guest post by mikl-em

photo by Geof Teague

For the second year in a row, a group of San Francisco theatrical mavericks are transposing a triumvirate of cinematic thrillers to a small San Francisco stage. Last year’s trio of B-beginning movies include The Blob and The Birds.

This year it’s Blue Velvet, Bride of Frankenstein, and Barbarella. A diverse set of B’s indeed. You can blame the fine folks at Foul Play Productions for that.

I have one piece of bad news and two bits of good: Blue Velvet has come and gone. But Bride of Frankenstein and Barbarella still await your attendance.

Bride is up right now (Thurs-Sat until October 17th) at StageWerx Theater, and it is quite an achievement. The play is presented in Black and White: costume, set, props, lighting, and skin tones are all painted, covered or otherwise adapted to a silver screen tone reminiscent of the 1935 original.

Featuring the original Franz Waxman score, and combining puppetry, shadowplay and myriad other theatricalities of a bygone era, Bride of Frankenstein is a perfect October offering, with showmanship and genuine thrills throughout!

With the dramatic lighting design and pointed use of shadows through the production, there’s a definite call-back to The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari. While he’s technically filling Boris Karloff’s tremendous shoes as The Monster, the remarkably named Fennel Skellyman physically evokes the gangly, alien-headed horror of Nosferatu–the true O.G. of cinematic killer creatures.

Played for fun and style, not for horror, The Bride is a blast and the entire cast is wonderful including Jim Jeske, Gerri Lawlor, Jordan L. Moore, and director Flynn De Marco. I can’t do justice to the ingenuity of the props, lighting, and staging here, but suffice to say it’s great.

You can buy tickets online for the last two weekends of Bride of Frankenstein.

Barbarella will open on October 22 and run for 9 shows only. Starring the remarkable Khamara Pettus, in the role that Jane Fonda could no longer play, and with projections, animation, and puppetry, this show promises to make up for the color deprivation of the Bride’s run.

The film is a cult classic space romp from 1968, an outrageous one-of-a-kind, sexified carnival from the 40th Century. It was co-written by Terry Southern (Easy Rider, Dr Strangelove, Casino Royale) and features Marcel Marceau in a speaking role. It is the film from which the band Duran Duran took their name. I’m just saying.

photo by Geof Teague

Tickets are on sale now for all nine performances.

Five-Star Astro-Navigatrix Barbarella (Khamara Pettus) is on a mission to find and recover Duran Duran (Fennel Skellyman), creator of the abominable Positronic Ray. To track her quarry, she must penetrate the City of Night where the Great Black Queen (Gerri Lawlor) and her Leathermen hold power supreme.

Between the Bride of Frankenstein and Barbarella, you can bookend your Halloween appropriately between the scary and outrageous.

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guest post by mikl-em

photo by Michael Rauner

How to Survive the Apocalypse, a Burning Man-inspired rock opera opens Monday, October 5th and runs through October 20th at Teatro ZinZanni in San Francisco.

There will be performances for three weekends only (the last weekend was just added due to high demand). Ticket details are on the Teatro ZinZanni website.

Delivering the outrageous and transformative culture of Burning Man to wider audiences, “How to Survive the Apocalypse” is a freak fable that combines rock opera, vaudeville, and a Dionysian revival show as it follows three people, each with their own baggage of fears and expectations, through their first experience of the erotic, psychological, and apocalyptic minefield of this temporary city in the desert. A kind of “Hair” for the new millennium, the show explores the conflicts and paradoxes of the Burning Man event, while inviting the audience to tap into the festival’s spirit of collaborative culture-making at a time of immense world changes.

The official Burning Man blog has a writeup about the show with lots of great photos. The fantastic cast photos shown here are by photographer Michael Rauner and there are many more on his site.

photo by Michael Rauner

Back in January, I wrote about the debut run of this show at Stage Werx Theater in San Francisco. It was a very short, very sold out run in a 49-seat theater, with the workshop feel of a collaborative piece that was evolving in real time.

People involved in those initial shows, in both the cast and audience, had diverse levels of Burning Man experience: from some of the earliest participants to current BM staff; from those who have just discovered the event to many who stopped attending long ago. The take on Burning Man and its history is as varied as that mix of viewpoints would suggest.

Candy ravers mingle with art freaks, manic minigolf, bull-horned rabbits, and the abstract caricatures Moustachio and The Stetson. Happily the event and its history is not romanticized, but neither are the profound aspects of experiencing Burning Man (especially for the first time) under stated or estimated.

Clearly a fun, freaky art experiment, at its best the show has a “vibe” to it that resonates with all in attendance; an infrequent but not quite rare occurrence like the best moments at parties, events, or temporary desert municipalities. It is something from which you can almost literally catch a buzz, and maybe a flashback or two.

photo by Michael Rauner

The text was written by Erik Davis (star of the penultimate instance of Laughing Squid’s Tentacle Sessions series). Erik is a journalist and culture critic, and a long-time Burning Man attendee who covered Burning Man for Wired more than a decade ago. His most recent book is The Visionary State about “California’s spiritual landscape” is a good example of his style: thinking deeply about the weird and freaky.

The music is composed by Mark Nichols, originally from the Seattle area, who first attended Burning Man more recently, which is where the idea for this rock opera began to evolve from a chance meeting at the porta-pottys one night.

photo by Michael Rauner

After its short successful run in January, the show went off the grid, preparing for a bigger, more polished return. The ultimate plan includes a tour at some point after this second San Francisco run.

The ensuing months have included lots of work on the show, the inevitable fund-raising of an independent production, and expansion of the cast and crew and the overall scale of the opera.

The new set was designed by Shannon O’Hare, one of the mad anachronistic geniuses behind “Neverwas Haul”, the steam-powered mobile Victorian house which has travelled to Burning Man the last few years.

photo by Michael Rauner

The cast now includes Phat Mandee (another Tentacle Session star) who has come all the way from Pittsburgh, PA for extended rehearsals prior to the opening. See her blog post about the show and her history with Burning Man (plus rehearsal pix).

The list of incredible collaborators goes on. You can see them all here. They include Burning Man founder Michael Mikel and long-time BM staffers Harley DuBois and Andie Grace.

photo by Michael Rauner

You can follow the show on twitter (@burningopera) and also find them on Facebook.

And remember that if you want to go you should get tickets soon. While this theater fits closer to 300 per show, tickets are going fast.

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guest post by mikl-em

It is that time of year again, when a localized theatrical system emerges in the Tenderloin (and spreads to various satellite venues) featuring hundreds of high density, low budget, short attention span events over the course of two weeks.

PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT: Comedy and Justice for All by PSA Ensemble

The San Francisco Fringe Fest is now in its 18th year. Following in the tradition of the Edinburgh Fringe, the SF Fringe is the 2nd oldest Fringe in the US and is produced each year by The Exit Theater, which is now 26 years old and includes 3 stages plus a cafe in two buildings near the intersection of Taylor and Eddy.

Most shows are less than an hour & cost less than $10 (you pay $2 more to buy advance tix online, but 50% of all tix are saved to sell at the door for each show). Venues are small, staging is minimal; it is accessible, palpable theater. The festival runs September 9th through 20th.

The Frank Diary of Anne from Toronto’s Fishbowl Theater – photo by aMuse

Every production is designed to set up and break down very quickly, so there is only 30 minutes between shows, thus maximizing the number of performances in a night and over the 12 days. However there’s enough time for the audience to switch venues after a show, which multiplies the options for a choose-your-own-adventure style multi-play night.

Survival Tips for the Reckless by Carnival of Chaos – photo by Liz Payne

The festival is uncurated, which means that there is a wide and wild range of professionalism, style, quality, and charm. Like the program says…

The unjuried format of the Fringe Festival allows the artists to have total creative freedom when producing their work and provides for a unique theater-going experience. As a result of this boundary-free approach to creating theatre, the Fringe has become a popular development tool; encouraging artists to take risks, explore ideas, pose questions and tell their stories in new and exciting ways.

JESUS IN MONTANA: Adventures in a Doomsday Cult a solo show and true story about someone who lived in Jesus’ basement by Barry Smith – photo by Victor Des Roches

In all this year’s SF Fringe Fest features 250+ performances of 43 shows (2/3 of them on The Exit’s 3 stages). In addition to numerous Bay Area performers, there are shows from L.A., Boston, New York, as well as Montana, Colorado, and international travelers from Canada, Brazil, Slovenia, Germany, and Andorra.

Suicide Me!, a “darkly humorous one-woman puppet show for adults” by Iris Schleuss from Koeln, Germany – photo by Torsten Wolber

A full range of genres await from sketch comedy to horror rock musical to “Queer Performance Spectacular”. So there’s really something for everyone, and probably several things you won’t like. The online audience reviews, updated daily, can help you home in on shows you want and don’t want to see. And you can post your own review to rave or warn based on your experience.

The Godling a modern guignol by End Times Productions – photo by Matthew Kriener

Here’s a quick peek at the action in Poste Restante which looks to be a fun, clown-y dance show….

Poste Restante by They Gotta Be Secret Agents – photo by Androo Sokol

Tickets for the Fringe are now on sale, there are different shows in different order every day (that’s part of the fun). So check the daily schedule.

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The Pee-wee Herman Show is returning to it’s roots as a live stage show for a limited engagement starting November 8th at The Music Box @ Fonda in Hollywood.

Let the fun begin! Pee-wee Herman is inviting you – and all your friends – back to Puppetland. Come join Pee-wee, Miss Yvonne, Cowboy Curtis, Jambi, Chairry and all your favorites, live on stage.

Re-imagined, re-invented, and nuttier than ever, “The Pee-wee Herman Show” will be LA’s theatrical event of 2009, with its live-action cast and puppets galore!

via /Film

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“I Can Has Cheezburger: The MusicLOL!”, a musical based on the popular LOLcat blog I Can Has Cheezburger, is part of the New York International Fringe Festival with performances on August 14-28 at the Cherry Lane Theatre in Greenwich Village.

After being uploaded to ICanHasCheezburger.com, a young, impressionable LOLcat embarks on a journey to find his one true love: A cheezburger. Along the way, he meets a colorful cast of characters who help — and hinder — his mission.

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Shadow Circus Vaudeville Theatre, San Francisco’s most belligerent puppetry
troupe will be performing this Wednesday, April 15th at Climate Theater in San Francisco and this Saturday, April 18th at The Stork Club in Oakland.

When Wesley realizes that his life has been an utter failure, he tries to improve his outlook using the popular self-help book ‘The Secret’. Will Wesley be able to turn his life around with the power of ‘The Secret’, or will his supposed friend Hatchet the Velociraptor just use it as another tool to torment him with? A full night of music, magic & monsters!

Also appearing are special guests Meredith Yayanos aka Theremina (who has recorded with Dresden Dolls, Faun Fables & Sleepytime Gorilla
Museum), doing her own set and sitting in with the Shadow Circus ensemble; Hernan Cortez (creator of Popcorn Anti-Theater) doing magic, and Angela Mae Thompson (Vau De Vire Society) doing dance. With a special musical performance by Victoria & the Vaudevillians!

Combining folklore, mythology, Lovecraftian monsters and pop-cultur parody, Shadow Circus Creature Theatre has been one of San Francisco’s most popular and outrageous puppetry troupes since it’s formation in 2000. Using life-sized latex and foam creatures Shadow Circus creates a world that is utterly fantastic, and yet hilariously similar to our own.

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guest post by mikl-em

They’re doing it again. For the sixth year running, The Dark Room Theater presents a 4-week stand that includes 8 stage remakes of original Twilight Zone TV episodes. Each weekend a different pair of episodes is featured, plus live on-stage commercials and a different Rod Serling impersonator each weekend as well.

Shows run Friday & Saturday at 8pm and Sundays at 3pm. The show opens this weekend and runs through March 29th. Here more info.

I’m more than a little familiar with The Dark Room because I’ve been in numerous shows there, including a few of the earlier Twilight Zone seasons. The TZone shows are a lot of fun because they have both the classic trappings of Mr Serling’s wonderful TV show, which originally ran from 1959-1964, and the ingenious manic energy of fans making an homage. Some follow true to the original, while others take the original in wholly new directions. Expect a liberal dose of laugh and some suspense (depending on the episode). This year there’s one that claims to combine four classic episodes into one. We’ll see!

The Dark Room is a 50ish-seat black box theater, one of the more active venues in the de facto theater district scattered throughout San Francisco’s Mission (others include The Marsh, The Brava, The Rhinoceros, Theatre Artaud, and Intersection for the Arts).

Dark Room shows are split between stand-up or sketch comedy, pop-culture adaptations from TV or the Big Screen to the small low-budget stage, and refugees from public access television. Not to mention the Bad Movie Night film hecklage.

image via The Dark Room Theater

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guest post by mikl-em

How to Survive the Apocalypse is a rock opera about Burning Man that is running for two weekends in January at Stage Werx Theater near Union Square in San Francisco.

This show has generated excitement and swift ticket sales not only for its cast’s talents but also their direct connections to the temporary zone of great art, big fire, painted nakedness, expanded minds, and rented RVs that happens on Labor Day weekend in Nevada each year.

How to Survive the Apocalypse is a Burning Man-inspired theatrical freak-out that combines rock opera, vaudeville, and a Dionysian revival show that is just as inspired and terrified by current events as you are. Part mutant mystery play, part crash-course in proactive future culture, the evening combines millennialist rants and sexy burlesque with select scenes and songs from the “Burning Opera,” an ambitious and ferociously inventive rock musical scored by Mark Nichols, with libretto by counterculture writer Erik Davis.

As I mentioned this is a hot ticket. The first weekend sold out so fast that they have now added a second weekend. At the time of this post tickets are only available for the Friday January 23rd show.

Stage Werx is a small theater, run by twin sisters Ty & Cory McKenzie who in addition to being longtime SF theater workers are themselves Burning Man regulars (see the pic of them below at the event).

The cast of the show includes Steffanos X who has performed in actual playa operas by long-time BRC auteure Pepe Ozan (Mr. X was also seen in Star Wars on-stage & The Wicker Man, and for years as lead singer of the much missed band Tom Jonesing).

Another participant is Barbara Traub, who is best known as the photographer who created some of the most recognizable images of Burning Man including those in the 1997 HardWired book on the festival.

Most of the photos on this post are from Traub’s book Desert to Dream: A Decade of Burning Man Photography.

A stellar cast and a Stetson hat also help to bring to life the music of Mark Nichols and the lyrics of Erik Davis. Davis is a noted expert on Philip K. Dick and Led Zeppelin whose most recent book is The Visionary State about California diverse history of alternative spiritualities, and he has written for Wired amongst many other publications.

Traub and Davis also each performed in Laughing Squid’s living artist series The Tentacle Sessions somewhere on the edge of the last millennium.

The video below shows Steffanos in action with Tom Jonesing (at least one other member of which is also in this show):

photos by Barbara Traub & ChiaLynn

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“Star Wars: Live on Stage”, the theatrical production of Star Wars Episode IV at The Dark Room in San Francisco, was recently featured on The Official Star Wars Blog. In the write-up Bonnie Burton interviews the play’s director and Dark Room co-owner Jim Fourniadis as well as using some of the photos I shot of a recent performance.

Star Wars: Live on Stage runs through December 27th, Fridays and Saturdays at 8pm.

See Previously:

- Photos of Star Wars: Live on Stage at The Dark Room

- Star Wars: Live on Stage at The Dark Room

photo by Scott Beale

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guest post by mikl-em

New York theater group Banana Bag & Bodice performed an extended run of their original show BEOWULF: A Thousand Years of Baggage (A SongPlay) in Berkeley in the summer of 2008 to rave reviews.

For one night in January, the show will be back in the Bay Area, once again produced by the Shotgun Players for one night only at the Berkeley Rep’s RODA theater.

The show is based on the Old English epic poem Beowulf, adapted into a rock opera (or “SongPlay”, as the BBBers call it) with all original music and a live band on-stage. Below are a couple pictures from this past summer’s production:

Go here for ticket information. There are 700 seats and it will sell out.

This performance benefits the upcoming New York production of the show at The Abrons Arts Center in April 2009. The cast includes both New York and Bay Area performers, under the direction of BBB veteran Rod Hipskind.

More stuff:

• Reviews of this summer’s performances,
• Last year’s writeup on BBB’s show The Sewers
• Beowulf the poem online
• Other Banana Bag & Bodice plays

Here’s the King Hrothgar song, sung by King Hrothgar who is played by Dave Malloy who is the composer of all the music for the ShowPlay:

photos by Jessica Palopoli

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Saturday night I finally had a chance to check out the hilariously awesome Star Wars: Live on Stage at The Dark Room in San Francisco (see Mikl-em’s previous post). I hadn’t planned on shooting photos, but ended up taking a few from the third row (sorry Geekboy, I didn’t get any good ones of your characters).

Star Wars: Live on Stage runs through December 27th (Fridays & Saturdays at 8pm). I highly recommend checking it out if you have a chance.

Photo Gallery: Star Wars: Live on Stage

See Previously: Star Wars: Live on Stage at The Dark Room

UPDATE: Star Wars: Live on Stage was featured on The Official Star Wars Blog.

photos by Scott Beale

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Here are some photos I shot at last Saturday’s performance of “I Am Snowmiser: Walken in a Winter Wonderland”, a wonderful play directed by Rhiannon Charisse at The Dark Room in San Francisco that imagines what it would be like if Christopher Walken had stared in all of those great Rankin/Bass stop-motion animated holiday specials (see Violet Blue’s previous post).

I Am Snowmiser runs one more weekend, December 19th and 20th at 10pm.

Photo Gallery: I Am Snowmiser: Walken in a Winter Wonderland

See Previously: I Am Snowmiser: (Christopher) Walken in a Winter Wonderland

UPDATE: Puzzling Evidence shot video of Christopher Walken talking about misfit toys.

photos by Scott Beale

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guest post by Violet Blue

Many of us think of Christopher Walken as “The King of New York” — but how many remember Walken as the king of all those stop-action animated holiday TV specials that shaped the very foundation of our ability to see right from wrong, Santa from Satan, and when how sometimes in life an elf or two maybe occasionally needed to get whacked so little Timmy could get his toy boat?

Well, local theater company MacGyver Productions remember Walken’s formative voice-acting jobs from children’s television specials such as “The Year Without a Santa Claus” (1974), where demonic Heat Miser (voiced by George S. Irving) battles his arch-nemesis Snow Miser over the fate of Santa Claus. ‘Cause look: Snow Miser, he *owns* the North Pole. And he doesn’t like to be left out of business, unless you like your reindeer fulla bullet holes (hey, there’s “transportation costs” too). So MacGyver Productions has — this weekend only, in San Francisco, four nights — turned Walken’s ouvre as the voice of evil clay into, you guessed it: a cabaret called I Am Snowmiser: Walken In A Winter Wonderland.

There’s no business like snow business.

Christopher Walken [as played by Sean Owens] recounts his life for his official biography, reliving the greatest and most dreadful moments of his career, in such roles as Snowmiser, Frosty the Snowman’s whistle-swallowing Cop, and the nay-saying anti-dentistry Boss Elf. He broke the hearts of Mrs. Claus and the Doll from the Island of Misfit Toys, but ultimately found a holiday spirit which cannot be denied. Walk in our winter wonderland and bask in our ranks of the best local SF talent!

IAS:WIAWW is a MACGYVER PRODCUTION from Rhiannon Charisse and features the talents of Sean Owens, Sherilyn Connelly, Alexia Staniotes, Mikl-Em, Jim Jeske, Erin Lucas, Dan Foley, and Kelly McCarron.

Performances are at The Dark Room Theater on December 12, 13, 19, and 20. Tickets are $20 at the door, or $15 online via Brown Paper Tickets.

See Also: Star Wars: Live on Stage at The Dark Room

UPDATE 1: The “I Am Snowmiser” trailer is now online:

UPDATE 2: Scott shot some photos of “I Am Snowmiser”:

UPDATE 3: Puzzling Evidence shot video of Christopher Walken talking about misfit toys.

illustration by Rhiannon Charisse

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guest post by mikl-em

San Francisco’s Dark Room Theater has delivered stage versions of numerous films over the years, from Clue to The Princess Bride to The Ten Commandments. All these performed on a stage that is, to quote one review, not much bigger than a big screen TV. In full disclosure, I’ve appeared in several shows there myself and one upcoming. I posted about the “Bene-fett” for this play a few months back.

This (long) time (ago) the theater goes far, far away beyond their previous productions when Star Wars: Live on Stage opens this week. Beginning this Friday, December 5th the show will run for just 8 performances: each Friday and Saturday through December 27. Tickets are available online.

This stage production of Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope features a thousand and ten performers (give or take a thousand) and a $100 special effects budget! Bringing all the thrills of the world of Star Wars off the movie screen and on to the ingenious but diminutive stage in front of you: Light saber duels! Zero-Gravity dogfights! Jawas! Droids! Darth Vader and his pinchy-chokey special attack! Uncle Owen!

STAR WARS: Live on Stage is a Dark Room Production adapted and directed by Jim Fourniadis, produced by Erin Ohanneson and featuring the considerable talents of Joe Gorman, Nancy Bower, Jim Jeske, Damien Chacona, Julien Sierra, Steffanos X, John Halfacre, Dan Foley, Erik Salmoson, Tim Kay, AJ Margolis, Dave McKew as Darth Vader.

This play is being performed with the permission of Lucasfilm Ltd. Pretty cool, and maybe not too surprising when you think about the fact that the Star Wars fans and fan art have always been a big part of what kept Luke, Leia et al alive for all those bleak years before we entered the prequel zone.

It seems that Lucasfilm has been tolerant of much of the fan fiction, films, art and other amateur tributes since 1981, but not always.

In 2000 they partnered with Atom Films to provide a place for fan films (and even a contest for the best ones each year) on the condition that the creators adhere to some basic guidelines–here are this year’s finalists.

This article from 2001 gives an overview of the universe of fan films at that time. TheForce.Net is the hub of the Star Wars fan universe, they even have a database of fan film casts and crews.

And just to keep you in that Star Wars tribute mood, here’s probably the most famous of all Star Wars tributes, the short film Troops from 2001 (which you can download off of TheForce.Net):

See Previously: Dark Room Theater Bene-Fett: Night of a Thousand Stars…Wars

UPDATE 1: SF Weekly has posted some photos from Star Wars: Live on Stage from the opening weekend.

UPDATE 2: Scott also shot some photos Star Wars: Live on Stage:

UPDATE 3: Star Wars: Live on Stage was featured on The Official Star Wars Blog.

poster image by Flynn de Marco

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guest post by Aaron Muszalski

After suffering a predicatably soulless remake starring Nicolas Cage in 2006, the beloved 1973 cult horror film The Wicker Man was ripe for a more entertaining adaptation.

That adaptation arrives this week, in the form of The Wicker Man: A Rock Opera About The Ultimate Sacrifice. Created by notorious San Francisco underground theater artists, Cameron Eng and Sean Owens, as part of their series of “Foul Plays”, The Wicker Man stars Flynn DeMarco, Steffanos X and Maura Sipila, and features an original music score by Jim Fourniadis and LIVE EVIL. Also keep an eye out for Laughing Squid guestblogger (and Man Of 1,003 Faces) Mikl-em, who performs in several roles.

April showers bring the sanctimonious Sergeant Howie a mysterious letter concerning a missing girl from Summerisle, the tiny pagan island commune renowned for its bountiful produce and unabashed holy day rituals. His investigation of the restless natives proves as fruitless as last year’s crops, though; and the bizarre inhabitants only serve to add fuel to the flames of his righteous indignation. Driven to save the girl’s immortal soul from this den of idolaters, he discovers the truth behind the girl’s disappearance—that come May Day, the villagers intend to sacrifice her to their gods of the field to ensure a successful harvest. Howie must infiltrate their festivities, find the girl and escape—but will his plan put him out of the frying pan and into the fire?

The Wicker Man: A Rock Opera About The Ultimate Sacrifice opens this Thursday, October 2nd at The Dark Room. It runs through October 25th.

photo by Geof Teague

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guest post by mikl-em

BIG NEWS from The Dark Room Theater: in December they will present a live stage version of the film Star Wars. This production is being mounted with the permission of Lucasfilm. Fully sanctioned by the creators of Star Wars, they now only have the intimidating task of surviving the impending critiques of all those fanboys (and wait til theforce.net finds out!).

To help them put on this play (and weather what has been a couple slow months at the theater), this Friday and Saturday The Dark Room presents two special shows to raise funds and help them continue their mission of bringing great comedy and theater to San Francisco’s Mission District. Tickets are available from BrownPaperTickets in advance or at the door

An all-star lineup of local talent will be onstage to make each show well worth your cash, including amongst others: sensational sketch comedy from Uphill Both Ways and Kasper Hauser, incredible improv from Gerri Lawlor & Rafe Chase, stellar spoken word by Sherilyn Connelly, and the epic erudition of the one and only Hal Robins of Ask Dr. Hal fame.

Here’s a bit more from the theater’s website:

Dark Room Productions presents The Night of a Thousand Stars…Wars, a two-night cabaret show benefiting our FULLY SANCTIONED intepretation of George Lucas’ Star Wars (coming December 2008). Kids love the Dark Room, and kids loooove rascally bounty hunter Boba Fett, so we thought, what the heck, let’s call our big show a Bene-Fett!!!! In fact you might kind of say we’re the Boba Fett of Mission street theaters. Not that we have a jet pack or anything, but we can round up the best sketch comedy, yodeling, improv, spoken word, and baked goods that the galaxy (more specifically, SF) has to offer.

Also both nights you’ll get to see short films by Lev from his Tales of Mere Existence series, like the one below “A Typical Conversation With My Mom”

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guest post by mikl-em

The San Francisco Fringe Festival features 280 performances of 48 shows over 12 days. It opened last night, so there are only 266 performances to go! A quick highlight reel of some of this year’s shows is below, but first a little bit more about the festival itself

The Fringe is an uncurated festival that brings a diverse range of indie theater to San Francisco each September. Now in its 17th year, the festival includes shows from the UK, Canada and Poland, as well as Oregon, Kentucky, Virginia, Colorado, New Jersey, New York and DC. The shows themselves include original musicals, one person shows, sketch comedy, drama, a noir re-telling of an ancient Greek play, queer themes, Jewish themes, and even one that features a prominent ukulele.

The nine venues are all in the downtown and SOMA areas, so it’s designed to allow you time to get to other venues between shows. That means it’s easy to see multiple shows a night, especially because most shows are an hour or less. From now until next Sunday, September 14th, there are at least 10 shows a night, and on the weekends there are up to 40+ performances running all day long. Tickets are on the cheap side, ranging from $5-$9 (or $11 max if you buy them online) and all door money goes straight to the performers.

The center of the festival is The Exit Theater which has 3 stages each doing at least 3 shows each night of the festival. Their website has a place for attendees to write their own reviews of each play, which provides an important reference to check when deciding which shows to attend.

NOW ON TO THE SHOWS:

To Kill For, the show in the clip below, is a fanciful reprocessing of Alfred Hitchcock’s Vertigo that begins with Hitchcock himself in the afterlife. It will perform 3 times in Grace Cathedral and features several Equity actors.

Exit Sign: A Rock Opera features a great cast including Steffanos X and Dean Mermell of TomJonesing fame. They have a My Space page and everything.

Something strange and wonderful is happening in The Iron Muffin/Glass Jungle 11, including influences of Butoh, Noh Theater, and the artist’s travels to Myanmar and Thailand.

People loved The Monkey Poet show last year. This one-man-monkey-poet is a visitor from across the pond, Manchester UK to be precise. This year he’s back with a new show: The Big Brown Number Two, and is bound to be a crowd pleaser again.

Along the Path of Larks and Swallowsis the new show by Mia Paschal a repeat performer at the Fringe as well, this is her third show. Her first two were very well-received, and the early buzz on the new show is very positive also.

Then there’s There’s a Monster in the Well!, a sketch comedy show that includes performers from long-time SF sketch groups like Please Leave the Bronx, 2Good4u, and The Fresh Robots (comic Mike Spiegelman who’s also a regular at Bad Movie Night). Clusters and short bursts of uncontrolled laughter ensue….

Only one show in the fest was hot enough to make our pal Violet Blue’s sfgate sex column: Peg-Ass-Us by Pack of Others from Brooklyn. It’s about a, um, receptive boy who meets girl, and then comes singing, puppetry, nudity and–well, the description does say “no-holes-barred”…

And finally The Ukulady, another longtime Fringe favorite, brings a variety show format and unfathomable energy to her Ponyshow.

Here’s the roundup of more Fringe shows that have YouTube videos. Tickets are available at the door before each show or online in advance for a fee. More important ticket details here. And lastly the Fringe coverage from SFGate’s theater critic.

photos via Lydia Danieller, The San Francisco Fringe Festival, Mookie Bailey, Jonathan Farmer, Thessaly
Lerner

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guest post by mikl-em

Berkeley’s Shotgun Players are staging Ubu Roi the classic work of proto-dadaism. Performances will be in John Hinkel Park in Berkeley.

The show opens this Saturday and runs until mid-September, it’s a free show in the park but donations are encouraged (just like the SF Mime Troupe). It’s a rare opportunity to see a first rate production of one of the great strange theatrical works of all time. And it’s the perfect thing for an election year!

Ridiculous! Raucous! Irreverent! Absurd!

Shotgun Players invite you to jeer at the candidates, throw some rotten cabbages and stand up for what you really believe in at John Hinkel Park – starting this weekend!

Saturdays and Sundays at 4pm
August 2nd – September 14th

Bring a picnic! Or belly up to the concessions stand for a Shotgun snack.

JOHN HINKEL PARK (Southampton Ave. off The Arlington in North Berkeley)

FREE ADMISSION with Campaign contributions to Shotgun Players strongly encouraged!

FEATURING:
Dave Garrett, Ryan O’Donnell, Carla Pantoja, Gary Grossman, Sung Min Park, Casi Maggio, Marlon Deleon, Megan Guzman, Raechel Lockhardt, Alf Pollard & Jordan Winer

This is show four of an impressive 6-show year for the Shotgun Players including Beowulf (by Banana Bag & Bodice which earned Best Theatrical Production of the Year) and the upcoming Vera Wilde (with Sean Owens as Oscar Wilde). And if the on-stage work weren’t enough, Shotgun’s guest poster designer is artist R Black, that’s his work above.

Ubu Roi is a play by Alfred Jarry which pre-dated and influenced Dada (as well as Surrealism). It debuted in 1896 (when he was only 23 years old) and was, by any considered Dadaist’s terms, a mind-blowingly raging success…

To quote from Wikipedia….

Ubu Roi’s savage humor and monstrous absurdity, unlike anything thus far performed in French theater, seemed unlikely to ever actually be performed on stage. However, impetuous theater director Aurélien-Marie Lugné-Poe took the risk, producing the play at his Théâtre de l’Oeuvre.

On opening night (10 December 1896), with traditionalists and the avant-garde in the audience, King Ubu (played by Firmin Gémier) stepped forward and intoned the opening word, “Merdre!” (”Shittr!”). A quarter of an hour of pandemonium ensued: outraged cries, booing, and whistling by the offended parties, countered by cheers and applause by the more forward-thinking contingent. Such interruptions continued through the evening. At the time, only the dress rehearsal and opening night performance were held, and the play was not revived until 1907.

Alfred Jarry died that same year–1907, less than a decade into the 20th Century–at the ripe age of 34 from complications related to his sincere love for ether and absinthe.

He was remembered and his spirit carried on by friends who would become great and ground-breaking writers and artists in their own right including Guillaume Apollinaire, Max Jacob, and Pablo Picasso.

Jarry also invented “Pataphysics” which he described as the science of imaginary solutions. His other literary works include Caesar Antichrist and Le Surmâle (The Supermale) which is known as the first cyborg sex novel. A film based on The Supermale will show later this year at YBCA in San Francisco.

poster art by R Black

image #1 from the original program for Ubu Roi

image #2 from Wikipedia

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On Friday, July 4th, the San Francisco Mime Troupe debuts their new show in Dolores Park… RED STATE

What if a small town found itself at the forefront of a political fight? It’s Election Day in small town America, and that’s what happens when, due to an Electoral College tie, the entire Presidential Election comes down to the one tiny town. Suddenly, the ignored, disregarded Bluebird, Kansas is the most important town in America. And they are being pressured to quickly cast the deciding vote, and vote the “right way.”

But what would happen if they decided to wait? Can one little town hold an entire nation’s election hostage? Should it? Is bread on the farm house dinner table tonight more important than deciding who sits at the Oval Office desk tomorrow? Yep, this election could take a while . . .

I am not sure how many years SFMT has done their season-opening show on the Fourth of July at Dolores Park in San Francisco, but it’s a lotta them. As always the show is free, the music starts at 1:30 and the show at 2pm. They will ask for donations after the show, so give generously if you can.

You should get there early and bring a blanket, if you want a good seat. A picnic and a bottle of wine or three is not a bad idea either. If you miss the Friday the Fourth show, they will be doing it again on Saturday & Sunday at the same place and time. And after that they start performing the show several days a week all around SF and the greater Bay Area: see the full schedule.

The Mime Troupe, in case you weren’t aware, is not a group of white-faced silent-types, but a politically-explicit and musically-enabled company, or rather collective, that has existed since the early-60s and won 3 Obie awards. Their early performances were mostly in the Commedia dell’Arte form and included a production of Ubu Roi scored by a young Steve Reich.

Without the Mime Troupe, Bill Graham would probably never have become a music promoter.

Many other well-known names are alumnae of the group. Luis Valdez, a young college grad, spent a few months with SFMT then left to found El Teatro Campesino which was the cultural arm of the United Farm Workers in the mid-60’s. Peter Coyote was an actor, writer and director for SFMT in the 60’s.

And of course Ed Holmes, who is a long-time member of the troupe and a great friend of Laughing Squid. Ed’s alter ego is Bishop Joey, Supreme Pontiff of the First Church of the Last Laugh. Every April 1st, he celebrates “Saint Stupid’s Day” by leading a parade through downtown San Francisco. This helps the world in innumerable ways which cannot be adequately accounted. Ed has an unfortunate resemblance to Dick Cheney, which has cursed him with a set role for the last several years.

photos by San Francisco Mime Troupe and getinet

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guest post by mikl-em

A crooked ship is sailing north from San Francisco right now, tacking its way across small stages in Oregon and Washington over the next two weeks. The Curse of the Goddamned Ship by Stars & Garters Theater Company is like Gorey and Burton shanghaied by Bukowski (got it? but in a good way). It’s a decrepit lyrical beauty listing decidedly to port.

The cast includes Ben Burke, Jenny Jo, Mr. Phoenix, Jascha Ephraim, Linda Robertson and Damien Chacona. Many of these are usual suspects from the late great Odeon Bar, owned by Chicken John. For those of you who remember the place or may only have heard about it, it was San Francisco’s nexus of inspired chaos for quite some time, but not long enough.

You should catch this ship if you can, it’s a cabaret ghost shanty like none you’ve seen or heard before. And pass the word on to acquaintances, family members, and mortal enemies alike who are in the affected communities of Eugene, Seattle and both Port-land and Port Townsend. Details of dates below.

They also have a My Space page.

See previously: The Curse of the Goddamned Ship

Wed July 2nd
Eugene, OR
@ Sam Bond’s Garage
9pm, $?
w/ Sour Mash Hug Band

Thurs July 3rd
Seattle, WA
@ The Can Can
9:30pm, $?
w/ the Castaways

Fri July 4th
Seattle, WA
@ The Can Can
7:30pm, $?
w/ the Castaways

Thurs July 10th
Port Townsend, WA
@ Siren’s Pub
9pm, $?

Fri July 11th
Port Townsend, WA
@ Siren’s Pub
9pm, $?

Sun July 13th
Portland, OR
@ The Someday Lounge
9pm, $?

photo by Eva Kolenko

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