Theatrical Garden

The Arts Research Center at UC Berkeley presents the first reading from the new theatrical adaptation of Michael Pollan's book, The Botany of Desire, on April 24 at 5:30. Pollan will be in attendance and will apparently talk afterward on the experience of seeing his book turned into a play. (Pollan has a loose connection to the acting world: he's Michael J. Fox's brother-in-law.)

Dan Hiatt plays the role of The Gardener.

This "new play with music" is by director Alex Harvey and composer John Gromada, who are artists-in-residence at the Center. According to the press release, "Harvey and Gromada say they plan to contrast solo monologues that capture Pollan’s wry, inquisitive first-person narrative with more operatic, expressionistic scenes that bring to life the array of characters who wander through his tale—American pioneers, Dutch burghers, Ottoman Turks, genetic scientists, and even Dionysus himself. Following the four-part structure of the book, which explores the history of the apple, tulip, cannabis, and potato, a series of episodes will transport the Gardener to times and places throughout history, always returning him to his garden—physically unscathed yet spiritually altered. The reading at Berkeley will feature the apple section."

Love that last line. I haven't read the book, but it certainly sounds scathing.

Berkeley Rep Premieres Green Day Musical

Holy shit--here's some awesome crazy news for a Monday morning.

On September 4, 2009, Berkeley Rep presents the world premiere of Green Day's American Idiot. The band, which as many know came up from Berkeley's punk movement, is collaborating with Spring Awakening director Michael Mayer, and SA producers Tom Hulce and Ira Pittelman will also be connected with the American Idiot production.

Says Billie Joe Armstrong in a press release, “We are really excited to be working with Michael Mayer on this project. We’d been thinking of bringing American Idiot to the stage, but knew we needed to find the right partners. After meeting with Michael to discuss the possibility, he invited us to see Spring Awakening. We were so impressed with that production, as well as his vision for American Idiot, that we knew we’d found the perfect collaborator. Plus, doing it in our hometown at Berkeley Rep was an obvious bonus. They’re an amazing theatre group, very adventurous, and their willingness to take chances is in keeping with the spirit of the album. The end result will be terrific, and we’re really proud.”

American Idiot (the musical) includes every song from the album plus several songs from its upcoming release 21st Century Breakdown.

Tickets for American Idiot are on sale now.

Who Let the Dogs Out?

I just couldn't wait until Monday to add Chad Jones's Theater Dogs back to my blogroll. Welcome back, sir!

ACT Season (Hint: Marco)

American Conservatory Theater announced its season today, and those waiting to see Marco Barricelli back on stage will only have to wait, well, about another year. Marco shares the stage with Olympia Dukakis in Morris (The Overcoat) Panych's Vigil next March.

Other offerings include the world premiere of The Tosca Project in June (2010), which explores 100 years of the famed Tosca Cafe, the world premiere of Phedre, in association with the Canada's New Burbage Stratford Shakespeare Festival, the U.S. premiere of Noel Coward's Brief Encounter with England's Kneehigh Theatre, and the West Coast premiere of David Mamet's November.

Rounding things out are Caucasian Chalk Circle, Ayckbourne's Round and Round the Garden, and...Christmas Carol.

For those who can't wait until next year to see Marco perform, he's scheduled to do a staged reading of a Mark Twain piece at Shakespeare Santa Cruz, where he's currently the AD, on April 5.

Thom Pain Rocks

OK, I don't usually do this sort of thing, and I'm hyper-sensitive about it because we try to be fair to everyone, but when I heard that some of the weekly papers and the Chronicle haven't yet been to Cutting Ball's production of Thom Pain (based on nothing), I couldn't believe it.

Because the show totally rocks!

Look, just because it's a solo show doesn't mean it's slight. The script is brilliant (read more about playwright Will Eno's thoughts on the fourth wall), really inventive in its deviations. And, I've never had the chance to see actor Jonathan Bock before, so I won't say "where did this guy come from?," but he was totally spot-on on opening night. Seriously. He had the tone and the lines down perfect, as if he had been performing for two months already.

Admittedly, I'm a little biased. My husband has worked (and still is) with CB's Rob Melrose, and we're more than acquaintances with Rob and Paige.

Also, I'm well aware that there are several awesome shows (and companies) out there that the Chron doesn't see or review, and that falls under the whole problem of the past decade (at least) wherein the Chron doesn't devote enough writers or space to theatre, and now newspapers are all dying anyway, so what the heck are theatres gonna do then, and the May issue of the magazine will have at least one article touching on the "future of theatre criticism" topic, so I won't go into here. Clearly.

And, to be a little more fair, here are the other shows I've seen in the past couple of weeks that were all intriguing:
A Beautiful View at Theatre Rhino
Machinal at Brava
Skin at Climate
Where the Sidewalk Ends at Boxcar
(I actually haven't been seeing a whole lot of small SF theatre lately, so I was trying to catch up)

And here's what's on my to-see list (so far):
Lydia at Marin Theatre Company
Kite Runner at SJ Rep
War Music at ACT
Miss Julie at Aurora
Over the Mountain at Brava

Vibrator on Broadway

Today Berkeley Rep announced that Sarah Ruhl's In the Next Room (Or the Vibrator Play), which just closed last week, receives its Broadway debut at the Shubert in October. This will also be the Broadway debut for both Ruhl and director Les Waters (who will stage a new production after having staged the world premiere at the Rep). This is the eighth show in eight years that Berkeley Rep developed and sent to New York.

7 Lucky Website Tips

Every month after my staff and I process a couple hundred listings, we notice the same problems with companies’ websites. Here’s a little list of 7 lucky website tips—lucky, because it’s St. Patrick’s Day and I’m giving out a little luck o’ the Irish.

But seriously, this stuff is important, because often calendar editors and journalists look at companies’ websites for more information on a press release, or to double-check spelling and show info.

1. Make sure the “current show” is actually the current show, not the show that closed 2-6 months ago. Seriously.

2. Complete and correct information for your current/next show. This includes the correct dates. I find that about 50% of the time, the press release for the current show has different dates than the site.

3. Your current season, with correct dates. Update the list as needed. We use your sites to determine articles and Editors’ Picks up to three months in advance.

4. Your past seasons/production history. This is incredibly useful for journalists—we often want to reference your past productions, or simply want to find that info.

5. Your box office number in an easy-to-find place, and/or a link to buy tickets online. Why wouldn’t you want to have these on your site?

6. Contact info for all important staff members. Again, spell their names correctly, and if you list an email address and/or phone number, please make sure they check their email and voicemail often. I can’t tell you how many smaller theatre companies I’ve wanted to do an Editors’ Pick on and didn’t simply because they returned my phone calls and emails more than a week after I sent them.

7. Downloadable production photos for you current production. Include lower-res for the web and higher-res for print. Caption the photos and credit the photographer.

Latest Chron News

For those interested in following all the drama at the San Francisco Chronicle, and keeping up with the news, such as the fact that the ratification vote has been moved to Saturday (tomorrow), check out the California Media Workers Guild site.

SF's New Daily

Notice I didn't add the word "paper" to that headline. Because, didn't you know, paper's dying? Anyway, the new SF Appeal, a online daily news site, just launched, helmed by the talented and energetic Eve Batey, who was the editor that put SFist on the map (now still doing well in the hands of Brock Keeling) and was also the managing editor of online at the SFGate.

Batey, who was always a supporter of arts and culture, hired Richard Ciccarone of the Funny But Mean sketch group and a past contributor to Theatre Bay Area magazine, to write up theatre pieces for the site. Check out today's post on Machinal, which opens tonight at Brava.

Solis's Lydia a Steinberg Finalist

Octavio Solis, who graces the cover of the current magazine, emailed me that Lydia is a finalist for the Steinberg Award. Lucky us, we get to see Lydia this month at Marin Theatre Company.

Here's the release:

U.S. THEATER CRITICS NAME SIX FINALISTS
FOR 2009 STEINBERG/ATCA AWARD --
LARGEST NATIONAL NEW PLAY AWARD

The American Theatre Critics Association (ATCA) has selected six finalists for the 2009 Harold and Mimi Steinberg/ATCA New Play Award, which recognizes the best new scripts produced professionally outside New York City during 2008.

The winner and two additional citations will be presented April 4 at Actors Theatre of Louisville during the Humana Festival of New American Plays. The top award includes a commemorative plaque and a cash prize of $25,000 – currently the largest national new play award – with $7,500 for each citation.

The finalists are:
* “Becky’s New Car” by Steven Dietz is “a warmly humorous and nimble romantic farce … a genial consideration of loves lost and found, midlife and middle-class ennui and American car lust,” said the Seattle Times. It was produced in October 2008 by ACT Theatre in Seattle.

* “Great Falls” by Lee Blessing is a wry drama about a stepfather and his disaffected stepdaughter trying to make connections on a road trip across the American West. It was produced in February 2008 at the Humana Festival of New American Plays at Actors Theatre of Louisville. Blessing won the award in 2006 for “A Body of Water” and 1987 for “A Walk in the Woods.”

* “Lydia” by Octavio Solis is a searing depiction of a dysfunctional Mexican-American family in the 1970s dealing with issues of immigration, assimilation and mental illness. It premiered at the Denver Center Theatre Company in January 2008.

* “Our Enemies: Lively Scenes of Love and Combat” by Yussef El Guindi depicts Muslim-Americans struggling among themselves how to portray their cultural identity and how deeply to assimilate in the post-9/11 world. It was produced in March 2008 by Silk Road Theatre Project in Chicago.

* “Song of Extinction” by E.M. Lewis starts as a realistic examination of ecology, genocide, isolation, music, family relationships and a host of other issues but morphs into a dreamscape which weaves the disparate strands into a cohesive pattern of inter-connectedness. It premiered in November 2008 at Moving Arts in Hollywood. Lewis won ATCA’s Francesca Primus Award last year.

* “Superior Donuts” by Tracy Letts is a comic drama portraying the resurrection of a former ‘60s radical who is hiding from disappointments and tragedies by running a tiny Chicago doughnut shop. His isolation is challenged by a young black man seeking a job and running from some secrets of his own. It premiered in June at Steppenwolf Theater.

Consideration for the Steinberg/ATCA awards is limited to new plays not yet produced in New York City by the end of the year. These six finalists were selected from plays nominated by ATCA members, then evaluated by a committee of 13 theater critics, led by chairman Wm. F. Hirschman of the South Florida Sun-Sentinel.

Other committee members are Misha Berson, Seattle Times; Bruce Burgun, Bloomington Herald Times and Back Stage; Michael Elkin, Jewish Exponent (Pa.); Jay Handelman, Sarasota Herald-Tribune; Pam Harbaugh, Florida Today (Melbourne); Leonard Jacobs, New York Press, Back Stage and The Clyde Fitch Report; Chad Jones, Oakland (Cal.) Tribune; Elizabeth Keill, Independent Press (Morristown, NJ); Elizabeth Maupin, Orlando Sentinel; Wendy Parker, The Village Mill (Midlothian, Va.); Michael Sander, Back Stage (Minn.); and Herb Simpson, Totaltheater.com (Rochester, NY).

“This year’s entries dig deep into the soul of America with timely issues about technology’s effect on humanity and timeless issues about searching for meaningful human connections,” Hirschman said. “The nominated plays reflect an encouraging range of well-known names and newcomers, young voices and mature talents, the mainstream drama and the surreal. Protagonists are as diverse as Arab-Americans fighting about their image or Southern white women planning a wedding to an African American runner from Louisiana.”

These awards began in 1977, when ATCA started to cite each year one new play produced outside New York City. In 1985, the annual citations expanded to three, and from 1986 one of those three was given the ATCA New Play Award of $1,000, with various newspapers providing financial subsidy. In 2000, the award was renamed to recognize the Steinberg Foundation’s generous annual gift of $15,000, raised in 2006 to $40,000.

Honorees since 1977 have included Lanford Wilson, Marsha Norman, August Wilson, Jane Martin, Arthur Miller, Mac Wellman, Adrienne Kennedy, Donald Margulies, Lynn Nottage, Horton Foote and Craig Lucas. Last year’s winner was Moises Kaufman for 33 Variations.

Each year’s honorees are chronicled in The Best Plays Theater Yearbook, edited by Jeffrey Eric Jenkins, alongside the 10 best plays produced that year in New York City. For a complete list of the 80 plays cited from 1977 through 2008, go to www.americantheatrecritics.org, under Awards.

The Harold and Mimi Steinberg Charitable Trust was created in 1986 by Harold Steinberg on behalf of himself and his late wife. Pursuing its primary mission to support the American theater, it has provided millions of dollars to support new productions of American plays and educational programs for those who may not ordinarily experience live theater.

ATCA was founded in 1974 and works to raise critical standards and public awareness of critics’ functions and responsibilities and to recognize excellence in the American theater. The only national association of professional theater critics, with several hundred members working for newspapers, magazines, radio and television stations and websites, ATCA is the U.S. national section of the International Association of Theatre Critics, a UNESCO-affiliated organization that sponsors seminars and congresses worldwide.

ATCA also presents the M. Elizabeth Osborn Award, honoring emerging playwrights, and the $10,000 Francesca Primus Prize, funded by the Francesca Ronnie Primus Foundation, honoring outstanding contributions to the American theater by a female artist who has not yet achieved national prominence. Annually it makes a recommendation for the Regional Theater Tony Award, presented by the American Theatre Wing/Broadway League, and its members vote on inductions into the Theater Hall of Fame.

For more information on ATCA, visit www.americantheatrecritics.org.

Hey NY Times: Memphis Premiered at TheatreWorks!

Isn't the NY Times supposed to be known for good thorough journalism? How did Dave Itzkoff get so sloppy that he didn't mention that Memphis got its world premiere at TheatreWorks? He just says it played at La Jolla and 5th Avenue (which had artists from the TheatreWorks production).

Blog Power

Killing My Lobster's production of Pure Shock Value got a good review in the San Francisco Chronicle, which is probably helping ticket sales, but the company isn't just relying on the Chron. (Thank goodness.) KML has always embraced the power of internet and tech marketing, and for this show has launched a blog where the actors are writing in character.

Says Lobster Jon Wolanske, "It's a blog from the perspective of Ethan, one of the leads in the play. He's a filmmaker and the play is the story of his exploits trying to get his dream film, Barking Spiders, made."

And these bloggers are savvy enough to thank Killing My Lobster and promote Pure Shock Value. Check it out--it may be a good marketing tactic for your company too.

For more on the marketing angle, check out The Mark-Up blog.

"Identity Theft"

Apparently the news that Crowded Fire had to cancel its entire run of My Name Is Vera Cupido just a few days before opening last season didn't really sink in, because news came in last week that the Exit Theatre and playwright Sean Owens received a cease and desist over Owens's one-man show about Paul Lynde that was slated to be part of DivaFest.

Vera Cupido and Paul Lynde are real people, people. You can't write about real people, especially using their real name, without getting permission from them. Well, you could write about them, as long as your writing doesn't see the light of day.

While I'm all for fair use and I don't mean to pick on these playwrights, I'm kind of astounded that these projects made it so far into the production process without someone thinking that maybe it's not really cool to write about real people and use their real name, especially those still alive, without their permission. Especially when those involved know the person is a real person. I suppose many of us would feel honored if someone deemed our lives interesting enough to write about and wouldn't care what they wrote, but still, I know I would feel a little violated if someone put me and my life up there on stage without asking me about it first. At the very least, it behooves all theatre artists to know the basics of copyright law and follow the law, even if we don't agree with it.