Wendy Wasserstein Dies at Age 55

After weeks of no news on Wendy Wasserstein's illness, word came out today about her untimely death. Here's Playbill.com's report.

Nothing much more to say....

Dinner Theatre: Filippos and Shotgun Players

I love the Ashby Stage, home of Shotgun Players. It's right next to the Ashby BART, which means you can not only pay lots of money to BART from the city to the theatre, but also park right across the street form the theatre as well.

What I don't like about the Ashby Stage so much is the lack of restaurants in the immediate vicinity. Sure, there's the Berkeley Bowl, but I wasn't quite up for that. Now, I don't go to the Ashby Stage very often, so this first Dinner Theatre column already exposes my lack of restaurant knowledge. Deal, or suggest.

So, the other thing I dislike about, well, Berkeley, is the traffic. I know, I'm not supposed to drive. But sorry, I want food. So we (me and my thetare date) drove, uh, crawled up to College, where we parked (I have good parking karma) and walked into the first acceptable restaurant closest to the car: Filippos.

Cute but social atmosphere plus great and super-fast service make Filippos a great pre-theatre restaurant--as long as you don't mind getting back in the car and careening back down Ashby. I had butternut squash ravioli in a sage and butter sauce, which was pretty nice, though the pasta was a bit too firm. My date had something with chicken and penne and red sauce, equally nice. And at about $10 or less a plate, pretty economical.

By the time you read this, the Shotgun Players show Cabaret would have closed, so treat this as a mere historical piece. Hey, the show didn't need another review anyway--it already got great reviews and sold out its month-long extension. Director Russell Blackwood outdid himself with the show's concept and design, from the Kit Kat Klub girls flirting with the audience before the show--Divina Cohen made an especially nice lap partner--to the sleight of hand to implicating the audience in the "Tomorrow Belongs to Me" number and especially the end where the whole Klub comes down. Blackwood's kinkiness is evidenced, yet he mixes it wonderfully with this intelligent interpretation. Kimberly Dooley was absolutely fetching as Sally Bowles, and Cassidy Brown framed her nicely as Clifford Bradshaw. I only wish that Clive Worsley was still playing the EmCee. I did feel bad for Kieran Chavez, who did just fine in the role, because anyone who knows Worsley's acting would be looking forward to his edgy performance.

My guess is that Blackwood was also behind the lobby decorations, the kinky photos and especially the peep shows in the walls, which revealed drawing and dioramas--the really kinky stuff, of course, was closer to the floor. So shorter people like kids could see? Actually, a couple brought in some kids, who looked no older than 12. I watched as one of the pre-show actors pulled them aside and started talking intently. I guess they were mature enough to handle nudity and all the sexual innuendo--and overtness.

In all, a good and cheap meal plus an entertaining musical (and parking at BART) made for a good Friday evening of Dinner Theatre.

Regarding Disney/Pixar

The editor over at Waterbones--a friend of Staged Readings--has the most amusing anecdote to come out of the Disney takeover of Pixar.

Children's Theatre

Though hardly anything can beat David Sedaris's Holidays on Ice, where a theatre critic writes about children's holiday pageants, this dispatch in The Onion comes close.
Thanks, "theatre date."

Overheard

Overheard by EM at Lestat:
"Do you know about the play at ACT by David Mamet [pronounced as rhyming with "play"]?"

As Eddie Izzard would say, "We pronounce it Mamet because it's got a fucking T in it."

Sad Story

Disney just bought Pixar. How depressing.

In On It

Daniel MacIvor's In On It, playing at Encore Theatre Company, is one of those self-reflexive plays-within-a-play about two lovers who act out a play, interrupting the scenes to comment on them. Yeah, when you hear that, you almost want to groan. But this is one of the smartest and most elegant plays I've seen in a long time, with equally elegant direction (by MacIvor; yes, sometimes playwrights are excellent at directing their work) and lighting and sound design.

Some of the beauty of this script lies in the structure, naturally multi-layered, with the two actors alternating parts. But just when you think a scene is going to go in a cliched direction, it shifts and ends on a surprisingly funny, absurd or heart-breaking note. You think you've heard this story before, or know where the scene's going, but you don't really. MacIvor repeatedly strikes perfect notes and earns every line (and especially the end).

Actors Glenn Peters and local Ian Scott McGregor turn in outstanding and precise performances. The script allows for a perfect synthesis between playwright and actor: the actors are able to bring so much to the play, but not at the expense of the script. If you see a lot of plays, or work in the community, you think you see plays where you think the script allows the actors to play or you think you see the actors respecting the script, but I don't think that really happens that much. In this play, you really get a sense that something's clicking, which is ironic, given that the actors (in the play within a play) question the playwright often.

I know a play is good when my "theatre date" can't stop marveling at it, when he raves about it, then is quiet for a few minutes, and then starts: "And in this scene...that was just perfect." I especially know it's good when he talks about how good the script is.

In On It is one of those perfectly enjoyable plays that makes you think, that's funny, and most importantly, believes in the intelligence of its audience.

Serenade

Just got a call at home from Trev, who's MC'ing the second day of TBA's General Auditions at Berkeley Rep, on my birthday, no less. Well, he got the accompanist to play and all the casting directors (about 90) to sing happy birthday to me from the stage over his cell phone.

So, thank you to all over at Berkeley Rep this morning for making me smile!

What's Up

I'm taking a weekend off again. TBA is holding its general auditions at Berkeley Rep, and my "theatre date" is MC'ing the three-day event, and besides, I'm turning 30 again. (I hated the 20s.) Anyway, what I usally do on my birthday is present an award for best costume designer or best supporting male in a drama over at Contra Costa County's Shellie Awards, which is a total trip.

However, what I would recommend is The Mystery Plays over at SF Playhouse, which opens tonight. I met playwright Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa while attending the critics institute at the O'Neill Playwrights Center a few years back, and his work is really fun. Read more about it on SFist.

Fire, Opera?

Unfortunately, the Crucible's fire opera doesn't live up to the hype. Not enough good opera for the opera people, and not enough fire for the fire people. Though, as a friend pointed out, "I've never been to opera that required me to wear safety glasses in the first row."

Not that they didn't do some cool things: mini motorcycles, a flame thrower, flaming nipples, you know, the usual. I was just expecting way more spectacle.

Did Lestat Suck?

You know, it's usually a bad sign when a theatre writer, when talking about (because I won't admit to reviewing) a show, starts off with the scenic design. Especially when they rave about the scenic design. It usually means the rest of the show sucked, and/or the scenic design isn't really that great, but by comparison, it rocks. Well, neither is the case. Lestat didn't suck as much as it could have, and the scenic design really was great. And because the one review I read didn't spend even enough time on it, I'll do it here.

First, any theatre artist who's been wanting to integrate multimedia into theatre--and you know who you are, because I know who's reading, and that means that I know you know who you are--should go see this musical. Really, I'm not kidding. And, even better, you may be able to get half-price tickets because the Chron gave the show a Sleeping Man.

Now, my big disclaimer is I loooove Dave McKean's art. The one comic I religiously collected was Sandman (and thanks to eBay I have a full set), which lead me to buy anything that McKean worked on. So, when I heard he was the visual consultant on Lestat, well, I thought maybe it wouldn't be so bad after all.

Now, this musical integrated the multimedia perfectly. I'm used to seeing wavering rear projections degenerating into a blue screen of death, or, worse, actors sitting at computers while their chat room conversations are written out on a huge screen above their heads. That is to say, most haven't figured out a way for multimedia and story to coexist without at least one element being compromised. In Lestat, it worked very well. For example, in Anne Rice's books, we learn that when a vampire (or at least her vampire) bites its victim, he or she sees all the victim's memories. How do you do this onstage? Obviously, with film. But memories are fragmented, overlapping things, and that's why McKean's collaged images work so well. So, the vampire bites (centerstage of course, with dramatic lighting), and the filmic memories are projected on the screen above the actors. You don't miss any action while watching the screen. Also, how do you show a vampire burning onstage, without hurting the actor? Well, go check that one out. McKean's images also helped fill in the set design by complementing actual set pieces with background images that evoked the numerous settings the story inhabited. Now, the risk here is that multimedia will start taking away from our idea of traditional musical theatre. I heard that one audience member complained it was like seeing a show at Paramount's Great America. But, come on people: musical theatre is about spectacle! If some witch in training can defy gravity, then vampires can burn. I may even go so far as to say that the genre of musical theatre should learn to incorporate multimedia the way Lestat has, and more, if it wants to survive as a viable form of entertainment. We live in Silicon Valley, after all.

Now, that said, here's the part where I defend my assertion that Lestat didn't suck as much as it could have. Hmm, well.... OK, look, the book needs work, but it's not a total loss. They have the story, they just need to edit. They didn't make a hokey vampire musical; it's really about a man's (or vampire's) personal journey. However, I will complain that they turned the child vampire Claudia into Veruca Salt (witness "I Want More"). The main problem is that the music and songs were all the same. I thought having some pop song writers on the job would make the musical less smaltzy, but it just made it dull. What John and Taupin could learn from the masters is that the songs should not only sound different, but contribute to the plot and character development and so on in different ways. I mean, when the best song in the show belongs to Lestat's mother, who virtually disappears after act one, you've got a problem. Also, speaking of act one, I found all the projected time markers amusing: "6 weeks later," "30 years later." Considering that vampires live forever, 30 years is like mere seconds, and, really, unnecessary to note. A lot of that can be deduced from the text, and the projections just makes the audience groan. I mean, you might as well put a huge stopwatch onstage.

You know, I was really unimpressed by Wicked at its world premiere, and I didn't think was all that bad by comparison. It wasn't as bad as LestatMambo Kings. (I heard enough about the Lennon previews to stay away, so I can't compare that.) I think it probably does have an audience, and, if cleaned up and if Elton John decides to devote at least 11 more days to the show, it could probably do OK.

Honestly, that's the first show I've been to in quite a while. The next couple of week sees the beginning of "theatre season, round two." But, frankly, I'm psyched that I got tickets to The Crucible's fire opera Thursday night. Hopefully, I won't see actors--vampires or otherwise--on fire there.

Yea Kittens

One of the top 5 referring links to this blog is a Web search for the VH-1 kittens, which is linked to an "Encore" post.

I'm not sure how I feel about that.

But for all you fans, here's another funny cat video that's been a hit at JibJab. It's not the VH-1 kittens, but still funny.