of shoes.

A lone figure in a headscarf and wide trousers, Rafidain (Yara Badday), approaches the centerstage and begins to speak in Arabic, offering chai, looking anxiously over her shoulder for her interpreter, Shahid (Mohamed Chakmahchi). In Theatre Period’s ongoing production of Aftermath, the year is 2008, the location is Jordan, and all of the characters are Iraqi refugees, their stories gleaned from a series of interviews conducted by Jessica Blank and Erik Jensen on the subject of the 2003 US invasion and occupation of Iraq, and its ongoing repercussions. 

Throughout the course of the play, the individual character traits of the interviewees reveal themselves through text and minimal movement. The independent fierceness of Rafidian, a pharmacist; the brash materialism of action-film aficionado and dermatologist Yassar (Shoresh Alaudini); the righteous anger of Imam Abdul-Aliyy (Munaf Alsafi); the only partially-subdued optimism of a pair of exiled theater artists played by Andrea Ali and Hassan Alnawar.

Facing reality: a scene from Aftermath. Guardian photo by Nicole Gluckstern

A familiar ritual accompanies each introduction, as each character offers tea, coffee, baklava, a peek at the family photo album or a proud pair of diplomas — acts of culturally-ingrained hospitality reminiscent of similar scenes in Joe Sacco’s documentary graphic novel, Palestine.  

Since most of the text is in English, the role of the “interpreter,” a composite character created by Blank and Jensen, spends much of his stage time interpreting not language, but rather the timeline and the historical role of tribalism in Iraq for audience edification.

As for the other characters, their discourse is scripted directly from interview material: a Christian woman, Basmina (Jasmin Kimberley Ali) describing the sound of falling bombs, a young couple (Dolfakar Mardan and Susu Attar) struggling with painful nostalgia for the home they built themselves and then had to leave behind, the dignified Abdul-Aliyy elucidating the tortures he survived during his unwarranted incarceration at Abu Ghraib. The play focuses not so much on creating a linear narrative, but on creating awareness that each character is not mere statistical data to collect — they are full-fledged, multifaceted members of the human race. 

The production is not without its awkwardness. The material is intense, often discomfiting, and unadorned, mirrored by the minimal staging, stark lighting, and the stilted bearing of a few of the actors, (some of whom have never performed in a play before).

The scenes play out mostly like a televised eyewitness documentary, populated primarily by static talking heads, any intricacies of decor (save the television) left to the audience to visualize on their own. But ultimately with a play like this, the less that detracts from the simple honesty of the stories being told the better. There’s simply no need to dress this production up with stagecraft, the stories are compelling enough on their own.

Aftermath

Through June 30, $25

Stagewerx

446 Valencia, SF

www.stagewerx.org

www.theatreperiod.com

 

Win a pair of VIP passes to the Sierra Nevada World Music Festival

Maria Poblet
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Win a pair of VIP passes to the Sierra Nevada World Music Festival

Epiphany Artists presents the 19th Annual Sierra Nevada World Music Festival.

SNWMF once again brings you some of the greats in world, roots, dancehall and reggae.  This years lineup features Jimmy Cliff, Luciano, Third World, J Boog, Iration, Katchafire, David Rodigan, Stone Love, and many more.  With two stages, a late night dancehall, an interactive kids program with workshops and dedicated performances, food from around the globe, and the best in arts and crafts vendors, SNWMF is a fantastic way to kick off the Summer Solstice with the whole family.  Single day, three day, and limited camping tickets are available here.

Win a pair of VIP passes to the festival, which includes a three-day ticket, side-stage view, and both non-alcoholic beverages and beer. Email sfbgpromos@sfbg.com with Sierra Nevada World Music Festival and leave your name and phone number. One randomly chosen winner will receive a phone call Friday, June 15 at noon. Good luck!

Friday thru Sunday, June 22-24 @ Mendocino County Fairgrounds in Boonville, CA

Live Shots: Patrick Watson at Great American Music Hall

Tony Robles
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The Great American Music Hall was at about half capacity for Patrick Watson’s Sunday night performance, but what the audience lacked in numbers they made up in energy. Before the Montreal-based singer even walked onto the stage, there was a buzz of excitement in the small crowd.

At first, the eagerness of the audience seemed at odds with the band’s quiet, dreamy folk songs. But with every song it played, the band picked up energy and volume, at times building from its lullaby-like melodies into cymbal crashing jam sessions with backing gang vocals reminiscent of Arcade Fire.

The beginning of the set focused on Watson’s airy vocals paired with simple piano riffs. As the night continued, the songs became more and more eclectic, oscillating between genres too fast to even identify the Latin roots of one chorus before they had already played a bluesy bridge into a folk refrain.

Even more varied than the band’s influences was the multitude of instruments used in each song. Odd-looking percussion tools were scattered around the stage. The drummer played not just the standard drum kit, but also many obscure and homemade instruments that I simply could not identify. He held a bow to nearly anything that could have noise conjured out of it, including a saw and, at one point, what appeared to be a soccer trophy.

Watson interspersed the patchwork of tunes with anecdotes relating to the origins of the songs, most pertaining to transient adventures or quiet, bucolic moments. His tone with the audience was charmingly conversational. At points he upheld dialogues with fans that shouted out to him, telling stories about his two children and his small house in Quebec.

Much of the band’s charm lies in the air of camaraderie that hangs heavily around them. A self-described “big traveling family” Patrick Watson and his band radiate affection for each other and for their music. Even in the moments that the style-switches were not seamless and the energy dipped, the sincerity of Watson’s smile outshone it all.

The prestige

Jesse Hawthorne Ficks
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The prestige

marke@sfbg.com

SUPER EGO Everybody’s in an uproar. Panties: twisted! Wig: askew! Weave: berated! Kanga: roo’d! The upper lefthand quadrant of the Internet is aflame.

Respected undergroundish house DJs are being kicked out of upscale club booths at an alarming rate. In February, Dennis Ferrer was tossed from the tables at Miami’s Mansion for not playing “commercial enough.” Last week, our own beloved Mark Farina got bumped from the Marquee poolside in Las Vegas because the management was “getting complaints from the table service crowd” about too much house. (And, most inexplicably, adorable ambient sage Mixmaster Morris was unplugged at a prestigious Berlin event late last year, for not wanting to spontaneously tag team with the tipsy promoter.)

Beyond screaming, “Why the hell would you play these idiotfests to begin with!” (each has their own credible individual explanation), I tend to think this rash of boots is simply symptomatic of dance music’s current bout of mainstreamification. A similar thing happened when oonce-oonce techno took over mainstream-y dance floors in the mid-1990s. Suddenly it seemed every DJ disappeared except Paul van Dyk, Paul Oakenfold, Armin van Buuren, and Sasha and Digweed. Creepy. This time around, house lovers, there’s plenty of venues and crowds for everyone, without having to cry about our time slot in the Electric Daisy Cannibal of life. All is full of PLUR. Just don’t fuss with our Farina again, Vegas, or we’ll Mushroom Jazz your ass.

 

DMITRI FROM PARIS

And now I will spin you a shaggy tale of reverse-douchebagginess. The year? 2000. The place? Winter Music Conference in Miami. The party? Playboy Mansion. All the fixings of a bottle service fake boobs popped collar disaster-fantasy! Of course I went. But then. Someone handed me one of those little shaker eggs that make maraca noises. And then. DJ Dmitri from Paris launched into a 12-minute version of “Love is Always on Your Mind” by Gladys Knight and the Pips. The floor went wild and I went straight (forward) to heaven. It was totally like that moment in the gay bar in 1978 when someone hands Sandra Bernhard a tambourine. Free at last! Ever since then I’ve adored this kicky disco Greek Frenchman, and now that he’s launched several re-edit projects, he’s back in the pulsating limelight. Will he drop the epic opera version of Pet Shop Boys’ “Left to My Own Devices”? As a guest at Marques Wyatt’s monthly Deep party, one of the best and most diverse in SF, anything goes.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mi50cNBjSMw

Fri/15, 10pm-3am, $15 advance, $20. Mighty, 119 Utah, SF. www.mighty119.com

 

THE MAGICIAN

Have we at least reached the late Steve Miller Band stage of electro-disco? Abracadabra, out pops this mysterious prestidigitator, pulling blissful, keyboard-chiming, fog-enshrouded tricks from his fuzzy-wuzzy dream hat. I am assuming ze Magician is French, because he pulls off that excellent French touch trick of pulling your feverishly beating heart out of your chest right when the strobes hit. But in a more contemporary, happy house way. (UPDATE: The Magician is possibly Belgian. Magic!)

Fri/15, 9pm, $17 advance. Mezzanine, 444 Jessie, SF. www.mezzaninesf.com

 

MAYER HAWTHORNE

Don’t call him a “throwback” — the young soul-funk revivalist prefers to count J. Dilla among his influences, even while he’s nicking inspiration from Holland-Dozier-Holland. The Stones Throw label favorite’s DJ set should span a spectrum of mood-bending, rootsy sounds.

Sat/16, 9pm-late, $10–$15. Public Works, 161 Erie, SF. www.publicsf.com

 

SON’Y RAYS

Kind of freaking out about this one. Some of the deepest, most intellectually soulful —– and danceable! —– tech-house future beats are being made in Oakland right now (and for the past few years) by the Deepblak crew. This showcase will bring together most of the major players at SF’s SOM: Diaba$e and Nasrockswell, Blaktroniks, Aybee and Afrikan Sciences, and Damon Bell. Do not miss this night of exquisite hometown, hand-crafted live machine vibes.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ASEDs4n6HOk

Sat/16, 10pm, $10. SOM, 2925 16th St., SF. www.som-bar.com

Stage Listings

Andrew Lam
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Stage listings are compiled by Guardian staff. Performance times may change; call venues to confirm. Reviewers are Robert Avila, Rita Felciano, and Nicole Gluckstern. Submit items for the listings at listings@sfbg.com. For further information on how to submit items for the listings, see Picks.

THEATER

OPENING

5 Lesbians Eating a Quiche Phoenix Theatre, 414 Mason, SF; www.tidestheatre.org. $20-38. Opens Fri/15, 8pm. Runs Thu-Sat, 8pm (also Sat, 10pm). Through July 21. Tides Theatre performs Evan Linder and Andrew Hobgood’s comedy about five women forced into a bomb shelter during a mid-breakfast nuke attack.

BAY AREA

Emotional Creature Berkeley Repertory Theatre, Roda Theatre, 2015 Addison, Berk; www.berkeleyrep.org. $14.50-73. Previews Thu/14-Sat/16 and June 19-21, 8pm; Sun/17, 7pm. Opens June 22, 8pm. Runs Tue and Thu-Sat, 8pm (also Sat, 2pm; no show July 13); Wed, 7pm (no show July 4); Sun, 2 and 7pm. Through July 15. Berkeley Rep presents Eve Ensler’s world premiere, based on her best-seller I Am an Emotional Creature: The Secret Life of Girls Around the World.

Salomania Aurora Theatre, 2081 Addison, Berk; www.auroratheatre.org. $30-55. Previews Fri/15-Sat/16 and June 20, 8pm; Sun/17, 2pm; June 19, 7pm. Opens June 21, 8pm. Runs Tue, 7pm; Wed-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 2 and 7pm. Throgh July 22. Aurora Theatre Company closes its 20th season with writer-director Mark Jackson’s world premiere, commissioned especially for the company, about a San Francisco-born dancer notorious for her take on the "Dance of the Seven Veils."

ONGOING

Aftermath Stagewerx, 446 Valencia, SF; www.brownpapertickets.com. $25. Thu-Sat, 8pm. Through June 30. Theatre, Period presents Jessica Blank and Erik Jenson’s docu-drama, based on interviews with Iraqi civilians forced to flee after the US military’s arrival in 2003.

A Behanding in Spokane SF Playhouse, 533 Sutter, SF; www.sfplayhouse.org. $20-70. Tue-Thu, 7pm; Fri-Sat, 8pm (also Sat, 3pm). Through June 30. If Garth Ennis had been asked to write a comic book about a one-handed sociopath with a dark obsession, he might well have written something similar to Martin McDonagh’s A Behanding in Spokane. And admittedly, approached from that angle, a lot of the script’s dramatic flaws are more easily forgiven. There’s not a whole lot of subtle context or languid metaphor to be found in McDonagh’s criminal caper about the little-known "hand-dealing" trade, but as in Ennis’ best known work, Preacher, the pretty girl (Melissa Quine) is the smartest one in the room; the sociopath (Rod Gnapp) is interested in enacting as vicious a revenge on all humanity while spewing as many blatantly offensive invectives as possible; the boyfriend (Daveed Diggs) has some arrested development issues to work out; and the receptionist (Alex Hurt) takes the caricature of man-child to a whole new level. In fact, while all four actors deliver rock-solid performances of their mostly unsympathetic characters, it’s Hurt’s that impresses most. His spooky intensity and goofily tone-deaf determination plays like a combination of Adam Sandler and Arno Frisch, and if there’s a real sociopath in the room, the evidence suggests it’s probably him. Ultimately though the piece relies too heavily on hollow one-liners to remain interesting — a 20-minute farce stretched to 90 minutes — and quite unlike an Ennis comic, it does not leave one wanting more. (Gluckstern)

The Full Monty Eureka Theatre, 215 Jackson, SF; www.roltheatre.com. $25-36. Thu-Sat, 8pm (also Sat, 2pm); Sun, 2pm. Through June 30. In desperate times, how far would you go to turn a buck? The central premise of the 1997 movie and its namesake musical comedy The Full Monty, the answer to this question is right in the title, which limits the suspense, but amps up the expectations. Set not in Sheffield, England as in the movie, but the similarly economically challenged climate of Buffalo, New York circa the late nineties, the comical romp follows a group of unemployed steel workers who decide, rather optimistically, that spending one night as exotic dancers will solve their immediate financial woes. Banish all notions of a Hot Chocolate sing-along; the soundtrack of the stage musical has little in common with its cinematic predecessor, but there are a couple of toe-tappers, particularly the songs writ for the ladies: a belter’s anthem for their spry but elderly accompanist Jeanette (Cami Thompson), a snarky commentary on male beauty, "The Goods," for the ensemble. On opening night, Ray of Light’s production ran about 15 minutes long after a late start, and the tempo seemed sluggish in parts, but once it hits its stride, The Full Monty should provide a welcome antidote to the ongoing, we’re-still-in-a-recession blues, red leather g-strings and all. (Gluckstern)
Fwd: Life Gone Viral Marsh San Francisco, 1062 Valencia, SF; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. $20-50. Sat, 8:30pm; Sun, 7pm (June 24, show at 2pm; July 15, show at 7:30pm). Extended through July 22. The internet becomes comic fodder for creator-performers Charlie Varon and Jeri Lynn Cohen, and creator-director David Ford.

Lips Together, Teeth Apart New Conservatory Theatre Center, 25 Van Ness, SF; www.nctcsf.org. $25-45. Wed-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 2pm. Through July 1. New Conservatory Theatre Center performs Terrence McNally’s play about two straight couples spending July 4 amid Fire Island’s gay community.

100 Saints You Should Know Thick House, 1695 18th St, SF; www.therhino.org. $10-30. Wed-Thu, 7:30pm; Fri-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 3pm; starting June 22, runs Fri-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 3pm. Extended through July 1. Homespun scenic design notwithstanding, Theatre Rhinoceros and artistic director John Fisher offer a fine, engrossing production of this 2007 play by Kate Fodor (Hannah and Martin, RX), a sturdy comedy-drama about two fractured families colliding awkwardly in a sort of spiritual vacuum. Matthew (an intriguingly restrained Wiley Herman) is a desolate but forbearing Catholic priest sent on a leave of absence after a venial transgression involving some artful nude male photographs. Returning home, he endures a pained relationship with his devout, passively domineering Irish mother (Tamar Cohn, channeling a nicely measured mixture of stony discipline and childlike vulnerability). Soon Matthew gets an unexpected visit from single mom Theresa (a bright but shrewdly self-possessed Ann Lawler), a former Deadhead who now cleans the rectory and finds herself overcome with an urge to ask the gentle priest about prayer — just at the moment his faith seems to have left him. Meanwhile, Theresa’s too-cool-for-school teenager, Abby (a deft and hilarious Kim Stephenson), waits outside and does some preying of her own on a slower-witted but game young man from the neighborhood (a charmingly quirky Michael Rosen), both of them roiling with confused yearnings. The appealing characters and unexpected storyline come supported by some excellent dialogue, developing a searching theme that ultimately has less to do with formal religion than the ordinary but ineffable need it promises (problematically) to meet. "I think I could be religious or whatever if it made any sense," notes Abby, "but it doesn’t make any sense." It’s easy to agree with the teenager on this one. 100 Saints is a genuinely funny and compassionate play discerning enough to avoid naming the depths it sounds. (Avila)

Reunion SF Playhouse, Stage Two, 533 Sutter, SF; (415) 677-9596, www.sfplayhouse.org. $20. Wed-Thu, 7pm; Fri-Sat, 8pm. Through June 30. SF Playhouse presents a world premiere drama by local playwright Kenn Rabin.

"Risk Is This…The Cutting Ball New Experimental Plays Festival" Exit on Taylor, 277 Taylor, SF; (415) 525-1205, www.cuttingball.com. Free ($20 donation for reserved seating; $50 donation for five-play reserved seating pass). Fri-Sat, 8pm. Through July 14. Cutting Ball’s annual fest of experimental plays features two new works and five new translations in staged readings.

Slipping New Conservatory Theatre Center, 25 Van Ness, SF; www.nctcsf.org. $25-45. Wed-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 2pm. Through July 1. New Conservatory Theatre Center performs Daniel Talbott’s drama about a gay teen who finds new hope after a traumatic breakup.

Tenderloin Exit on Taylor, 277 Taylor, SF; (415) 525-1205, www.cuttingball.com. $10-50. Extended run: Thu, 7:30pm; Fri-Sat, 8pm (also Sat, 2pm); Sun, 5pm. Extended through June 24. Annie Elias and Cutting Ball Theater artists present a world premiere "documentary theater" piece looking at the people and places in the Cutting Ball Theater’s own ‘hood.

Vital Signs Marsh San Francisco, 1062 Valencia, SF; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. $15-50. Previews Fri/15, 8pm. Opens Sat/16, 8:30pm. Runs Sat, 8:30pm; June 22, 8pm. Through July 21. The Marsh San Francisco presents Alison Whittaker’s behind-the-scenes look at nursing in America.

The Waiting Period MainStage, Marsh San Francisco, 1062 Valencia, SF; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. $15-50. Fri, 8pm; Sat, 5pm. Extended through July 7. Brian Copeland (comedian, TV and radio personality, and creator-performer of the long-running solo play Not a Genuine Black Man) returns to the Marsh with a new solo, this one based on more recent and messier events in Copeland’s life. The play concerns an episode of severe depression in which he considered suicide, going so far as to purchase a handgun — the title coming from the legally mandatory 10-day period between purchasing and picking up the weapon, which leaves time for reflections and circumstances that ultimately prevent Copeland from pulling the trigger. A grim subject, but Copeland (with co-developer and director David Ford) ensures there’s plenty of humor as well as frank sentiment along the way. The actor peoples the opening scene in the gun store with a comically if somewhat stereotypically rugged representative of the Second Amendment, for instance, as well as an equally familiar "doood" dude at the service counter. Afterward, we follow Copeland, a just barely coping dad, home to the house recently abandoned by his wife, and through the ordinary routines that become unbearable to the clinically depressed. Copeland also recreates interviews he’s made with other survivors of suicidal depression. Telling someone about such things is vital to preventing their worst outcomes, says Copeland, and telling his own story is meant to encourage others. It’s a worthy aim but only a fitfully engaging piece, since as drama it remains thin, standing at perhaps too respectful a distance from the convoluted torment and alienation at its center. (Avila)

BAY AREA

Black n Blue Boys/Broken Men Berkeley Repertory Theatre, Thrust Stage, 2025 Addison, Berk; www.berkeleyrep.org. $14.50-73. Tue, Thu-Sat, 8pm (also Sat, 2pm); Wed and Sun, 7pm (also Sun, 7pm). Through June 24. Berkeley Rep presents a world premiere from writer-performer Dael Orlandersmith (a Pulitzer finalist for 2002’s Yellowman).

Emilie: La Marquise Du Chatelet Defends Her Life Tonight Berkeley City Club, 2315 Durant, Berk; www.brownpapertickets.com. $18-25. Thu-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 2pm. Through July 1. Symmetry Theatre Company presents Bay Area playwright Lauren Gunderson’s romantic drama centering on the life of 18th-century French physicist and mathematician, Émilie du Châtelet (Danielle Levin) and her (here tempestuous) long-term romance with Voltaire (Robert Parsons). In a familiar conceit left accordingly vague, fate rematerializes Emilie from some hazy afterlife so that she may relive key moments in her life and account for herself. A Cartesian mind/body split rules the replay, with Emilie finding herself painfully attenuated from the world of the senses — her flashback self (played by an impressive Blythe Foster) alone able to enjoy sensual contact with her surroundings. Meanwhile, love and loyalty face the test as Emilie goes head-to-head with a male-dominated scientific establishment over a certain theorem she calls "force vivre" — a formula into which Gunderson cleverly folds theoretical physics and the irrational heart. There’s even a visual aid: a running tally is kept throughout on a screen at the back of the stage, where hash marks appear and disappear under the headings "philosophy" and "love" as the scenes wind their desultory way back toward the moment of her demise. Chloe Bronzan directs a cast of strong actors but their work is uneven. Foster alone is consistently commanding in a part that, while minor, suggests what a more muscular approach overall might have accomplished. The normally formidable Parsons seems uncommitted in the part of Voltaire, admittedly a character too simpering and watery as written to merit much credence. Instead of palpable relationships — whether with lovers or ideas — Emilie deploys self-conscious verbiage, strained repartee and heavy thematic underscoring to churn what amounts to thin drama. (Avila)

God of Carnage Marin Theatre Company, 397 Miller, Mill Valley; www.marintheatre.org. $34-55. Wed/13, 7:30pm; Thu/14-Sat/16, 8pm (also Sat/16, 2pm); Sun/17, 2 and 7pm. Marin Theatre Company performs Yasmina Reza’s Tony-winning comedy about two sets of parents who meet after their children get into a schoolyard fight.

The Great Divide Ashby Stage, 1901 Ashby, Berk; www.shotgunplayers.org. $20-30. Wed-Thu, 7pm; Fri-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 5pm. Through June 24. Shotgun Players performs Adamn Chanzit’s drama about the hot topic of fracking, inspired by Ibsen’s An Enemy of the People.

The Kipling Hotel: True Misadventures of the Electric Pink ’80s New venue: Marsh Berkeley, 2120 Allston, Berk; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. $20-50. Sat, 8:30pm; Sun, 7pm. Extended through July 15. This new autobiographical solo show by Don Reed, writer-performer of the fine and long-running East 14th, is another slice of the artist’s journey from 1970s Oakland ghetto to comedy-circuit respectability — here via a partial debate-scholarship to UCLA. The titular Los Angeles residency hotel was where Reed lived and worked for a time in the 1980s while attending university. It’s also a rich mine of memory and material for this physically protean and charismatic comic actor, who sails through two acts of often hilarious, sometimes touching vignettes loosely structured around his time on the hotel’s young wait staff, which catered to the needs of elderly patrons who might need conversation as much as breakfast. On opening night, the episodic narrative seemed to pass through several endings before settling on one whose tidy moral was delivered with too heavy a hand, but if the piece runs a little long, it’s only the last 20 minutes that noticeably meanders. And even with some awkward bumps along the way, it’s never a dull thing watching Reed work. (Avila)

Not Getting Any Younger Marsh Berkeley, 2120 Allston, Berk; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. $15-50. Fri, 8pm; Sat, 5pm. Extended through June 30. Marga Gomez is back at the Marsh, a couple of too-brief decades after inaugurating the theater’s new stage with her first solo show — an apt setting, in other words, for the writer-performer’s latest monologue, a reflection on the inevitable process of aging for a Latina lesbian comedian and artist who still hangs at Starbucks and can’t be trusted with the details of her own Wikipedia entry. If the thought of someone as perennially irreverent, insouciant, and appealingly immature as Gomez makes you depressed, the show is, strangely enough, the best antidote. Note: review from the show’s 2011 run at the Marsh San Francisco. (Avila)

The Odyssey Angel Island; (415) 547-0189, www.weplayers.org. $40-76 (some tickets include ferry passage). Sat-Sun, 10:30am-4pm (does not include travel time to island). Through July 1. We Players present Ava Roy’s adaptation of Homer’s epic poem: an all-day adventure set throughout the nature and buildings of Angel Island State Park.

The Tempest Bruns Amphitheater, 100 California Shakespeare Theater Way, Orinda; (510) 809-3290, www.calshakes.org. $35-71. Tue-Thu, 7:30pm; Fri-Sat, 8pm (also June 23, 2pm); Sun, 4pm. Through June 25. California Shakespeare Theater opens its season with this dance-filled interpretation of the Bard’s classic tale.

Wheelhouse TheatreWorks at the Mountain View Center for the Performing Arts, 500 Castro, Mtn View; (650) 463-1960, www.theatreworks.org. $19-69. Tue-Wed, 7:30pm; Thu-Sat, 8pm (also Sat, 2); Sun, 2 and 7pm. Through July 1. TheatreWorks’ 60th world premiere is a musical created by and starring pop-rock trio GrooveLily.

The World’s Funniest Bubble Show Marsh Berkeley, TheaterStage, 2120 Allston, Berk; (415) 826-5750, www.themarsh.org. $8-50. Fri, 6pm; Sat/16, June 24, and 30, 11am. Through June 30. Louis "The Amazing Bubble Man" Pearl returns with this kid-friendly, bubble-tastic comedy.

PERFORMANCE/DANCE

"The Amen Corner" Lorraine Hansberry Theatre, 450 Post, SF; www.lhtsf.org. Mon/18, 7pm. $25. Project1Voice presents this benefit staged reading of James Baldwin’s play, part of a simultaneous staged-reading event with 25 other African American theaters across the country.

"Branded Funny" Purple Onion, 140 Columbus, SF; www.eventbrite.com. Thu/14, 8pm. $15. Stand-up with Melanie Bega, Seth Hardiman, and Justin Lucas.

"The BY Series" ODC Theater, 3153 17th St, SF; www.odcdance.org. Thu/14-Sat/16, 8pm; Sun/17, 2pm. $25. Robert Moses’ Kin Dance Company presents work by guest choreographers Molissa Fenley, Ramon Ramos Alayo, and Sidra Bell, plus the world premiere of Moses’ Scrubbing the Dog.

Alicia Dattner Exit Theatre, 156 Eddy, SF; www.theexit.org. Fri/15-Sat/16, 8pm. $26. The comedian performs.

"DEEPER, Architectural Meditations at CounterPULSE" CounterPULSE, 1310 Mission, SF; www.counterpulse.org. $25. Fri-Sun, 8pm. Through July 1. Lizz Roman and Dancers perform a site-specific work.

"Elect to Laugh" Studio Theater, Marsh San Francisco, 1062 Valencia, SF; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. Tue, 8pm. Ongoing through Nov 6. $15-50. Will Durst and friends perform in this weekly political humor show that focuses on the upcoming presidential election.

"Fresh Meat Festival" Brava Theater, 2781 24th St, SF; www.freshmeatproductions.org. $15-20. Fri/15-Sat/16, 8pm; Sun/17, 7pm. $15-25. The transgender and queer performance festival celebrates its 11th year with members of Vogue Evolution (America’s Best Dance Crew), Emily Vasquez (American Idol), drag star Miss Barbie-Q, same-sex ballroom champs William DeVries and Kumi Keali’I, and Sean Dorsey Dance.

"hOPPomage" Shotwell Studios, 3252-A 19th St, SF; www.brownpapertickets.com. Fri-Sat, 8pm; Sun/17, 3pm. Through June 23. $10-15. An evening of "mental dance" inspired by artist Dennis Oppenheim with Driveway Dancers.

"Jillarious Tuesdays" Tommy T’s Showroom, 1000 Van Ness, SF; www.jillarious.com. Tue, 7:30. Ongoing. $20. Weekly comedy show with Jill Bourque, Kevin Camia, Justin Lucas, and special guests.

"Kunst-Stoff Arts/Fest 2012" Kunst-Stoff Arts, One Grove, SF; kunststoffartsfest2012.eventbrite.com. Thu/14-Sat/16, 8:30pm. $15. Bruno Augusto and Meisha Bosma perform.

"Porch Light: I Do: The Wedding Show" Verdi Club, 2424 Mariposa, SF; www.brownpapertickets.com. Mon/18, 8pm. $15. Wedding-themed storytelling with Eugene Ashton-Gonzalez, Barbara Berman, Clint Catalyst, and more.

"Previously Secret Information" Stage Werx Theater, 446 Valencia, SF; www.eventbrite.com. Sun/17, 7pm. $15. Comic storytelling with C.W. Nevius, Jack Boulware, and more.

"Qcomedy Showcase" Stage Werx Theater, 446 Valencia, SF; www.qcomedy.com. Mon/18, 8pm. $8-20. Special Pride edition with stand-up comedians Julia Jackson, Scott Backman, Enzo Lombard, Justin Simpson, Karen Ripley, and drag performers House of Glitter.

"Queeriosity" San Francisco LGBT Community Center, 1800 Market, SF; www.youthspeaks.org. Fri/15, 7pm. Free. Youth Speaks hosts this literary arts and performance showcase for LGBTQ youth.

San Francisco Ethnic Dance Festival Novellus Theater, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, 700 Howard, SF; www.worldartswest.org. Sat/16-Sun/17, 3pm (also Sat/16, 3pm). $18-58. This weekend’s program includes dance from China, Cuba, Hawaii, Hungary, India, and more.

Sex and the City: Live!" Rebel, 1760 Market, SF; www.brownpapertickets.com. Tue, 7 and 9pm. Through June 26. $25. Heklina, D’Arcy Drollinger, Lady Bear, Trixxie Carr play the fab four in this drag-tastic homage to the HBO series.

"Two by 24: Love on Loop" UN Plaza, Market between Hyde and Seventh St, SF; www.rawdance.org. Tue/19, 11am-7pm. Free. RAWdance performs an eight-hour contemporary dance installation.

"Voca People" Marines’ Memorial Theatre, 609 Sutter, Second Flr, SF; www.marinesmemorialtheatre.com. Wed/13-Fri/15, 8pm; Sat/16, 6:30 and 9:30pm; Sun/17, 3 and 6pm. $49-75. A capella from outer space.

"When We Fall Apart" Z Space, 450 Florida, SF; www.zspace.org. Thu/14-Sat/16, June 20-21, and 27-28, 7pm; June 22-23 and 29-30, 7 and 9pm. $20-35. Joe Goode Performance Group presents a world premiere, an exploration of "home" with a set designed by architect Cass Calder Smith.

"Wonderland" Circus Center, 755 Frederick, SF; wonderlandatcircuscenter.eventbrite.com. Fri/15-Sat/16, 7pm; Sun/17, 2pm. Free (advance registration recommended). Family-friendly show of aerialists, acrobats, and other circus-style performers. *

Live Shots: Advance Base at Cafe Du Nord

Tony Robles
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0

For a smallish setup with little fuss, few musicians, and a minimalist sound, there was a lot to take in last night at Advance Base’s Cafe Du Nord appearance; a night otherwise known as Owen Ashworth’s (Casiotone for the Painfully Alone) first time playing SF in this new incarnation as Advance Base, since he essentially broke up with himself. And no, he would not be playing CFTPA songs.

Vintage instruments were packed neatly on the stage: Ashworth’s boxy 1970s-era Rhodes 54 electric piano, an Omnichord, an autoharp, a sampler, various pedals and twisty lit-up knobs and buttons. And then there was Ashworth himself, his bespectacled face and tall slumping shoulders, a decade’s worth of songwriting weighing down on them as he hunched over the Rhodes. His set began with that anticipation, his years of performances as another act behind him, a question of where it would begin.

At first, he sat alone, as he did as Casiotone (though didn’t he normally stand back then? No matter), and opened with springy, sample-driven, “Summer Music,” which actually is more of a breakup song, with a knife-twisting nostalgic pull in the repeated lyrics “The sound of music from the kitchen boombox” – like nothing changes yet everything ends with that old stereo continually pumping out sounds in another room, just out of sight. You’re gone and I’m still here.

“Summer Music” is also the first track off Advance Base’s newly released debut LP  A Shut-Ins Prayer. It felt like there was a sigh of relief from the crowd after that intro – phew – our own tense shoulders lowered. He hasn’t changed, too much (we collectively thought this, right?)

On the next song, “New Gospel” –  and through much of the set – he invited his fellow Chicagoan Jody Weinmann and touring opener Nick Krgovich up on stage to join him in song, on backup vocals and autoharp/keyboard respectively. Krgovich had proved himself a worthy musical companion during his own set; he’s a strong performer (who also used the Rhodes) with a powerful, jazz-inflected singing voice – and he chose great cover songs, originals by ’70s folk singer John Martin and Neil Young, to anchor his time. The crowd was too sparse during Krgovich’s earlier set, a shame really.

He also told the story of meeting Ashworth for the first time a decade ago in Krgovich’s native Vancouver. He said, “hi, I’m Owen.” Krgovich said “that’s the loneliest name in the world.” They’ve been stage-sharing pals ever since. Ashworth repeated the story during his set.

As a trio at Du Nord, Krgovich, Ashworth, and Weinmann turned nearly country fair folk, and moved onward to “The Sister You Never Had,” an elegant waltz, followed by “Christmas in Oakland.” The crowd made a light whooping sound at the mention of Oakland and Ashworth deadpanned, “Oh, you guys know Oakland?”

Much of the set was filled with the tracks off A Shut-Ins Prayer, but Advance Base also dropped in new songs like “Christmas in Milwaukee” and another that told the twee-cute story about a lost cat.

That song supposedly told the story of Ashworth’s cat back home in Chicago, how it ran away and they covered the neighborhood with “Lost Cat” posters, which totally bummed out his friends. He sang of idiot well-wishers who promised the cat would simply return on its own, and of checking the local SPCA religiously. Straining to hear the end of the sung story, we smiled as we learned the once-forlorn cat had been found, and was home safe.

Ashworth ended the set by asking the crowd if they had any questions (favorite color is blue, favorite baseball team is the Giants), and telling a joke about kids getting nutty when parents are out of town, all this before profusely thanking us for being there with him on this weirdly nostalgic evening for a brand new act.

Early SF results: No on A, Yes on B

Zelda Bronstein
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5

The first results just got posted, and it’s a fairly large number of votes. More than 60,000 people voted by mail, and there’s enough to draw a few conclusions.

Prop. A, the measure that would have required competitive bidding for the city’s garbage contracts, is dead, losing in the early absentees 77-23. No surprise that it’s losing; getting 23 percent of the vote with no campaign to speak of up against the full might of Recology’s money and political connections is actually pretty impressive.

Prop. B, the Coit Tower measure, is winning, 55-45, which is a good place to be at this stage. I’d say it’s time for the Yes on B camp to start celebrating.

The DCCC early returns show a lot of what we expected — the elected officials and incumbents are doing well. David Chiu is in first, beating Scott Wiener, who is beating John Avalos. For what it’s worth.

After that, it’s Bevan Dufty, David Campos, former Sup. Leslie Katz and former state Sen. Carole Migden.

Interestingly, Matt Dorsey, an appointed incumbent facing the electorate for the first time, is ahead of Sup Malia Cohen. Rafael Mandleman, Zoe Dunning, Alix Rosenthal, Petra DeJesus, and Justin Morgan finish out the top 14 on the East Side.

Those are the early absentees, and the difference between Morgan and incumbent Gabriel Haaland, now in 18th place, is just 800 votes. So it will change.

Right now, the progressives have 9 of the 14 seats on the East Side, but only 4 of the 10 on the West Side, which won’t be enough to elect a progressive chair and ensure good endorsements in the fall. But the margins are so thin and it’s so early we can’t call it yet.

On the West Side of town, Assessor Phil Ting is comfortably in the lead for the 19th Assembly District, but newcomer Michael Breyer, a conservative Democrat who spent a ton of money, is edging Republican Matthew Del Carlo by two points, setting up the possibility that Ting will have to raise money and face off against Breyer in November.

Womb raiders

Jesse Hawthorne Ficks
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0
Womb raiders

TRASH A primary figure in Philippine folklore dating back centuries, the aswang is a monster that has taken many forms — shape shifting being one constant. But arguably the most prevalent, at least in pop culture today, is that of a vampiric “witch” who uses the guise of a seemingly harmless old woman to ingratiate herself wherever there are pregnant women or young families, with the goal of eventually making a snack of the newborn or not-quite-yet-born. They manage the latter selection by using an extremely long proboscis to suck the … oh, you don’t want to know. (Although surely that image will someday be used by the ever-more-hysterical anti-abortion forces.)

Yerba Buena Center for the Arts’ “New Filipino Cinema” series (see Film story) features a mockumentary about Lilia Cuntapay, a senior actor whose modicum of local fame has come from playing variations on these mythical creatures, notably in the never-ending Shake, Rattle & Roll horror movie franchise. But for all the aswang’s ongoing ubiquity in the Philippines — a popular costumed Aswang Festival was held for several years in provincial Capiz until the Catholic Church got it shut down as “devil worship” — it’s rarely surfaced in entertainment abroad. Of course other cultures have their own traditional ghouls to play with. But it’s hard to deny that the baby lifeforce-sucking hag is a concept rather low on international-export value

One major exception is among the great underappreciated U.S. indie horrors of the last 20 years: 1994’s Aswang, shot on 16mm in and around Milwaukee for a reported grand total of $70,000, was the first feature for young Midwesterners Wrye Martin and Barry Poltermann. Their screenplay, devised from a story idea by Philippines-raised friend Frank Anderson, was the heartwarming tale of a lass in conventional “trouble” who finds a savior who’ll do what’s best for both her and her unwanted baby. Or so she thinks.

Knocked up by an irresponsible mullet-head boyfriend, barely-legal Katrina (Tina Ona Paukstelis) refuses to abort, instead agreeing to an unusual advertised offer: she will carry the child to term, posing as the bride of Peter Null (James Spader-ish Norman Moses). The last male heir to an aristocratic émigré Filipino clan, he claims he and his actual wife cannot conceive, and must resort to this ruse to inherit the family fortune. In an uncomfortable meeting presided over by a hilariously bored lawyer (John Garekis), the parties meet and sign the necessary contractual documents.

Seven months later, now ready-to-pop Katrina and her “husband” reunite, driving from the city to Chez Null, a rambling, isolated rural property with an aura of going-to-seed grandeur. She’s introduced to regal matriarch Olive (Flora Coker), given a creepy once-over by Tagalog-only-speaking housekeeper Cupid (Mildred Nierras), and pointedly told not to visit a small adjacent house where Peter’s sister Claire (Jamie Jacobs Anderson) is, ahem, not well. An uninvited, unwelcome guest of sorts also shows up, one Dr. Roger Harper (Josh Kishline). He says he’s just renting a vacation cottage nearby, but seems to be poking an investigative nose into some Null family mischief that is most definitely not for public consumption.

It does, however, involve consumption — as Katrina finds out after being put to bed heavily drunk on Cupid’s homemade special cider. Waking groggily, she senses a disturbance under the covers. To her considerable distress, it turns out she’s getting an intrusive visit from what one crew member later called a “50-foot tongue with a mind of its own.” Thus begins, just half an hour into the film’s 82 minutes, a nonstop escalation of grotesquely funny, tasteless mortal crises that rank ought to rank Aswang up there with The Evil Dead (1981) and Re-Animator (1985) for freaky, semi-camp gore-horror ingenuity.

Ought to, but Aswang sort of fell through the cracks, despite gaining some attention (not all favorable) as part of the Sundance Film Festival’s first-ever midnight sidebar. Theatrical release never came to pass; the U.S. video distributor released it cut, redubbed The Unearthing, and dumped into low-end retail outlets. Fame and fortune did not ensue for the filmmakers, who’ve separately stayed active in various capacities — editing, producing, even directing a documentary record of Charles Nelson Reilly’s one-man stage show — but never again created anything remotely like their crazily intense debut

The Mondo Macabro DVD release, out a few years now, has helped Aswang gain a small cult following, as well as regain its original title. Among factoids revealed in the extras are that most cast members were drafted from longtime Milwaukee avant-garde company Theatre X, though male lead Moses was, incongruously, a regional stage musical star. (Despite his memorably unhinged performance here, he seems to have never made another film.)

The making-of documentary is amusingly contentious, with some participants still discomfited by the paces they were put through, others retroactively doubting the directors’ competence, scruples, or whether they even shot particular scenes. They may still not quite know what they got themselves into, but hopefully time will prove it was something perversely great. Aswang does aswangs proud.

Pinoy rising

Jesse Hawthorne Ficks
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0
Pinoy rising

arts@sfbg.com

FILM Cinema has had a long and colorful history in the Philippines, with a first “golden age” of home-grown product in the 1950s, a turn toward exportable exploitation films in the ’60s, notable new-wave directors (like Lino Brocka) emerging in the ’70s, and so forth — sustaining one of the world’s most prolific film industries despite difficulties political and otherwise. At the turn of the millennium those wheels were wobbling and slowing, however, hard-hit by a combination of too many low-grade formula films, shrinking audiences, and stiffer competition from slick imported entertainments. The commercial sector stumbled on, but as a shadow of its robust former self.

But there’s something percolating beyond hard consonants on the archipelago these days, signs of a new DIY vigor coming from independent sectors juiced by the inexpensive accessibility of digital technology, undaunted (at least so far) by problems of exhibition and income-generating at home. It’s a sprawling, unpredictable, work-in-progress scene that some figure could well become the next “it” spot for cineaste types seeking one of those spontaneous combustions of fresh talent that arise occasionally where you least expect it — like Romania, to name one recent example.

One person who definitely thinks that’s the case is Joel Shepard, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts’ longtime Film/Video Curator. He’s traveled to the Philippines several times in recent years (once serving on the jury at CineManila), and has previously programmed a few prime examples of the country’s edgy new voices — particularly Brilliante Mendoza, whose notorious 2009 police-corruption grunge horror Kinatay (a.k.a. Butchered) was one of the most hotly divisive Cannes jury-prize winners in recent history. Now YBCA is presenting “New Filipino Cinema,” Shepard’s first “big fat snapshot” — hopefully to be continued on an annual basis — of a wildly diverse current filmic landscape, assembled in collaboration with Manila critic Philbert Ortiz Dy.

Shepard’s program notes call the Philippines “an extremely fascinating country…but the more I learned about the place and its people, the less I felt like I actually understood anything. The truth felt more and more slippery.” One might get a similar sensation watching the films in this expansive (nearly 30 titles, shorts included) sampler, in that they’re all over the map stylistically and thematically — from lyrical to gritty, satirical to anarchistic — suggesting no single defining “movement” or aesthetic to New Filipino Cinema.

Nor should they, since these movies reflect very different cultures, politics, and issues in regions hitherto underrepresented onscreen. After all, Manila isn’t the only place you can get your hands on a digital camera; and Tagalog is primary language for just one-third of all Filipinos.

The series opener has significant local ties: Loy Arcenas is a lauded stage set designer who’s worked frequently with our own American Conservatory Theater. Unavailable for preview, in description his feature directorial debut Niño (2011) sounds redolent of Luchino Visconti and The Garden of the Finzi-Continis (as well as, perhaps, 1975’s Grey Gardens) as it depicts a once grand family of Spanish émigrés living in decrepit splendor, diminished over generations by political inconvenience and a proud, fatal inability to adapt.

Their aristocratic pretensions are a far cry from the rowdier real life captured or depicted in other YBCA selections. A bizarre footnote to the United States’ complicated, incriminating relationship with the Philippines is documented in Monster Jiminez’s Kano: An American and His Harem (2010). Its subject is a Yankee Vietnam vet whose military pension allowed him to construct a sort of one-man imperialist paradise centered around his penis. Whether he was a gracious benefactor, a bullying rapist, or both is a puzzle only clouded further by contradictory input from former/current wives and mistresses (even while he’s in prison), stateside relatives who recall a childhood ideal to shape a sociopath, and the authorities who’ve lately kept him in prison.

War is ongoing, marriage an impractical hope in Arnel M. Mardoquio’s impressive Crossfire (2011), whose young lovers in southern region Mindanao must dodge government-vs.-rebel-vs.-bandit guns as well as a rural poverty sufficient to make our heroine vulnerable to being offered as a lender-debt payoff. Their plight is starkly contrasted with the spectacular scenery of countryside few tourists will ever hazard.

Its atmospheric opposite is Lawrence Fajardo’s Amok (2011), whose thousand threads of seemingly free-floating narrative depict life dedicatedly melting down all race, age, class, and economic divisions during a heat wave passage through one of Manila’s busiest intersections. What birth and development keeps apart gets nail-gunned together, however, once this string of naturalistic vignettes hits a plot device that delivers deus ex machina to all with no melodramatic restraint. Fate also lays heavy hand on the junior protagonists of Mes de Guzman’s At the Corner of Heaven and Earth (2011), a crude but honest neo-realist drama about four orphaned and runaway boys trying to eke out a marginal existence in Nueva Vizcaya.

Should this all sound pretty grim, be informed there’s lots of levity — albeit much of it gallows-humored — on the YBCA slate. Jade Castro’s exuberantly silly Remington and the Curse of the Zombadings (2011) finds the funny in homophobia as its crass young hero (a farcically deft Mart Escudero) is “cursed” by an angry queen he’d insulted to become gay himself; meanwhile somebody goes around their regional burg assassinating cross-dressers via ray-gun. Plus: zombies, and the proverbial kitchen sink. Also on the frivolous side is Antoinette Jadaone’s mockumentary Six Degrees of Separation from Lilia Cuntapay (2011), in which the titular veteran screen thespian struggles for recognition after decades playing bit parts and occasional showier ones, notably as witchy folkloric “aswang” attempting to suck the lifeblood from newborn babes. (See aswang-related coverage in this week’s Trash column, too.)

Yet those are but moderately playful New Filipino Cinema exercises compared to the determined off-map outrages practiced by Mondomanila (2011). This gonzo eruption of spermazoidal huzzah! by multimedia Manila punk underground mover Khavn de la Cruz seeks to leave no societal cavity unexplored, or unoffended. Opening with an infamous quote from Brokedown Palace (1999) star Claire Danes, who characterized Manila as a “ghastly and weird city … [with] no sewage system,” it delivers both fuck-you and fuck-me to that judgment via 75 minutes of mad under caste collage. There isn’t much plot. But there’s variably judged arson, pedophilia, yo-yo trick demonstrations, poultry abuse, upscale mall shopping, voyeuristic pornographia, Tagalog rap, rooftop drum soloing, and limbless-little-person salesmanship of duck eggs.

Further complicating your comprehension of a very complex scene, the YBCA series encompasses avant-garde shorts by veteran John Torres and newer experimentalists. There’s also a free afternoon Indie-Pino Music Fest Sat/9, and on June 17 there’s a postscript: Lav Diaz’s Florentina Hubaldo, CTE, the six-hour latest epic in a career whose patience-testing wide open cinematic spaces make Béla Tarr look like Michael Bay. 

“NEW FILIPINO CINEMA”

June 7-17, $8

Yerba Buena Center for the Arts

701 Mission, SF

www.ybca.org

Rites of passage

Jesse Hawthorne Ficks
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0
Rites of passage

arts@sfbg.com

FILM It’s commonly said of Nathaniel Dorsky’s films that they are beautiful beyond words. Which is true as far as it goes, but then the same could be said of many poems and they are words. What’s clear is that Dorsky is absorbed with a classical fulfillment of form, and as such his films do better with poetics than interpretation (he has himself supplied a fine entry point with his slim volume Devotional Cinema). Poetics in this context means respecting the mystery and proceeding gingerly with gesture, metaphor, and detail. No one ever says of a Dorsky film, “I liked it the more I thought about it.” Conversely, watching a second or third time one marvels to find the beauty springing to life with the same force, subtler and lovelier now for this trick of renewal. No one ever says of a sunset, “I’ve seen this one before.”

A three-part retrospective at the Pacific Film Archive beginning June 10 retraces the last decade of Dorsky’s work. The Return (2011) and August and After (2012) receive local premieres this weekend, accompanied by the delicate Pastourelle (2010). June 17 brings his “Quartet,” to my mind a signal achievement of the young century. The series concludes June 24 with three earlier films confirming Dorsky’s mastery of an open (sometimes called polyvalent) form of montage: Song and Solitude (2006), Threnody (2004), and The Visitation (2002). How fitting that these films should be spaced out over consecutive days of rest! They will be shown on 16mm because that is what they are (last I checked the museums still show the Old Masters in paint).

It’s our good fortune to share a city with Dorsky: opportunities to see the films with him as a guide come a little more frequently, and the phenomena that supply his visual repertoire are that much more familiar. Here are the blossoms, the Chinatown lanterns, the drifting Muni trains, the ocean skies, and the seasons as we only dare to see them in deepest reverie.

Dorsky began making movies under the influence of people like Stan Brakhage and Gregory Markopoulos, filmmakers who strove for an intrinsic cinematic language (while the auteurists chiseled out an essential cinema, they sought cinema’s essence). After relocating to San Francisco in 1971, he reemerged with Hours for Jerome (1980-1982), a dense exercise in spiritual autobiography culled from pastoral years in New Jersey. The films began arriving with greater regularity after Triste (1998) and continue apace even after the desertion of his beloved Kodachrome.

The silence of Dorsky’s films is lush, providing intoxicating accompaniment to the slowed projection of 18 frames per second which dips the photographic action just out of the flow of representation. The crescendos that surge past the finish of his films invariably leave me surprised that I haven’t been listening to music, as the black of the theater seems clarified in the same way silence is after an expressive composition. Pushing the analogy further, the relationship between movement and stillness in his films is akin to that of sound and rest in music, the two leaved together as intonation. We really need a new word to describe the juddering movement of branches and buds that punctuate Dorsky’s films. “Quiver” is close, but it doesn’t capture the spring in the frame, like dancers on a stage.

A couple of months ago, Dorsky showed something called Kodachrome Dailies from the Time of Song and Solitude (Reel 1) at Lincoln Center: Song and Solitude-era footage in the chronological order in which it was shot. The material had a completely distinct character viewed this way. Dorsky talked of it as a journal. The loose form made it easier to relate to his eye being grasped by something in the world, and yet one missed the justice of the cuts.

If pressed for a defining quality of these films, I would say rightness —each shot developing to its fullness, tuned to what comes before and after. The fact that this formal refinement is itself the focus of the films creates a suspension of time which, after all, is a basic condition of paradise. Certainly the films are colored by experience, as August and After for instance is clearly marked by grief, yet this is never what they are “about.” Trust is placed in the self-expression of the film stock — its luster and dusk.

Dorsky’s films will reintroduce you to what branches make of the sky and how the grass gladdens when the sun reappears from its shade. I think this is what people are talking about when they say the films remind them of childhood. “A child said What is the grass? fetching it to me with full/hands;/How could I answer the child? I do not know what it is any/more than he./I guess it must the flag of my disposition, out of hopeful/green stuff woven.” We could choose many lines of verse to say the same, but Whitman’s will do. There is something mystical in Dorsky’s slightly ajar illuminations of worldly objects and features. And yet so too is there something altogether sensible and almost courtly in their formal arrangements. The shots of dogs make us chuckle because we’re in a position to recognize our own recognition, all too human.

On first viewing The Return struck me as a deeply melancholy work, its darkly reflecting surfaces and doublings bearing the impression of lost sleep. August and After, on the other hand, is more immediate in its effect and a superior example of how Dorsky’s style can serve distinct emotional structures (threnody here). Tender impressions taken near the end of George Kuchar’s life, the filmmaker surrounded by family and friends, are framed in the light of long afternoons. Everything that follows is touched by these pictures of intimacy: two workers sliding down a skyscraper, a distant glass door sweeping a ray of light across a café, agitated steps into bramble. A rhythmic montage focuses on packages and fruits carried down the street, the actual things transfigured into pure color. When the film’s ship finally sails, it does so with such grace as to say love without saying.

“AFTERIMAGE: THREE NIGHTS WITH NATHANIEL DORSKY”

June 10, 17, and 24, 7:30pm, $5.50-$9.50

Pacific Film Archive

2575 Bancroft, Berk.

(510) 642-5249

bampfa.berkeley.edu

Psychic Dream Astrology

Andrew Lam
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0

June 6-12

ARIES

March 21-April 19

Being receptive is an action, Aries. Be courageous, because you need to take as much goodness in as possible this week. It can be a challenge to stay present for the good stuff, ’cause the more you have, the more you have to loose. Enjoy your bounty and leave your worries behind you for now.

TAURUS

April 20-May 20

Your greatest enemy is your own mind, Taurus. No matter what’s going on in your world, you’ve got to be able to check in with yourself and believe in your ability to carry out your own best interests. Don’t worry so much about the “what ifs” and worst-case scenarios. Strengthen your insides this week.

GEMINI

May 21-June 21

Resist the urge to fret over your future this week. You need to go slow through your situations so that you can participate in the way you want to, instead of being a blindly defensive and reactive Jekyll and Hyde kind of Twin Star. Don’t try and control things; find your truth in them and go from there.

CANCER

June 22-July 22

Your future sits brightly before you, Cancer. Whether you’ve been lovingly supported in your past, or you’ve had to figure out how to do that for yourself, now is the time to value what your history has taught you. Take the time to revisit your roots. Never forget what and where you come from.

LEO

July 23-Aug. 22

It is your job (but not your forte) to know when to call it quits. If you pursue fun too fiercely it can turn your good times into a burden. Pace yourself through the awesome in your world so you can enjoy it for a long time to come; otherwise you’re likely to have some serious backtracking to do, Leo.

VIRGO

Aug. 23-Sept. 22

Taking a leadership role in your relationships is well-starred, but it doesn’t involve getting to boss people. Lead only by example this week, Virgo. If you engage in dynamics that you don’t like, how do you expect anything to change? Participate only in ways you feel good about, or not at all.

LIBRA

Sept. 23-Oct. 22

Focusing your energy into your worries feeds them, Libra. Do what you’ve got to do to take care of business instead of endlessly fussing over it, and starve your fears out. There is only so much you can accomplish, so if you’ve done your best for now, at a find a way to enjoy the reprise from enterprise.

SCORPIO

Oct. 23-Nov. 21

If you aren’t certain where you stand, what are you certain of? This week you should strive to clarify your position on the things. Solidifying your opinions and needs will help you to know when things are veering off course before they get too far. Know yourself, you complicated Scorpio, you.

SAGITTARIUS

Nov. 22-Dec. 21

Stand on your own without the threat of obligation pushing you. This week you are meant to revisit your relationship to responsibility; don’t do it because you have to, do it ’cause it’s right for you. Freely choose to rise to the occasion, Sagittarius and not only because you feel it’s required of you.

CAPRICORN

Dec. 22-Jan. 19

You are not meant to have control, all of the answers or even to be on top of your game all of the time, Capricorn. Sometimes you’ve got to go with the flow and see where it takes you. Make peace with your uncertainty this week, because it’ll take you places that your willfulness is unlikely to bring you.

AQUARIUS

Jan. 20-Feb. 18

Obsessing over details will lead you to anxiety and not answers, Aquarius. Write a short list of the practical things you can do this week to improve or support your situation. Every day this week, write a new list of what you should do that day. Outside of those tasks, your primary work is to manage your overactive mind, pal.

PISCES

Feb. 19-March 20

It doesn’t matter who or what is to blame for things, it only matters how you deal with it, Pisces. Think about laying foundations upon which you can build success, not about how to manifest your accomplishments immediately. Enjoy the stage you’re at this week, even if it feels tedious.

Jessica Lanyadoo has been a Psychic Dreamer for 17 years. Check out her website at www.lovelanyadoo.com or contact her for an astrology or intuitive reading at (415) 336-8354 or dreamyastrology@gmail.com

Our Weekly Picks: June 6-12

Andrew Lam
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WEDNESDAY 6

Church of Misery

A preternaturally crunchy, riff-savvy stoner rock band from Tokyo, Japan, whose influences are culled from the back catalogues of ’70s esoterica — think Mountain, Sir Lord Baltimore, and my beloved Captain Beyond, played through the kind of crustified old school black metal sensibilities that seem to inform a number of Japan’s most popular heavy metal exports. There’s also the serial killer thing — the vast majority of Church of Misery’s lyrics treat America’s most infamous murderers and sadists. A sly commentary on our obsession with the vaguely menacing sexuality of our cock rock icons? They do a mean cover of “Cities On Flame with Rock and Roll,” too. (Tony Papanikolas)

With Hail! Hornet, Gates of Slumber

9pm, $18

Elbo Room

647 Valencia, SF

(415) 552-7788

www.elbo.com

 

Teen Daze

Recalling the Balearic escapism of Air France and the Tough Alliance, Vancouver’s Teen Daze specializes in a blissed-out, beach-bound approach to DIY-electronica. His upcoming full-length, All of Us, Together (to be released June 5 on Lefse Records), sees the producer taking a cleaner, less hazy approach to his chillwavy pop aesthetic than ever before. Laptop-based sets can leave a whole lot to be desired, so let’s hope this one-man project has what it takes to translate its vision to the stage in a compelling way. (Taylor Kaplan)

With the One AM Radio, Giraffage, Slow Magic

8pm, $12

Rickshaw Stop

155 Fell, SF

(415) 861-2011

www.rickshawstop.com


THURSDAY 7

“BY Series”

In his new “BY Series,” Robert Moses formalizes a process he has engaged in over the years: inviting other choreographers to set work on his dancers. But why put Molissa Fenley, Ramon Ramos Alayo, and Sidra Bell — who probably have never even shared a cup of coffee, much less a stage — together? Like Moses, they speak with powerful 21st century voices from within the African Diaspora. Fenley spent formative years in Nigeria, Alayo in Cuba, and Bell, the youngest of the three, started her company as a community project in Harlem. Yet these artists couldn’t be more different from each other, and that’s the point. Also on the program will be the world premiere of Moses’ “Scrubbing the Dog.” (Rita Felciano)

Through June 17

Thu-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 2pm, $25

ODC Theater

3153 17th St., SF

(415) 863-9834

www.odcdance.org

 

The Polecats

Neo-rockabilly legends the Polecats formed in London in the late 1970s, and brought back the ’50s rock genre with classic tunes such as “Rockabilly Guy” and “Make A Circuit With Me.” Although the group fractured for several years, with singer Tim Worman performing with 13 Cats, and guitarist Boz Boorer going on to play guitar and write music with Morrissey, they still find time to reunite occasional and play a show here and there. Don’t miss this rare local appearance, a warm-up gig before the Polecats head south to perform at the Ink-N-Iron Festival in Long Beach this weekend. (Sean McCourt)

With This Charming Band, Texas Steve & the Tornadoes

9pm, $12–$15

Uptown

1928 Telegraph, Oakl.

(510) 451-8100

www.uptownnightclub.com

 

Sasha

Globe-trotting Welshman Alexander Coe (a.k.a. Sasha) went from underground acid house DJ in the late ’80s to worldwide icon in the early 90’s when he paired with English DJ and producer John Digweed. Sasha and Digweed would go on to become one of electronic music’s most celebrated acts, producing mix albums and performing live together for a decade. The duo broke ground with their ambitious Delta Heavy tour across the US in 2002, proving electronic musicians had gained critical mass stateside. After the pair split, Sasha continued to venture into unchartered territory, becoming among the first DJs to remix tracks during live performances. While he’s bounced around genres throughout his career, his live sets typically carry a 4/4 beat and occupy the space between driving techno and house. (Kevin Lee)

Base Seven-Year Anniversary

10pm, $25

Vessel

85 Campton, SF

(415) 433-8585

www.vesselsf.com


FRIDAY 8

The Shants

Plenty of Americana tunes will be offered at this Starry Plough show thanks to co-headliners the Shants and Sean McArdle. Sit back and enjoy the musical complexity and lyrical beauty of the Shants, then let their faster songs bring you to your feet to dance. Such classically rural sounds as the pedal steel guitar bring their sound a weary and rich twangy soul, and the use of harmonica gets the boots stomping. Their latest album Beautiful Was the Night features Brianna Lea Pruett and Quinn Deveaux on vocal harmonies, as well as violin by Howie Cockrill and horns by Ralph Carney; and in the past they’ve shared the stage with artists such as Canadian alterna-folk autoharpist Basia Bulat. This week they play both the Starry Plough tonight, and the Great American Music Hall Sat/9. (Shauna C. Keddy)

With Paige and the Thousand, Sean McArdle

9:30pm, $7–$10

Starry Plough

3101 Shattuck, Berk.

(510) 841-2082

www.starryploughpub.com

With Dirty Hand Family Band, the Famous, the Rogers, the Hot Pink Feathers

Sat/9, 8:30pm, $13

Great American Music Hall

859 O’Farrell, SF

(415) 885-0750

www.slimspresents.com

This Will Destroy You and A Place to Bury Strangers

Two headliners; two brands of face-melting guitar-rock. Hailing from San Marcos, Texas, self-described “doomgaze” outfit This Will Destroy You is sure to devastate, with its mountains of distortion and extreme dynamic range. A Place to Bury Strangers (a.k.a “The Loudest Band in NYC”) should overwhelm in equal measure, with its suffocating barrage of squalling guitars, insistent basslines, and unrelenting drums. With two distinct walls-of-sound to get lost in, this double-bill should offer up one of the most viscerally affecting evenings of music this town has seen in a while. Bring earplugs… or, don’t. (Kaplan)

With Dusted

10pm, $14

Bottom of the Hill

1233 17th St., SF

(415) 621-4455

www.bottomofthehill.com


SATURDAY 9

“I Call the Shots: New Works By Ben Venom”

Local artist Ben Venom’s signature quilts, stitched from chopped band tees, are spectacular to behold. A featured artist at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts’ “Bay Area Now 6” exhibit last year, Venom combines traditional hesher motifs (skulls, wolves, Satan, Slayerrr!) with traditional crafting techniques. (As his artist’s statement points out, “even the beasts of metal need a warm blanket to sleep with.”) Venom’s new solo show, “I Call the Shots,” includes wing-themed quilts I Go Where Eagles Dare and War Bird West (you could spend hours staring at each, picking out all the band logos embedded within), plus embroidered jean jackets and pillows suitable for cradling lazy demon heads. And speaking of heads, they will bang: local rockers Hazzard’s Cure and Dalton perform live at the opening. (Cheryl Eddy)

Also featuring work by Adam Feibelman

Through July 7

Opening reception tonight, 7-11pm, free

Guerrero Gallery

2700 19th St., SF

www.guerrerogallery.com

 

Superman: The Movie

Ever had the urge to watch Christopher Reeve valiantly save a busload of helpless schoolchildren on Golden Gate Bridge… in front of the bridge itself? Well, here’s your chance. In commemoration of the SF landmark’s 75th anniversary, The Presidio Trust and the Walt Disney Family Museum are curating “The Bridge on the Big Screen,” a series of seven bridge-centric films to be screened outdoors over the coming weeks, and Superman: The Movie is the second installment. Stay tuned for Hitchcock’s Vertigo, to be shown next Saturday. And remember to bring a blanket or low lawn chair. (Kaplan)

6pm, free

Main Post Green

Presidio, SF

www.presidio.gov

 

Corrosion of Conformity

It’s not every band that can wear two hats, or wear them both as well as Corrosion of Conformity. The Raleigh, NC outfit began in 1982 as a frenzied hardcore band before evolving into a slower, fuzzier stoner rock beast, starting with 1991’s Blind. More than 20 years later, though, the frenzy is back, courtesy of a stripped-down, power trio lineup and a new, self-titled album. With bassist Mike Dean taking over vocal duties from guitarist Pepper Keenan (busy playing in Down), COC have returned to their hardcore roots. Expect high tempos and chaos in the pit. (Ben Richardson)

With Torche, Black Cobra, Gaza

8pm, $21

Slim’s

333 11th St., SF

(415)-255-0333

www.slimspresents.com


SUNDAY 10

Sunset Island

Now in its fourth year, this annual “electronic music picnic” from the generous party mavens at SUNSET comes with a fee for the first time. But given the music on offer — including live sets from Magda, the always enticing genre-crossing daughter of Berlin and Detroit, and shadowy UK producer BNJMN, who made a double album debut last year with Black Square and Plastic World — the tickets still are coming at a steal. And that’s not factoring in the possibility of nice weather, a pleasant crowd, and an unparalleled view from one of the best venues/lawns in the Bay Area. Just, uh, remember to pick up your trash. (Ryan Prendiville)

With Eddie C, Galen, Solar, J-Bird

Noon, $5–$15

Great Lawn, Treasure Island

www.sunsetmusicelectric.com


TUESDAY 12

Here We Go Magic

A four-piece band of Brooklynites, Here We Go Magic received a notable nod from one Thom Yorke in the summer of 2010 — he said the act was his favorite at Glastonbury that year. Since then, songwriter Luke Temple and friends have continued making saliently synthy music while touring the globe, and even picked up a hitchhiking John Waters along the way. The indie-poppers are performing in support of their third full-length album A Different Ship, a percussion-driven record that is also purely melodic in its nature. Here We Go Magic at the Independent will be a chance to catch this fast-rising band at a smaller venue before the summer festival season is upon us, and before several high-profile tour dates with Coldplay in July. (Julia B. Chan)

With Harriet

8pm, $15

Independent

628 Divisadero, SF

(415) 771-1421

www.theindependentsf.com

The Guardian listings deadline is two weeks prior to our Wednesday publication date. To submit an item for consideration, please include the title of the event, a brief description of the event, date and time, venue name, street address (listing cross streets only isn’t sufficient), city, telephone number readers can call for more information, telephone number for media, and admission costs. Send information to Listings, 71 Stevenson Street, Second Floor, SF, CA 94105 or email (paste press release into email body — no attachments, please) to listings@sfbg.com. Digital photos may be submitted in jpeg format; the image must be at least 240 dpi and four inches by six inches in size. We regret we cannot accept listings over the phone.

Stage Listings

Andrew Lam
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Stage listings are compiled by Guardian staff. Performance times may change; call venues to confirm. Reviewers are Robert Avila, Rita Felciano, and Nicole Gluckstern. Submit items for the listings at listings@sfbg.com. For further information on how to submit items for the listings, see Picks.

THEATER

OPENING

Aftermath Stagewerx, 446 Valencia, SF; www.brownpapertickets.com. $25. Previews Thu/7, 8pm. Opens Fri/8, 8pm. Runs Thu-Sat, 8pm. Through June 30. Theatre, Period presents Jessica Blank and Erik Jenson’s docu-drama, based on interviews with Iraqi civilians forced to flee after the US military’s arrival in 2003.

Lips Together, Teeth Apart New Conservatory Theatre Center, 25 Van Ness, SF; www.nctcsf.org. $25-45. Previews Wed/6-Fri/8, 8pm. Opens Sat/9, 8pm. Runs Wed-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 2pm. Through July 1. New Conservatory Theatre Center performs Terrence McNally’s play about two straight couples spending July 4 amid Fire Island’s gay community.

Reunion SF Playhouse, Stage Two, 533 Sutter, SF; (415) 677-9596, www.sfplayhouse.org. $20. Previews Wed/6-Thu/7, 7pm; Fri/8, 8pm. Opens Sat/9, 8pm. Runs Wed-Thu, 7pm; Fri-Sat, 8pm. Through June 30. SF Playhouse presents a world premiere drama by local playwright Kenn Rabin.

“Risk Is This…The Cutting Ball New Experimental Plays Festival” Exit on Taylor, 277 Taylor, SF; (415) 525-1205, www.cuttingball.com. Free ($20 donation for reserved seating; $50 donation for five-play reserved seating pass). Opens Fri/8, 8pm. Runs Fri-Sat, 8pm. Through July 14. Cutting Ball’s annual fest of experimental plays features two new works and five new translations in staged readings.

Vital Signs Marsh San Francisco, 1062 Valencia, SF; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. $15-50. Previews Fri/8 and June 15, 8pm; Sat/9, 8:30pm. Opens June 16, 8:30pm. Runs Sat, 8:30pm; June 22, 8pm. Through July 21. The Marsh San Francisco presents Alison Whittaker’s behind-the-scenes look at nursing in America.

BAY AREA

Wheelhouse TheatreWorks at the Mountain View Center for the Performing Arts, 500 Castro, Mtn View; (650) 463-1960, www.theatreworks.org. $19-69. Previews Wed/6-Fri/8, 8pm. Opens Sat/9, 8pm. Runs Tue-Wed, 7:30pm; Thu-Sat, 8pm (also Sat, 2); Sun, 2 and 7pm. Through July 1. TheatreWorks’ 60th world premiere is a musical created by and starring pop-rock trio GrooveLily.

ONGOING

A Behanding in Spokane SF Playhouse, 533 Sutter, SF; www.sfplayhouse.org. $20-70. Tue-Thu, 7pm; Fri-Sat, 8pm (also Sat, 3pm). Through June 30. If Garth Ennis had been asked to write a comic book about a one-handed sociopath with a dark obsession, he might well have written something similar to Martin McDonagh’s A Behanding in Spokane. And admittedly, approached from that angle, a lot of the script’s dramatic flaws are more easily forgiven. There’s not a whole lot of subtle context or languid metaphor to be found in McDonagh’s criminal caper about the little-known “hand-dealing” trade, but as in Ennis’ best known work, Preacher, the pretty girl (Melissa Quine) is the smartest one in the room; the sociopath (Rod Gnapp) is interested in enacting as vicious a revenge on all humanity while spewing as many blatantly offensive invectives as possible; the boyfriend (Daveed Diggs) has some arrested development issues to work out; and the receptionist (Alex Hurt) takes the caricature of man-child to a whole new level. In fact, while all four actors deliver rock-solid performances of their mostly unsympathetic characters, it’s Hurt’s that impresses most. His spooky intensity and goofily tone-deaf determination plays like a combination of Adam Sandler and Arno Frisch, and if there’s a real sociopath in the room, the evidence suggests it’s probably him. Ultimately though the piece relies too heavily on hollow one-liners to remain interesting — a 20-minute farce stretched to 90 minutes — and quite unlike an Ennis comic, it does not leave one wanting more. (Gluckstern)

The Full Monty Eureka Theatre, 215 Jackson, SF; www.roltheatre.com. $25-36. Thu-Sat, 8pm (also Sat, 2pm); Sun, 2pm. Through June 30. In desperate times, how far would you go to turn a buck? The central premise of the 1997 movie and its namesake musical comedy The Full Monty, the answer to this question is right in the title, which limits the suspense, but amps up the expectations. Set not in Sheffield, England as in the movie, but the similarly economically challenged climate of Buffalo, New York circa the late nineties, the comical romp follows a group of unemployed steel workers who decide, rather optimistically, that spending one night as exotic dancers will solve their immediate financial woes. Banish all notions of a Hot Chocolate sing-along; the soundtrack of the stage musical has little in common with its cinematic predecessor, but there are a couple of toe-tappers, particularly the songs writ for the ladies: a belter’s anthem for their spry but elderly accompanist Jeanette (Cami Thompson), a snarky commentary on male beauty, “The Goods,” for the ensemble. On opening night, Ray of Light’s production ran about 15 minutes long after a late start, and the tempo seemed sluggish in parts, but once it hits its stride, The Full Monty should provide a welcome antidote to the ongoing, we’re-still-in-a-recession blues, red leather g-strings and all. (Gluckstern) Fwd: Life Gone Viral Marsh San Francisco, 1062 Valencia, SF; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. $20-50. Thu/7, 8pm; Sat/9, 8:30pm; Sun/10, 7pm. The internet becomes comic fodder for creator-performers Charlie Varon and Jeri Lynn Cohen, and creator-director David Ford.

100 Saints You Should Know Thick House, 1695 18th St, SF; www.therhino.org. $10-30. Wed-Thu, 7:30pm; Fri-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 3pm. Through June 17. Theatre Rhinoceros performs Kate Fodor’s comedy-drama about family love, homosexuality, and adolescence.

Othello Phoenix Theatre, 414 Mason, SF; www.brownpapertickets.com. $15-18. Thu/7-Sat/9, 8pm. Ninjaz of Drama performs Shakespeare’s classic in a contemporary setting.

Slipping New Conservatory Theatre Center, 25 Van Ness, SF; www.nctcsf.org. $25-45. Wed-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 2pm. Through July 1. New Conservatory Theatre Center performs Daniel Talbott’s drama about a gay teen who finds new hope after a traumatic breakup.

Tenderloin Exit on Taylor, 277 Taylor, SF; (415) 525-1205, www.cuttingball.com. $10-50. Extended run: June 14 and 21, 7:30pm; June 15-16 and 22-23, 8pm (also June 16 and 23, 2pm); June 18 and 24, 5pm. Annie Elias and Cutting Ball Theater artists present a world premiere “documentary theater” piece looking at the people and places in the Cutting Ball Theater’s own ‘hood.

The Waiting Period MainStage, Marsh San Francisco, 1062 Valencia, SF; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. $15-50. Fri, 8pm; Sat, 5pm. Extended through July 7. Brian Copeland (comedian, TV and radio personality, and creator-performer of the long-running solo play Not a Genuine Black Man) returns to the Marsh with a new solo, this one based on more recent and messier events in Copeland’s life. The play concerns an episode of severe depression in which he considered suicide, going so far as to purchase a handgun — the title coming from the legally mandatory 10-day period between purchasing and picking up the weapon, which leaves time for reflections and circumstances that ultimately prevent Copeland from pulling the trigger. A grim subject, but Copeland (with co-developer and director David Ford) ensures there’s plenty of humor as well as frank sentiment along the way. The actor peoples the opening scene in the gun store with a comically if somewhat stereotypically rugged representative of the Second Amendment, for instance, as well as an equally familiar “doood” dude at the service counter. Afterward, we follow Copeland, a just barely coping dad, home to the house recently abandoned by his wife, and through the ordinary routines that become unbearable to the clinically depressed. Copeland also recreates interviews he’s made with other survivors of suicidal depression. Telling someone about such things is vital to preventing their worst outcomes, says Copeland, and telling his own story is meant to encourage others. It’s a worthy aim but only a fitfully engaging piece, since as drama it remains thin, standing at perhaps too respectful a distance from the convoluted torment and alienation at its center. (Avila)

BAY AREA

Black n Blue Boys/Broken Men Berkeley Repertory Theatre, Thrust Stage, 2025 Addison, Berk; www.berkeleyrep.org. $14.50-73. Tue, Thu-Sat, 8pm (also Sat, 2pm); Wed and Sun, 7pm (also Sun, 7pm). Through June 24. Berkeley Rep presents a world premiere from writer-performer Dael Orlandersmith (a Pulitzer finalist for 2002’s Yellowman).

Crevice La Val’s Subterranean, 1834 Euclid, Berk; www.impacttheatre.com. $10-20. Thu/7-Sat/9, 8pm. Just in case you were feeling panicked about the persistently recessed state of the economy and what might be your own less than ideal place in it, the Impact Theatre and Playground co-presentation of Lauren Yee’s Crevice might help to put your woes into perspective. That’s because slacker sibs Liz (Marissa Keltie) and Rob (Timothy Redmond) are only slightly exaggerated representatives of Generation Next whose penchant for making lackluster life choices has sentenced them to an indefinite prison term of couch-surfing and Teen Mom marathons in their childhood home. Naturally, they desire change, but it’s not until their mother (Laura Jane Bailey) starts having a hot fling with a younger man that things do. In an egregious breach of the TMI line, it appears that Mom’s orgasms open a “crevice” into an alternate reality that Rob and Liz subsequently fall into. Thus removed from the entropy of their former reality they begin testing the parameters of their new one, quickly coming to the realization that sometimes the alternatives to what you already have are even worse. Getting home again is a convoluted, not fully mapped-out process, but in the interim, their navigation of their erstwhile wonderland offers most of the play’s best lines as well as the uncomfortably effective transformation of Reggie D. White from Liz’s nerdish best buddy to multi-lingual Mafia killer and casual sadist. (Gluckstern)

God of Carnage Marin Theatre Company, 397 Miller, Mill Valley; www.marintheatre.org. $34-55. Tue and Thu-Sat, 8pm (also June 16, 2pm); Wed, 7:30pm; Sun, 2 and 7pm. Through June 17. Marin Theatre Company performs Yasmina Reza’s Tony-winning comedy about two sets of parents who meet after their children get into a schoolyard fight.

The Great Divide Ashby Stage, 1901 Ashby, Berk; www.shotgunplayers.org. $20-30. Wed-Thu, 7pm; Fri-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 5pm. Through June 24. Shotgun Players performs Adamn Chanzit’s drama about the hot topic of fracking, inspired by Ibsen’s An Enemy of the People.

Not Getting Any Younger Marsh Berkeley, 2120 Allston, Berk; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. $15-50. Fri, 8pm; Sat, 5pm. Extended through June 30. Marga Gomez is back at the Marsh, a couple of too-brief decades after inaugurating the theater’s new stage with her first solo show — an apt setting, in other words, for the writer-performer’s latest monologue, a reflection on the inevitable process of aging for a Latina lesbian comedian and artist who still hangs at Starbucks and can’t be trusted with the details of her own Wikipedia entry. If the thought of someone as perennially irreverent, insouciant, and appealingly immature as Gomez makes you depressed, the show is, strangely enough, the best antidote. Note: review from the show’s 2011 run at the Marsh San Francisco. (Avila)

The Odyssey Angel Island; (415) 547-0189, www.weplayers.org. $40-76 (some tickets include ferry passage). Sat-Sun, 10:30am-4pm (does not include travel time to island). Through July 1. We Players present Ava Roy’s adaptation of Homer’s epic poem: an all-day adventure set throughout the nature and buildings of Angel Island State Park.

The Tempest Bruns Amphitheater, 100 California Shakespeare Theater Way, Orinda; (510) 809-3290, www.calshakes.org. $35-71. Tue-Thu, 7:30pm; Fri-Sat, 8pm (also June 23, 2pm); Sun, 4pm. Through June 25. California Shakespeare Theater opens its season with this dance-filled interpretation of the Bard’s classic tale.

The World’s Funniest Bubble Show Marsh Berkeley, TheaterStage, 2120 Allston, Berk; (415) 826-5750, www.themarsh.org. $8-50. Fri, 6pm; Sun/10, June 16, 24, and 30, 11am. Through June 30. Louis “The Amazing Bubble Man” Pearl returns with this kid-friendly, bubble-tastic comedy.

PERFORMANCE/DANCE

American Foundation for Equal Rights benefit Bayfront Theater, Fort Mason Center, Marina at Laguna, SF; www.brownpapertickets.com. Mon/11, 8pm. $25-50. BATS Improv and Tom Bruett of marriageequalityplays.com present short plays by local playwrights, plus an improvised short play, on the theme of marriage equality.

“Beef Cake Comedy Show” Deco Lounge, 510 Larkin, SF; www.decosf.com. Sun/10, 8pm. $10. Comedy music group Saw Dem Eyes headlines this night of “straight guys telling jokes with their shirts off.”

“The BY Series” ODC Theater, 3153 17th St, SF; www.odcdance.org. Thu-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 2pm. Through June 17. $25. Robert Moses’ Kin Dance Company presents work by guest choreographers Molissa Fenley, Ramon Ramos Alayo, and Sidra Bell, plus the world premiere of Moses’ Scrubbing the Dog.

“Elect to Laugh” Studio Theater, Marsh San Francisco, 1062 Valencia, SF; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. Tue, 8pm. Ongoing through Nov 6. $15-50. Will Durst and friends perform in this weekly political humor show that focuses on the upcoming presidential election.

“Elementary, My Dear Watson, It Was Crack” Purple Onion, 140 Columbus, SF; (415) 956-1653. Thu/7, 9pm. $20. Comedian Will Franken performs his latest one-man sketch comedy show.

“A Funny Night for Comedy” Actors Theatre of San Francisco, 855 Bush, SF; www.natashamuse.com. Sun/10, 7pm. $10. Natasha Muse and Ryan Cronin host a comedy talk show, followed by “A Funny Night for Improv” at 9pm.

“Feel the Power of the Dork Side” Exit Theatre, 156 Eddy, SF; www.brownpapertickets.com. Fri/8-Sat/9, 8pm. $15. Engineering professor by day, stand-up comedian by night: Dr. Pete Ludovice performs his solo show.

“Get In Front” Herbst Theater, 401 Van Ness, SF; www.getinfront.org. Wed/6, 7pm. $35-250. A benefit for Cancer Prevention Institute of California, this event features performances by principal dancers from San Francisco Ballet, Alonzo King LINES Ballet, ODC/Dance, and more.

“House of Matter” Dance Mission Theater, 3316 24th St, SF; www.brownpapertickets.com. Fri/8-Sat/9, 8pm; Sun/10, 7pm. $15-25. Nicole Klaymoon’s Embodiment Project presents its latest installment of urban dance theater.

“Idina Menzel: Barefoot at the Symphony” Davies Symphony Hall, 201 Van Ness, SF; (415) 864-6000. Thu/7, 8pm. $69.50-125. The Tony winner performs a show of Broadway and modern pop songs.

“Kunst-Stoff Arts/Fest 2012” Kunst-Stoff Arts, One Grove, SF; kunststoffartsfest2012.eventbrite.com. Thu/7-Sat/9 (Program One) and June 14-16 (Program Three), 8:30pm; Tue/12, 8pm (Program Two). $15. Program one: Dance Elixir and Kunst-Stoff Dance Company; program two: Silvia Girardi performing multimedia theater work All I Wanted to Say; program three: Bruno Augusto and Meisha Bosma.

“Performance Night at the Strand” Strand Theater, 1127 Market, SF; maryarmentroutdancetheater.com. Fri/8, 8:15pm. Free (donations accepted). Mary Armentrout Dance Theater, Oakland’s Milkbar, and Paz de la Calzada present an evening of site-specific performances and installations inspired by de la Calzada’s mural on the shuttered Strand Theater.

“R16 North American B-Boy Championships” Palace of Fine Arts Theater, 3301 Lyon, SF; www.r16usa.com. Sat/9, 2-6pm. $10-25. Come check out dancers popping, locking, and otherwise vying to represent North America at the Supreme World Championship finals in South Korea.

San Francisco Ethnic Dance Festival de Young Museum, 50 Hagiwara Tea Garden, Golden Gate Park, SF; www.worldartswest.org. Sat/9, 2pm. $15. Artist dialogue with “American Tribal Style Belly Dance” creator Carolena Nericcio, followed by a performance by FatChanceBellyDance. Also Sun/10, 2pm, Asian Art Museum, 200 Larkin, SF; www.worldartswest.org. Sun/10, 2pm. Free with museum admission ($7-12). Shamanic dance performace by Korean dance master Il Hyun Kim.

“Sex and the City: Live!” Rebel, 1760 Market, SF; www.brownpapertickets.com. Tue, 7 and 9pm. Through June 26. $25. Heklina, D’Arcy Drollinger, Lady Bear, Trixxie Carr play the fab four in this drag-tastic homage to the HBO series.

“Talkies” Artists’ Television Access, 992 Valencia, SF; www.atasite.org. Fri/8, 8pm. $6. Stand-up comedy and short comedic films hosted by Anna Seregina and George Chen.

“Voca People” Marines’ Memorial Theatre, 609 Sutter, Second Flr, SF; www.marinesmemorialtheatre.com. Tue-Fri, 8pm; Sat, 6:30 and 9:30pm; Sun, 3 and 6pm. Through June 17. $49-75. A capella from outer space.

“X” Garage, 715 Bryant, SF; www.brownpapertickets.com. Wed/6-Thu/7, 8pm. $10-20. Australian performer Sunny Drake presents his new show in conjunction with the National Queer Arts Festival.

BAY AREA

“Jazz Hams” Odell Johnson Performing Arts Center, Laney College, 900 Fallon, Oakl; www.brownpapertickets.com. Sat/9, 8pm; Sun/10, 1pm. $10. The plus-sized performers of Big Moves present a new, full-scale production featuring an array of dance styles.

Stage Listings

Andrew Lam
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Stage listings are compiled by Guardian staff. Performance times may change; call venues to confirm. Reviewers are Robert Avila, Rita Felciano, and Nicole Gluckstern. Submit items for the listings at listings@sfbg.com. Complete listings are located at www.sfbg.com.

THEATER

OPENING

Aftermath Stagewerx, 446 Valencia, SF; www.brownpapertickets.com. $25. Previews Thu/7, 8pm. Opens Fri/8, 8pm. Runs Thu-Sat, 8pm. Through June 30. Theatre, Period presents Jessica Blank and Erik Jenson’s docu-drama, based on interviews with Iraqi civilians forced to flee after the US military’s arrival in 2003.

Lips Together, Teeth Apart New Conservatory Theatre Center, 25 Van Ness, SF; www.nctcsf.org. $25-45. Previews Wed/6-Fri/8, 8pm. Opens Sat/9, 8pm. Runs Wed-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 2pm. Through July 1. New Conservatory Theatre Center performs Terrence McNally’s play about two straight couples spending July 4 amid Fire Island’s gay community.

Reunion SF Playhouse, Stage Two, 533 Sutter, SF; (415) 677-9596, www.sfplayhouse.org. $20. Previews Wed/6-Thu/7, 7pm; Fri/8, 8pm. Opens Sat/9, 8pm. Runs Wed-Thu, 7pm; Fri-Sat, 8pm. Through June 30. SF Playhouse presents a world premiere drama by local playwright Kenn Rabin.

“Risk Is This…The Cutting Ball New Experimental Plays Festival” Exit on Taylor, 277 Taylor, SF; (415) 525-1205, www.cuttingball.com. Free ($20 donation for reserved seating; $50 donation for five-play reserved seating pass). Opens Fri/8, 8pm. Runs Fri-Sat, 8pm. Through July 14. Cutting Ball’s annual fest of experimental plays features two new works and five new translations in staged readings.

Vital Signs Marsh San Francisco, 1062 Valencia, SF; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. $15-50. Previews Fri/8 and June 15, 8pm; Sat/9, 8:30pm. Opens June 16, 8:30pm. Runs Sat, 8:30pm; June 22, 8pm. Through July 21. The Marsh San Francisco presents Alison Whittaker’s behind-the-scenes look at nursing in America.

BAY AREA

Wheelhouse TheatreWorks at the Mountain View Center for the Performing Arts, 500 Castro, Mtn View; (650) 463-1960, www.theatreworks.org. $19-69. Previews Wed/6-Fri/8, 8pm. Opens Sat/9, 8pm. Runs Tue-Wed, 7:30pm; Thu-Sat, 8pm (also Sat, 2); Sun, 2 and 7pm. Through July 1. TheatreWorks’ 60th world premiere is a musical created by and starring pop-rock trio GrooveLily.

ONGOING

The Full Monty Eureka Theatre, 215 Jackson, SF; www.roltheatre.com. $25-36. Thu-Sat, 8pm (also Sat, 2pm); Sun, 2pm. Through June 30. Ray of Light Theatre performs the hit musical.

Fwd: Life Gone Viral Marsh San Francisco, 1062 Valencia, SF; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. $20-50. Thu/7, 8pm; Sat/9, 8:30pm; Sun/10, 7pm. The internet becomes comic fodder for creator-performers Charlie Varon and Jeri Lynn Cohen, and creator-director David Ford.

100 Saints You Should Know Thick House, 1695 18th St, SF; www.therhino.org. $10-30. Wed-Thu, 7:30pm; Fri-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 3pm. Through June 17. Theatre Rhinoceros performs Kate Fodor’s comedy-drama about family love, homosexuality, and adolescence.

Othello Phoenix Theatre, 414 Mason, SF; www.brownpapertickets.com. $15-18. Thu/7-Sat/9, 8pm. Ninjaz of Drama performs Shakespeare’s classic in a contemporary setting.

Slipping New Conservatory Theatre Center, 25 Van Ness, SF; www.nctcsf.org. $25-45. Wed-Sat, 8pm; Sun, 2pm. Through July 1. New Conservatory Theatre Center performs Daniel Talbott’s drama about a gay teen who finds new hope after a traumatic breakup.

The Waiting Period MainStage, Marsh San Francisco, 1062 Valencia, SF; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. $15-50. Fri, 8pm; Sat, 5pm. Extended through July 7. Brian Copeland (comedian, TV and radio personality, and creator-performer of the long-running solo play Not a Genuine Black Man) returns to the Marsh with a new solo, this one based on more recent and messier events in Copeland’s life. It’s a worthy aim but only a fitfully engaging piece, since as drama it remains thin, standing at perhaps too respectful a distance from the convoluted torment and alienation at its center. (Avila)

BAY AREA

Black n Blue Boys/Broken Men Berkeley Repertory Theatre, Thrust Stage, 2025 Addison, Berk; www.berkeleyrep.org. $14.50-73. Tue, Thu-Sat, 8pm (also Sat, 2pm); Wed and Sun, 7pm (also Sun, 7pm). Through June 24. Berkeley Rep presents a world premiere from writer-performer Dael Orlandersmith (a Pulitzer finalist for 2002’s Yellowman).

Crevice La Val’s Subterranean, 1834 Euclid, Berk; www.impacttheatre.com. $10-20. Thu/7-Sat/9, 8pm. Just in case you were feeling panicked about the persistently recessed state of the economy and what might be your own less than ideal place in it, the Impact Theatre and Playground co-presentation of Lauren Yee’s Crevice might help to put your woes into perspective. Slacker sibs Liz (Marissa Keltie) and Rob (Timothy Redmond) are only slightly exaggerated representatives of Generation Next; when their mother (Laura Jane Bailey) starts having a hot fling with a younger man, her orgasms open a “crevice” into an alternate reality that Rob and Liz fall into. Their navigation of their erstwhile wonderland offers most of the play’s best lines as well as the uncomfortably effective transformation of Reggie D. White from Liz’s nerdish best buddy to multi-lingual Mafia killer and casual sadist. (Gluckstern)

Not Getting Any Younger Marsh Berkeley, 2120 Allston, Berk; (415) 282-3055, www.themarsh.org. $15-50. Fri, 8pm; Sat, 5pm. Extended through June 30. Marga Gomez is back at the Marsh, a couple of too-brief decades after inaugurating the theater’s new stage with her first solo show — an apt setting, in other words, for the writer-performer’s latest monologue, a reflection on the inevitable process of aging for a Latina lesbian comedian and artist who still hangs at Starbucks and can’t be trusted with the details of her own Wikipedia entry. If the thought of someone as perennially irreverent, insouciant, and appealingly immature as Gomez makes you depressed, the show is, strangely enough, the best antidote. Note: review from the show’s 2011 run at the Marsh San Francisco. (Avila)

The Odyssey Angel Island; (415) 547-0189, www.weplayers.org. $40-76 (some tickets include ferry passage). Sat-Sun, 10:30am-4pm (does not include travel time to island). Through July 1. We Players present Ava Roy’s adaptation of Homer’s epic poem: an all-day adventure set throughout the nature and buildings of Angel Island State Park.

The Performant: All you can eat

Jesse Hawthorne Ficks
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Wild Food Walks and Bal Littéraire satisfy imaginative appetites.

“First, the bad news,” says our guide and frequent forager Kevin Feinstein. “Foraging in the Bay Area is illegal.”

Well, swell, I guess it’s a good thing that I packed snacks. “If the land is private, and you have permission from the owners, you can forage,” Feinstein amends, which still doesn’t help me in planning my lunch, but good to know for future reference. I’m attending one of ForageSF’s “Wild Food Walks,” along with about 15 others, hoping to graze upon that freest of foodstuffs, the weeds in our backyards — and yours.

The tour kicks off on the perimeter of Golden Gate Park, and without even taking a step, we’re summarily introduced to common mallow, miner’s lettuce, and stinging nettles. After another reminder about the illegality of *picking* the plants in the park, Feinstein exhaustively details each plant’s properties — their nutritional content, the edible parts of each, identification and preparation tips. Mallow is mucilaginous and anti-inflammatory, and the seed pods or “cheese wheels” can be eaten as well as the leaves, stalks, and everything else. Miner’s lettuce, which looks a bit like a land-locked lily-pad, is native to California, high in Omega-3s, and never gets bitter, even when older. Nettles do sting (which one curious child found out the hard way), but not when crushed or cooked. Extremely high in various minerals and vitamins, nettles are also easily cultivated, making them a good bet for amateur urban farmers as well as foragers.

“One five-gallon nursery pot grows more nettle than one person can handle,” promises Feinstein as visions of pestos and cream soups begin to creep into our collective consciousness.

Two hours and a dozen plants later, we’re all a little overwhelmed, but there’s excitement in it, like people are going to go home immediately and weed the garden, not for the usual reasons, but to make a salad. It almost makes one want to trade one’s wallet for a foraging basket, until reminded that urban foraging has its share of downsides — legal issues, contaminated soil, plant misidentification. Even so, I’m betting that hardly anyone in that group will be able to pass by a big clump of hilltop-dwelling nasturtiums or wild radish without checking for their crunchy, spicy seed pods, or slipping a few leaves in their bag for later.

Another new taste I was introduced to over the weekend was San Francisco’s first ever “Bal Littéraire,” a Parisian concept imported over as part of the French-American translation exchange, the Des Voix Festival. Though I’d been given an idea of the concept ahead of time — an ephemeral, collaborative work created by six playwrights, using pop songs to tie the scenes together and turning the floor into a giant dance party — nothing could have prepared me for the high-spirited spectacle it became.

Seeing a “typical” Bay Area theatre crowd getting down and dirty to hyphy hit “Fast (Like a Nascar)” in the middle of a French-accented, surrealistic serial romantic comedy featuring Liz Duffy Adams as a tough-talking, Jackie-of-all-trades stalking a middle-aged French divorcee, and Marcus Gardley as an octogenarian in drag, was a taste of contemporary France mixed with a Bay Area spice that titillated a cosmic palate, and won’t soon be forgotten. Here’s hoping that either Playwrights Foundation or the Consulate General of France find a way to keep this new theatrical tradition going in SF for years to come.

‘Wanted Man’: resurrecting Johnny Cash’s San Quentin concert

Sue Vaughan
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What did it mean for Johnny Cash to “Walk the Line”? At First Person Singular‘s one night only (May 28) performance of Wanted Man: Johnny Cash at San Quentin at Berkeley’s Ashby Stage, star Josh Pollock argued that we can all relate to the fine line that Cash walked his entire life.
 
He was never jailed for his drinking or drug problems, but as he performed at San Quentin prison — recorded for his now-classic 1969 album At San Quentin, the follow-up to 1968’s At Folsom Prison — he is said to have looked out at the inmates and thought how close he had been, so many days and nights, to tipping over a precarious edge. June Carter, God, and his guitar kept him on the right side of the law (rock ‘n’ roll fun fact: he was arrested, once, for picking flowers).

Pollock and backing band the East Bay Three did an amazing job capturing the spirit of Cash’s material. Before the show Pollock told me that he was proud to consider this reinterpretation sacrilege, though the audience certainly took nothing but raw pleasure in the performance.

Although the seats were mostly filled with older Cash aficionados, it was a still fairly diverse crowd, and boy did they join in when foot-stomping and hand clapping was encouraged. It was the kind of musical experience where you felt yourself completely enveloped with a feeling of community, and the passion of the music made you forget any trivial problems that had preoccupied your mind earlier that day.
 
Pollock’s theatrical idiosyncrasies, including some creative hand gestures when he did not have his guitar occupying his arms, were quite entertaining — he was sure giving it his all. The same can also be said for the East Bay Three, comprised of musicians well-known for their other projects.
 
Violinist Anton Patzner is an Oakland native, and his musical skills have brought him on world tours with the likes of no less than Bright Eyes, including a Late Show with David Letterman performance. His band Judgement Day (with his brother Lewis Patzner) is a “string metal” trio, accompanied by drums.

The Cash show gave Patzner the chance to utilize his violin skills, but he also played such offbeat instruments as a barrel drum (literally a barrel, upright). Watching Patzner bang the hell out of that barrel encapsulated a little taste of the level of fervor I imagine Cash faced, playing before those San Quentin fans over four decades ago.
 
Laura Weinbach of Foxtails Brigade offered a spitfire interpretation of June Carter, duetting with Pollock on “Jackson”. Weinbach’s inflection and guitar playing were both quite enjoyable. Joe Lewis on upright bass was also fascinating to watch; he played with pluck and great timing. An added treat was that Weinbach’s younger twin brothers made an appearance on trumpet and saxophone — and even had a whistling musical break. Their hand-snapping and dance moves were certainly among the most charming moments of the show.
 
During his rendition of “Starkville City Jail” — written about that infamous flower-picking incident — Pollock paused to ruminate on how much Cash’s shoes (“I started pacin’ back and forth and now and then, I’d yell/ And kick my forty dollar shoes against the steel door of my cell”) would cost now with inflation (he guessed $200).

 

Next up for First Person Singular — according to host Joe Christiano, “a performance series that draws from a variety of media to showcase the American voice” — is an all-duets installment of its “Hoot!” open mic night, Sun/10 at St. Alban’s Episcopal Church in Albany. 

Destroy build destroy

Jesse Hawthorne Ficks
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Destroy build destroy

arts@sfbg.com

MUSIC “Harsh urban space, with a light misting.” That’s how Dan Bejar describes 2011’s Kaputt, his ninth full-length under the Destroyer moniker; listen to it with headphones, on a foggy day in San Francisco, and you just might agree.

Much has been made of the stylistic shift the Vancouver singer-songwriter has initiated on this record. Awash with fretless bass, lite-jazz sax noodling, and a syrupy synth-haze reminiscent of Avalon by Roxy Music, Kaputt comes across as subdued and wistful, in contrast to the baroque, acerbic tone of his previous output.

Bejar spoke with me over the phone from his home in Vancouver, detailing the second Destroyer lineup since the release of Kaputt, and their renewed approach to the material, as, “more dynamic and muscular than the aesthetic of the production… it’s mostly just a disco band, really,” he explains, with a tinge of sarcasm. “Yeah, hard-rock disco.”

However, while the previous tour was almost exclusively concerned with translating Kaputt to the stage, Bejar suggests that his current octet has, “probably learned twice as much material as any other Destroyer band before it.” The upcoming tour will find Destroyer approaching older, guitar and piano-based songs with trumpet, sax, and mega-synths for the first time. “We’ve not necessarily Kaputtified [the older material],” he explains, “but definitely given things a new sound.”

Kaputtified? Bejar wouldn’t likely be using this word if the album didn’t possess such a distinct, consistent atmosphere. The production aesthetic of Kaputt has inspired countless nerd-debates over the past year or so, largely concerning the merits of tributing a musical era — the early 1980s — that some listeners find questionable these days.

“I think there’s some things on the record that, some people might find repellent,” Bejar observes. “Not necessarily younger people so much as people my age, or a bit older, who maybe lived through the late ’70s and the ’80s, and were kind of just bludgeoned with really bad examples of production techniques and instrumentation that went down.”

That said, Bejar himself is hesitant to slap the “’80s” tag on Kaputt, despite this strong reaction from the blogosphere. “You never know when your intentions, and when the reality of what you’re doing, match up,” he admits, “[but] I always just think the songs are distinct enough that they can just grab hold of whatever style they feel like, and still come out sounding like their own voice.”

Another common misconception about Kaputt is the suggestion that it was written and recorded from a nostalgic perspective. After all, Bejar was a mere nine years of age when Avalon came out. “I don’t think it’s really nostalgic,” he insists. “I’ve always thought of it more as, say, someone on their deathbed, pumped full of morphine, maybe seeing what visions go wafting by.”

This deathbed image sheds some light on what Bejar describes as a “blankness” at the heart of Kaputt‘s songwriting and vocal delivery. “The sense of space was always important,” he contends. “There’s probably half the word count than there is on any other Destroyer album.” This relative economy of words is reflected in Kaputt‘s relaxed, unhurried pacing, which provides a stark contrast to the freewheeling energy of, say, 2006’s Destroyer’s Rubies.

In describing his aesthetic influences, Bejar mentions, “most of my inspiration comes from Miles Davis, on a daily basis, anyway,” Thinking within that context, Kaputt very well might be Destroyer’s In a Silent Way: a deeply transitional affair steeped in lush ambiance, with the ability to go hog-wild, but the class, restraint, and wisdom to keep things at a simmer.

It’s an ideal soundtrack to this city at its grayest. A light misting, indeed.

DESTROYER

With Sandro Perri, Colossal Yes

Tue/5, 9pm, $25

Fillmore

1805 Geary, SF

(415) 346-6000

www.thefillmore.com

 

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