September to October Reviews

September to October Reviews

Marin Shakespeare Ends 06 Season on a Mirthful Allegro Note

In Jim Dunn's seventh stage direction at Marin Shakespeare, the award-winning
veteran director concocts a hilariously up dated rendition of the Bard's
Comedy of Errors. In one of Shakespeare's most improbable farcial situations
revolving around mistaken identity, two sets of identical twins, consisting of two
masters and their servants, appear in the same town to create havoc when
mistaken for one another.The twins undergo accusations of betraying their wives
with other women, owing money, losing their minds and other misunderstandings.
Director Dunn and his fine cast of eighteen comedians play to the hilt confusing
bits such as one brother asking his servant to bring him gold only to receive
a rope ordered by his twin. In another scene the servant is covered by kisses
by a woman who has mistaken him for his twin. Each scene becomes more
ludicrous as the mistaken identity broadens.
To further enliven the farcical aspect of the play Dunn gives free rein to
his actors to improvise and insert modern day fads such as drinking coca cola
out of cans and wearing large horn-rimmed eyeglasses, sneakers and wrist watches
that never jar but harmonize well with the production's stylized delivery of
the text and use of some traditional costumes.
Contrary to other regional and national Shakespeare productions, Dunn, in
combining contemporary elements of staging and modern day scenery (Bruce
Lackovic) and costumes( Abra Berman) with the more traditional aspects of staging
Shakespeare, never goes overboard for the sake of innovation at the expense of
obliviating the Bard's prose. He allows us to savor Shakespeare's wisdom and
lyricism as well as succeeds in" contemporizing" the work and freeing it from
becoming an unimaginative, staid interpretation.
In this season's stagings of King Lear, Alice in Wonderland and The Comedy of
Errors, Marin Shakespeare has.offered a highly varied reperoire of tragedy,
fantasy and comedy.
For information on the upcoming Marin Shakespeare season visit
www.marinshakespeare.org

Trials! Oy Vey! Trials! at the Fringe

Best of Fringe 05 awardee for his Sperm Warfare, David Rouda's next play,
Pomp and Circumstance, at the 06 Fringe offered a unique experience for critics
who were formally subpoenaed to be present at a pomp reception on opening
night, after which they were conducted by a court baileff to the play's opening at
the Exit Theatre. Midst the excitement of crowds attending multiple Fringe
stagings, Rouda's play got under way. We learn that a young adventurous and
imaginative lawyer is challenging his father, an established criminal defense
lawyer, as the former takes on a personal injury case. The action revolves around
sex and love and religious and civil law when, to please his young bride, a
Jewish husband overdoses on pills to increase his virility.
A second trial is based on an actor's reliving of his role of Othello off
stage that causes him to murder the actress with whom he is playing.Although this
shorter second trial spoofing silly court cases enhances the satirical humor
of the play some spectators may be confused about its relationship to the rest
of the production.This could possibly be remedied by a fuller development of
the second court case and by tying it more closely together with the ensemble.

Throughout Rouda incorporates a Jewish flavor utilizing Jewish characters,
names and cultural allusions that add to the comedic value of the work and that
in its rapid change of action and pace also recalls the playwright's
experience as a writer of T.V. drama.
All in all David Rouda's play is staged with careful directon by Rouda,
simple set design by Rouda and Sergio Sepulveda, and performed by a fine cast of
largely Bay Area actors. Although written in the style of a lively and light
diversion, the play has the makings of a meaningful satire on the absurdity and
pomp and circumstance of civil and religious law in courtroom trails as well as
on lawyer ambitions.
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War and Motherhood in Brecht's Mother Courage at Berkeley Rep

As Mother Courage forges ahead with her cart pulled by herself and her
children selling goods to soldiers during the 30 years war to feed and clothe her
family, she intrepidly survives all the impediments that she encounters,
including the military officers who lure her sons into a war that she well knows will
take them from her for good. And yet because of the war she and her children
are able to survive."As long as there is a war it (like love) will find its
way," she says. After the war takes her sons' lives she continues onward with
her daughter until war removes this last child from her. At play's end we see
Mother Courage struggling to push her heavy cart alone and we leave the theatre
wondering how much more this courageous mother can sustain.
This tale of the horrors of war is softened somewhat by songs sung by cast
members, including a lullaby by Mother Courage to her dead daughter that is both
moving and thought-provoking. Leishman's original compositions combining
military, circus and cabaret music for piano, accordeon and tuba provide a
refreshing change from the harpooning on war that reoccurs throughout the play.
Brecht's piece was triggered by his own experience fleeing the Nazi invasion.
Although he intended through his theories on epic theatre to spark spectators
to revolt against the absurdity of war rather than move them emotionally on
the fate of a strong willed mother struggling to protect her children, this
production, as well as others, cannot completely avoid an emotional (rather than
an exclusively reasoned) reaction to the human losses of the heroine.

Well directed by Lisa Peterson (aside from what may be an intended slowness
of pace), the cast offers some excellent characterizations a la Brecht. Ivonne
Coll in the principal role adds a Hispanic flavor to her part as she ignites
our feelings against war in her determined and indignant outcrys against it.
Katie Barrett follows suit in her fine creation of the loud-mouthed, promiscuous
Yvette. Patrick Kerr's chaplain and Jan Monroe's cook are colorful
characterizations and Katie Huard is a sensitive mute Kattrin, aware of her mother's
every need.
Sets by Rachel Hauck and costumes by David Zinn, mostly modern, along with
Alexander V. Nichols' varied lighting effects, blend with the action to
wonderfully convey the dramatic content.
The Berkeley Rep production is a tribute to Brecht's vision of a theatre that
empowers us to reevaluate the validity of war, the heroism of which may bring
at the very most statues and banners of one's heroism but not without the
higher price of the perdition of human lives.
Mother Courage continues thru Oct. 22. For info, call 510-647-2949 or visit
www.berkeleyrep.org.

The Challenge of Caricature in Stoppard's Travesties

After Carey Perloff's announcement of the official renaming of the Geary
Theatre as the Actors Conservatory Theatre, later followed by a champagne toast
during intermission, Stoppard's Travesties took off with audacious visuals of
tableaux frames, a librarian flying across the stage while placing books on a
bookshelf, and furniture and props circulating about that sparkled the curiosity
of an audience dazzled by this opening presented in Dadaist style. Then there
appeared the elderly figure of Henry Carr in a wheelchair who attempts to
recall his memories of encounters in 1917 in Zurich with novelist James Joyce,
Dadaist Tristan Tzara, Bolshevik leader Lenin and his fellow Marxist wife along
with two English females involved with these personalities. Interspersed with
Carr's lengthy, but well enacted narration, are scenes that illustrate these
figures' farcical interchange of ideas on art and politics.
Well directed by Carey Perloff, the play is comprised of intellectual
discussions and judgements of the artist's role in worldwide political conflicts
(such as World War 1) along with the evaluations of the works of Joyce and Tzara
and the politics of Lenin presented in light bantering back and forth of witty
conversation. These playful interchanges of ideas take precedence over
humorous human intrigues, one of which involves English librarian Gwendolen's
relationship with Tristan Tzara, who is madly in love with her but whose affection
she will not accept until he, like herself, admires the genius and talent of her
mentor James Joyce.
Geordie Johnson delivers the long solo passages of the elder Carr with his
failing memory and manages to hold audience attention admirably well.
Anthony Fusco as the sometimes reserved, sometimes firy James Joyce is
convincing. Geoff Hoyle moves with ease from his role as the stylized, serious
butler Bennett (at one point juggling scarves while serving) while beneath his
serious allure scoffing all he sees about him to the role of the dictatorial
Bolshevik leader Lenin played in a delightful clownesque manner. Joan Mankin as
Lenin's wife and political follower commands our attention with her military-like
vaudevillesque stance. Renee Augesen as Gwendolen and Allison Jean White as
Cecily offer portraits of charming frivolous English ladies. Gregory Wallace's
colorful farcical caracterization of the Dadist artist is somewhat over the
top.
Scenic effects by Douglas W. Schmidt, costumes by Deborah Dryden with
lighting effects by Robert Wierzel are visually breathtaking.
As the play's title suggests (derived from the French travestir meaning to
disguise, extended to signify "caricature"), the play caricatures noted artists
and political figures residing in Zurich in 1917 who bounce about ideas on
their role in the shadow of the 1st World War. This production well captivates
intellectual exchanges, games of clever witticisms and light argumentation that
reflect Stoppard's verbal talent and mastery of jeux de l'esprit or play of
the mind.
Travesties continues through Oct. 22. For info. call 415-749-2228 & online
www.act-sf.org.

Charles Mee's Bouncing Big Love by Fool's Fury at Traveling Jewish Theatre

Charles Mee's award-winning Big Love at the Traveling Jewish Theatre has
Fool's Fury's cast bouncing about on mats as fifty American brides (performed by
three actresses) who escape from arranged marriages to fifty Greek males flee
to the shores of Italy where they encounter Piero, the owner of a villa, and
convince him to give them refuge. But when their husbands arrive by heliocopter
to recuperate the women who abandoned them at the altar they are faced with
Piero's order to go through with their wedding in his villa. Resolved to murder
their future husbands during the ceremony, in the scenes that precede the
wedding both the males and females illustrate their male female frustrations by
throwing about their bodies, falling hard on the mats, somersaulting and
performing circus acrobatics along with the use of modern dance and mime that soon
has the staging resembling a multi media production.
However, all of this bursting of action does not exclude passages of poetic
philosophy that reveal Mee's ideas on male female relationships, sexuality,
love, marriage, justice and the meaning of life and happiness. These spontaneous
verbal passages take us by surprise and spark his interest throughout.
The actors in this production, physically well trained and adept as movement
theatre artists, are applauded for their versatility and perfected technique
(even if at times their physical virtuosity takes precedence over the verbal
richness of the text and has some spectators cringing for the actors' safety).
In contrast, Linda Ayres Frederick as Piero's Italian mother with a perfect
Italian accent, creating a warm, down-to-earth elderly woman, and Josiah Polhemus
as the authoritative Piero, acting as observers of the tumultuous physical
action, offer strong interpretations central to the main action.
Sets by Sean Riley with valises and wine glasses along the walls and a real
vintage bathtub and piano are highly innovative and Ambra Sultzbaugh's costumes
are both attractive and allow for physical movement.
Directed by Anne Bogart trained Laley Lippard of the Fool's Fury company, the
staging brings out the many facets of movement stemming from movement
theatre, dance-mime and clowning. It also recalls the movement of Greek chorus, one
of the sources of Mee's play being Aeschylus' Suppliant Women. Lippard has
successfully combined Fool's Fury movement aesthetic and the intensive physical
training of Anne Bogart's SITI Co.with the poetic, philosophic and
psychological truths concerning the male female relationship that Mee imparts in his
highly imaginative and original theatre.
Big Love plays through Oct. 21. For information call 1-800-838.3006 or visit
www.browntickets.com.

The Many Proofs in the Ross Valley Players' Proof

Back again to direct with the Ross Valley Players, Chris Cassell's newest
theatre adventure is David Aubun's Proof, an intriguing play revolving around the
proof of a deceased math professor's mathematical discovery that involves his
family members and a student working with him.The action continues around the
professor's daughter Catherine who attempts to salvage the research of her
father whose efforts to continue were arrested by mental illness and cancer.
When Hal, her father's math student, asks to see his professor's notebooks and
Catherine, suspecting Hal's intentions to steal his father's findings, refuses
the drama intensifies. And when Hal proves his honesty and that her father has
achieved an imortant breakthrough in math, the play finds its resolution but
not without posing another mystery that requires proof. Is Catherine's
declaration that despite her limited knowledge in math it was she that who the proof
of the theorem while helping her father true? And is Catherine's secret
undertaking of searching for the proof of the theorem not evidence of her love and
faith in her father's ability to do so?

Proof 's production value lie in Cassell's careful, nuanced direction along
with motivated physical movement and in the concentrated acting of Katherine
McDowell as Catherine, Wood Lockhart as Robert, Michael Abts as Hal and
Jeanette Harrison as Claire. Set design by Don Cate and prop design by Lnda Dunn
appear simple but can one prove that the arch leading to the rear of the house is
not symbolic of a mathematical form that challenges our imagination? Costume
design by Michael A. Berg conforms with the reserved attire of an academic
ambience.
The production excites the spectator's curiosity throughout with its multiple
mysteries needing proof in the domains of mathematics and concerning the
human relationships involved in searching for other proofs.
Proof plays until October 22 at the Ross Valley Players' Barn. For
information call 415-456-9555 or visit www.rossvalleyplayers.com.

In Character: Actors Acting Exhibit at S.F. Performing Arts

In honor of photographer Howard Schatz's book, In Character: Actors Acting,
the San Francisco Performing Arts Library and Museum is featuring an
exhibition by the same name, which opened with a reception attended by Schatz on
Thursday, September 21, 2006. For the book, Schatz invented scenarios and then
photographed 105 well known actors doing what they do best; acting. Each actor was
given a direction, a character to play, a scene, and, at times, even dialog;
and Schatz photographed them as they developed their parts. The exhibition is
open free to the public Tuesdays-Fridays, 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. and Saturdays from
1 p.m. to 5 p.m. through February 24, 2007 at PALM on the fourth floor of the
Veteran's Building, 401 Van Ness Avenue, San Francisco. Phone 415-255-4800.
By Flora Lynn Isaacson for Annette Lust

Arthur Miller's Ride Down Mt. Morgan or "Who Gets the Husband?"at the
S.F. Playhouse

S.F. Playhouse's fourth season opened with Miller's so-called last play,
The Ride Down Mt. Morgan, centering around a tantalizing conflict between
bigamist Lyman Felt's two wives, one devoted and boring after 32 years of
marriage, and the younger one passionate and sensual who renews the hero's lust for
life. After Lyman has an accident on a Mt. Morgan hill and finds himself in a
hospital bed, the two wives meet at his bedside to discover that they have the
same husband who has been living the lie of being the husband to each..
Miller succeeds in stretching this premise into a drawn out conflict that
offers truths about the disillusionment of marriage. "Why do people stay together
once they realize who they are with?" asks the playwright at one point. And
Lyman's contention to his wives that the simultaneous gift of each wife,
loyalty on the part of one and passion on the part of the other, mutually create the
happiness of both of them as well as that of Lyman because the hero's
contentment with having both looyalty and passion has repercussions on their
contentment.
In response to these supposed truths, the dramatic action provokes several
questions. Did Lyman rationalize his egocentric desires to ease his moral qualms
about being a bigamist? And is the accident he has had (and did he really
have one?) and the medication he has taken cause him to fear and fanticize the
possibility of two women with whom he is involved confronting one another at
his bedside? In director Joy Carlin's program notes, she mentions that in
Miller's play the line between reality, memory and fantasy is blurred.
Expertly directed by B.AT.C.C. awardee Joy Carlin with good all-around acting
interpretations by Victor Talmadge as Lyman, Karen Grassle as wife #1, Nancy
Carlin as wife #2, Keith Burkland as the lawyer, Kristin Stokes as daughter
Bessie and special mention for Marjorie Crump-Shears as the warmhearted Nurse
Logan.
Both Miller and the S.F. Playhouse have done it again with the writing and
production values of an intriguing, imaginative and truthful depiction of how to
beat the darker side of the ethics of married life.
The Ride Down Mt. Morgan continues thru Nov. 4. For information call
415-677-9596 or visit www.sfplayhouse.org.

Shepard's God of Hell, Political Farce and Beyond

Sam Shepard's response,in the form of a political farce to Bush's invasion of
Iraq now playing at the S.F. Magic Theatre starts out on a very low key when
we meet Emma and Frank living on a Wisconsin farm peacefully caring for their
heifers and having taken in a former friend of Frank's who resides in their
basement. When Frank tells Emma that the friend (Mr. Haynes) used to work for
the government and that he had a job in which he was tortured, Emma's curiosity
peaks. With the sudden appearance of an individual (Welch) who sells
patriotic flags and banners and asks who is living in the basement, she begins to be
disturbed by their visitor's presence. After she rids herself of the salesman,
we learn that Haynes gives off static shock when approached and that the
salesman could be a government agent looking for Haynes. The dramatic action mounts
when Welch returns and, utilizing fear tactics, claims that their home could
explode any time due to a force that the government if fighting. After
succeeding in finding Haynes, gruesomely tormenting him (by tying a rope to his penis
and pulling him around the living room), Welch marches off with Frank who now
is converted to Welch's ideas. Emma is left alone to resist against
government intrusion on their farm, desperately pulling on the cow bell she used to
call her husband in their stable with his heifers.

Directed by award-winning Amy Glaze the play is performed by a strong cast
with Anne Darragh and John Flanagan realistically depiciting a farm couple,
Michael Santo as a caricature of Bush, and Jackson Davis convincing as the
tormented victim.
Shepard's play has wonderful potential in content and form with the
possibilty to create interesting characters. Yet it could be still stronger if both the
production and writing could move beyond political farce directly targeting
our present president and refer to all leaders who manifest their dictatorial
nature and ask such telling questions about their honesty such as "you didn't
think that you could ride on the back of democracy forever, did you?" Although
this is the playwright's intent, a less pointed finger at our present
situation with a more universal reference to all tyrannical government take-overs
could render the piece more meaningful than restricting it to a political farce
referring to one leader and one incident in history.
God Of Hell continues at the Magic through Oct. 22. For information call
415-441-8822 or visit www.magictheatre.org.