Tag: Berkeley Theater

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Pick! ASR Theater ~~ Immigrants’ Tale: “The Far Country” at Berkeley Rep

By Barry Willis

Xenophobia—the fear of foreigners—has infected human societies since the dawn of time. A particularly American variety gets an insightful treatment in The Far Country at Berkeley Rep’s Peet’s Theatre through April 14.

In the early-to-mid 19th century, Chinese immigrants were welcomed into the United States as a source of cheap labor. They built the railroads that enabled America’s great industrial expansion, but by the 1880s, that work was mostly completed, and fear of foreigners prompted the Chinese Exclusion Act, intended to keep more of them from entering the country.

… “insightful” (and) “adroitly directed”  …

Toward the end of the century, there were reportedly fifty Chinese men in the US for every Chinese female. Most of these men sent a substantial portion of their earnings to their families back in China. That sort of ‘family-support-via-long-distance’ is still common among immigrants to this country.

Tess Lina (Low/Two) in Lloyd Suh’s breathtaking, “The Far Country”, performing at Berkeley Rep through Sunday, April 14, 2024. Photo Credit: Kevin Berne

Playwright Lloyd Suh’s The Far Country examines the phenomenon from the individual perspectives of two generations of Chinese immigrants. Act One opens with a grueling interrogation of a San Francisco resident named Gee (Feodor Chin), a laundryman claiming that all his identification papers were destroyed in the fire that consumed the city after the 1906 earthquake. Aaron Wilton is effectively annoying as an aggressive, condescending interrogator, assisted by a perfectly bilingual interpreter despite Gee’s apparent ability with English.

Gee seeks permission to travel to China to visit his family and bring back his son, but he lacks proof of legal residency and isn’t sure he’ll be able to return. Repeated questions and more-than-implied doubts about Gee’s honesty intentionally rankle him—and the audience.

(L-R) Tommy Bo (Moon Gyet), Sharon Shao (Yuen/Four), Whit K. Lee (Yip/One), Tess Lina (Low/Two), and Feodor Chin (Gee/Three) at work at Berkeley Rep. Credit: Kevin Berne

The San Francisco Bay’s Angel Island served as a sort of counterpart to New York’s Ellis Island, where for many decades, European immigrants were processed for admission to the US, often without difficulty. Angel Island was different, a sort of choke-point for incoming Asians who could be kept in detention for as long as two years. In keeping with the Chinese Exclusion Act, the government’s work on Angel Island was to reject as many of them as possible.

Much subterfuge was involved in trying to overcome bureaucratic obstacles to admission—the theme of Act Two, where we meet Moon Gyet (Tommy Bo), Gee’s “son” who endures 17 months of detention on Angel Island, where he was allowed only one hour per day outside, and where he was subjected to intense interrogations including nonsense questions about how many steps led to the door of his childhood home.

Tommy Bo (Moon Gyet) and John Keabler (Dean/Inspector), in Lloyd Suh’s “The Far Country” at Berkeley Rep through 4/14/2024. Credit: Kevin Berne

The somewhat intricate story goes back and forth from California to China, where Moon Gyet meets Yuen (Sharon Shao), a bright, sassy prospective wife. There’s also an emotional flashback of Gee reuniting with his mother, Low (Tess Chin), as he hunts for an appropriate son. The whole affair of ‘admission-or-rejection’ is depicted as a complicated, high-stakes game of deception and manipulation, both by immigration authorities and people hoping to become US residents—a situation still playing out every day almost 100 years after the era of The Far Country.

Adroitly directed by Jennifer Chang and dinged only by a couple of overlong bits of dialog, The Far Country is an insightful and effective examination of gut-wrenchingly difficult circumstances. Its abrupt ending on a beautiful, upbeat note gives hope where there might have been only despair. That is the power of great art.

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ASR Nor Cal Edition Executive Editor Barry Willis is an American Theatre Critics Association member and SF Bay Area Theatre Critics Circle president. Contact: [email protected]

 

ProductionThe Far Country
Written by Lloyd Suh
Directed by Jennifer Chang
Producing CompanyBerkeley Repertory Theatre
Production DatesThru April 14th, 2024
Production Address2025 Addison Street, Berkeley CA 94704
Websitewww.berkeleyrep.org
Telephone(510) 847-2949
Tickets$22.50-$134
Reviewer ScoreMax in each category is 5/5
Overall4/5
Performance4/5
Script4/5
Stagecraft4/5
Aisle Seat Review Pick?YES!
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Pick! ASR Theater ~~ Berkeley Rep’s Astounding, Confounding “Bulrusher”

By Barry Willis

Magical realism, a small-town soap opera, and the need for identity all combine in Eisa Davis’ Pulitzer Prize-finalist Bulrusher, at Berkeley Rep’s Peet’s Theatre through Dec. 3. Davis also composed the show’s original music.

Directed by Nicole A. Watson, Jordan Tyson stars as the show’s eponymous “Bulrusher,” a mixed-race foundling so named because she was discovered as an infant floating in the bulrushes of the Navarro River near the Northern California town of Boonville. Raised by a single male schoolteacher named Schoolch (Jamie LaVerdiere), she’s been gifted with magical clairvoyant powers. Bulrusher can see images of the future through the medium of water.

…There’s enough material in Davis’ story to supply a year’s worth of Lifetime TV episodes…

Most of the tale plays out on an elaborate two-level set by Lawrence E. Moten III, elaborated by superb projections by Katherine Freer and lighting by Sherrice Mojgani. The central locale is a brothel operated by hard-to-the-core Madame (Shyla Lefner) and patronized by Schoolch and a local handyman named Logger (Jeorge Bennett Watson).

Jeorge Bennett Watson (Logger), Shyla Lefner (Madame), Jamie LaVerdiere (Schoolch), and Rob Kellogg (Boy) in Eisa Davis’ lyrical coming-of-age story, “Bulrusher”, performing at Berkeley Rep October 27 – December 3, 2023. Photo Credit: T Charles Erickson

Another frequent visitor is a guitar-playing young man called Boy (Rob Kellogg) who relentlessly pursues Bulrusher despite her aggressive disinterest. Out front of the stage is a small but convincingly realistic stream that serves as the river,  visited often by Bulrusher as a source of solace.

The playbill states the era as 1955—those who haven’t read it would more likely have pegged the time as twenty years earlier. The residents sometimes default to a local dialect called “Boontling,” developed in the 1880s and now almost extinct. It sounds like English but doesn’t register with non-speakers: “harping the ling” means “speaking the language” in Boontling. The only clue to the timeframe is an offhand comment by Boy to Logger that he “missed the Korean draft.” Otherwise we wouldn’t know.

Cyndii Johnson (Vera), Jeorge Bennett Watson (Logger), and Jordan Tyson (Bulrusher) at work in “Bulrusher”. Photo Credit: T Charles Erickson

The home-schooled Bulrusher earns a decent living buying and selling fruit. One rainy night she encounters a lone woman on the road, gives her a ride, and a place to stay. The woman is Vera (Cyndii Johnson), broke and far from her home in Birmingham, Alabama. On orders from her mother, she’s on her way to visit her uncle Logger. Vera is the first black woman Bulrusher has ever encountered, and the two become fast friends. The development of their friendship is among the play’s many endearing subplots. Another less endearing is Madame’s constant threat to sell her property and move away. A third that continually runs in the background is the mysterious identity of Bulrusher’s parents.

Rob Kellogg (Boy) and Jordan Tyson (Bulrusher) in Eisa Davis’ “Bulrusher”, at Berkeley Rep Oct 27 – Dec 3, 2023. Photo Credit: T Charles Erickson

It’s a complicated task for the show’s all-Equity cast, but they rise to the challenge most compellingly. Tyson is especially astounding, with several long monologs that are gorgeous sustained poems. Her interactions with Johnson, LaVerdierre, and Watson are all tremendous. Her closing confrontation with Lefner as Madame unveils the unspoken secret propelling the whole story.

There’s enough material in Davis’ story to supply a year’s worth of Lifetime TV episodes. At nearly three hours, the script at times feels over-long and in need of an edit, but who would know where to start on a project of that scale? Even so, it’s a tremendous night at the theater—a heartfelt celebration of one spunky girl who finds home at last.

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ASR NorCal Executive Editor Barry Willis is a member of the American Theatre Critics Association and president of the SF Bay Area Theatre Critics Circle. Contact: [email protected].

 

ProductionBushrunner
Written by Eisa Davis
Directed by Nicole A. Watson
Producing CompanyBerkeley Repertory Theatre
Production DatesThru Dec 3rd
Production Address2025 Addison Street, Berkeley CA 94704
Websitewww.berkeleyrep.org
Telephone(510) 847-2949
Tickets$22.50-$134
Reviewer ScoreMax in each category is 5/5
Overall4.5/5
Performance4.5/5
Script4.0/5
Stagecraft4.0/5
Aisle Seat Review Pick?YES!
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PICK! ASR Theater ~~ Comic Relief: “POTUS” Rocks at Berkeley Rep

By Barry Willis

The door-slamming farce is alive and well at Berkeley Rep’s Roda Theatre. A likely sold-out show, Selina Fillinger’s outrageous comedy POTUS runs through October 22.

In the grand tradition of Lend Me a Tenor and Noises Off, the show stars seven Equity women as various figures in the White House, doing their best to contain potentially disastrous effects from an erratic president, whom we never meet—and truthfully, hope we won’t.

Stephanie Pope Lofgren (Margaret), Deirdre Lovejoy (Harriet) , and Stephanie Styles (Dusty) at work. Credit: Kevin Berne

Diedre Lovejoy and Kim Blanck are perfectly balanced as Chief of Staff Harriet and Press Secretary Jean, respectively. Their worrisome back-and-forth bickering is hilarious on its own, but the remaining five cast members take the whole affair into the comedic stratosphere.

…Raunchy, rambunctious, and bursting with savagely cynical energy…

First Lady Margaret (Stephanie Pope Lofgren) is the cynical, long-suffering eye of the storm. White House correspondent Chris (Dominique Toney) shares much of the exasperation expressed by FLOTUS (“First Lady of the United States”) while having embarrassing personal issues as a new mother with leaky swollen breasts. The two are superb with both deadpan delivery and physical comedy.

Stephanie Pope Lofgren (Margaret) and Susan Lynskey (Stephanie) in Selina Fillinger’s gleefully feminist satire POTUS through Sunday, October 22, 2023. All Photos Credit: Kevin Berne

Then there’s addled secretary Stephanie (Susan Lynskey), whose accidental acid trip pushes the tale in marvelously unexpected directions, and Bernadette (Allison Guinn), the president’s tough-talking, drug-dealing sister, recently released on parole and hoping to get a pardon from her brother.

Dominique Toney (Chris) and Stephanie Pope Lofgren (Margaret) at work in “POTUS” at Berkeley Rep.  All Photos Credit: Kevin Berne

Topping it off is Dusty (Stephanie Styles), the president’s barely-pregnant “dalliance.” She’s a ditzy former cheerleader with wild commentary on everything taking place, and even wilder antics so funny that you’ll do well to catch your breath.

Embracing the fantastic performers in POTUS: Or, Behind Every Great Dumbass Are Seven Women Trying to Keep Him Alive is the quick-change set by Andrew Boyce. The frenetic pace of the performance is perfectly matched by the timing of set changes—and by Palmer Herreran’s great sound design and Yi Zhao’s lighting. Annie Tippe’s expert direction couldn’t be better.

Raunchy, rambunctious, and bursting with savagely cynical energy, POTUS is a cathartic exploration of presidential insanity—and the insanity induced in those who’ve signed on as members of his team. Painful as it is to remember the extreme dysfunctionality we experienced during the reign of “the former guy,” POTUS delightfully informs us how much worse it could be.

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ASR Executive Editor Barry Willis is a member of the American Theatre Critics Association and president of the SF Bay Area Theatre Critics Circle. Contact: [email protected]

 

ProductionPOTUS: Or, Behind Every Great Dumbass Are Seven Women Trying to Keep Him Alive
Written by
Selina Fillinger
Directed byAnnie Tippe
Producing CompanyBerkeley Repertory Theatre
Production DatesThrough Oct 22nd
Production Address2025 Addison Street, Berkeley CA 94704
Websitewww.berkeleyrep.org
Telephone(510) 647-2900
Tickets$37 - $134
Reviewer ScoreMax in each category is 5/5
Overall4.5/5.0
Performance4.5/5.0
Script4.5/5.0
Stagecraft4.5/5.0
Aisle Seat Review Pick?YES!
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ASR Theater ~~ “Rehoming”– Shotgun Players’ “Wolf Play”

By George Maguire

The redoubtable, inventive Shotgun Players troupe continues its journey into the the realm of high-value, thought-provoking and theatrically-bold selections with Korean playwright Hansol Jung’s masterful and multi-layered Wolf Play.

Directed with whip-smart precision by Elizabeth Carter, the show takes the audience on a discovery trip as we define and then redefine what the words “home” and “family” mean.

Wolf Play tells the story of Jeenu (Wolf) a six- year-old child first adopted by Peter and Kate. When Kate becomes pregnant with her own child, Jeenu is “rehomed” by Peter on the internet to Robin – half of a lesbian couple. Robin’s wife Ash is an aspiring boxer whose life and immediate goals are compromised by the unexpected arrival of the child.

…In a world of its own is James Ard’s glorious soundscape…

Played as a puppet manipulated with insouciant and inquisitive spirit by Mikee Loria, Jeenu is seeking a home and a pack and refers to himself as Wolf. He howls, bays, snarls, and growls with anger as his life is uprooted.

Mikee Loria as Wolf. All Photography by Ben Krantz.

Complications ensue when Peter (played with angst and determination by Sam Bertken) discovers that he has sold the boy to an LGBTQIA+ couple, and wants him back. By this time, having discovered his new “pack,” Jeenu has acclimated himself into the home life of his “moms.” Despite Robin’s motherly warmth, clear love of this child, and simultaneous steel (portrayal by the talented Laura Domingo) it is Gobby Momah’s Ash that the boy eventually identifies with.

Laura Domingo as Robin, Caleb Cabrera as Ryan.

One of the joys of the play is watching them communicate. All others look at the puppet when talking to the boy, Ash looks directly at Jeenu. She talks to him, not just about him. Ash is being trained for the big fight by Robin’s brother Ryan (a focused and determined Caleb Cabrero). The characters of Kate the wife and also Ryan and Robin’s Mom are not seen, but are spoken to by the actors in what the reviewer found to be a rather confusing mélange of conversation.

We watch the puppet/boy react with pain, confusion, and tears as his search for family, a pack, is ripped once again away from him. All this culminates in a final courtroom custody battle deciding the fate of the child. The results of that trial won’t be given away here.

Technical elements are good. Stephanie Johnson (whose gorgeous work illuminated Marin Shakespeare Company this summer) brings similar creativity to Shotgun Players. Celeste Martone’s set and Ashley Renee’s costumes serve the play well. The combination of David Maier and boxing consultant Emmanuel Blackwell bring the big match and Gabby Momah’s remarkable reactive punch/foot work to life.

Caleb Cabrera as Ryan, Gabby Momah as Ash.

In a world of its own is James Ard’s glorious soundscape. The opening moments with clangs and bells of the ring, are brilliant. The play’s running time is 1 hour and 50 minutes with no intermission.

Shotgun delivers a play dealing with many current issues of queer identity, broken lives, the vulnerability of children being bartered like animals, and above all, the need for roots, family, a pack.

Caleb Cabrera as Ryan, Sam Bertken as Peter, Laura Domingo as Robin, Gabby Momah as Ash in “Wolf Play” at Shotgun Players.

On Facebook, we see actors referring to casts as “my chosen family.” How long will that last past the closing? We chose family as such for a lifetime of eternal, ethereal connection. Wolf Play helps us clear the air and get to the root of this journey.

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ASR Contributing Writer George Maguire is a San Francisco-based actor/director and is Professor Emeritus of Solano College Theatre. He is a voting member of the SF Bay Area Theatre Critics Circle. Contact: [email protected]

 

ProductionWolf Play
Written byHansol Jung
Directed byKatja Rivera
Producing CompanyShotgun Players
Production Dates
Thru Oct 1st
Production Address1901 Ashby Avenue, Berkeley CA 94705
WebsiteShotgunplayers.org
Telephone(510) 841-6500
Tickets$26-$44
Reviewer ScoreMax in each category is 5/5
Overall3/5
Performance3/5
Script3/5
Stagecraft2.5/5
Aisle Seat Review Pick?----
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ASR Theater ~~ Shotgun’s “Yerma” Gives Something to Hope For

By George Maguire

Shotgun Players continues its “Season of Love” with a beautiful adaptation of Frederico Garcia Lorca’s Yerma, adapted and translated by Melissa Lopez, and directed with graceful gusto and imagination by Katja Rivera.

Lorca, one of the 20th century’s great Spanish playwright/poets, penned in quick succession, three masterpieces: Yerma, Blood Wedding and The House of Bernarda Alba, before he was executed in 1936 by a Nationalist firing squad. Lorca’s socialist political leanings and his homosexuality were antithetical to Franco’s right-wing militants.

Set in the grape vineyards of California’s San Fernando Valley in the 1930s, we enter into the lives of a Mexican-American rural family struggling to work, feed themselves and indeed procreate, hoping to keep their legacy alive as they try to climb the ladder of the American dream.

The play opens with a vivid scene of copulation between Yerma and her husband Juan. Played with brutal depth and passion by Regina Morones, Yerma is childless after ten years of marriage to Juan. Soon she announces to him that she is five weeks pregnant, only to learn that once again her “body is dry,” as she tells her friends.

Regina Morones as Yerma, Caleb Cabrera as Juan. Photography by Ben Krantz.

Juan (played with swaggering intensity by Caleb Cabrera) has inherited a pig farm which he is desperate to turn into a fertile vineyard. The play itself is infused with scenes of what later became known as “magical realism” under such writers as Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Isabel Allende and playwright Jose Rivera, whose realistic views of the world are altered by scenes with magical elements of dreams, hallucinations and hauntings.

This is a play about desire and what we are willing to do to manifest what we want, and indeed what we think we need for connection.

In this eight-person cast are Yerma’s four friends, who bring Yerma to a shamaka (Linda Amayo-Hassan giving a textured mystical performance of grandeur as Incarnacion) known for creating fertility in a seemingly barren woman.

Mylo Cardona as Veronica, Aisha Aurora Rivera as Dolores, Linda Amayo-Hassan as Incarnación. Photography by Ben Krantz.

Alejandra Wahl plays Maria who seems, as she says, to pass by a man and immediately become pregnant. It is a performance of strength and simultaneous fragility both aspects beautifully bifurcated in Ms. Wahl.

Regal Aisha Aurora Rivera, and ultra-chatty gossip Mylo Cardona add nuance and strength to the circle of women. In the midst of the muddle is Victor, Yerma’s childhood friend and now a sheep owner very much in love with her. The yin and yang roller coaster of emotions Yerma lives through on a day-by-day basis come to a brutal conclusion as she makes a horrifying choice at the play’s end.

April Ballesteros (Assistant Stage Manager), Mylo Cardona as Veronica, Alejandra Wahl as Maria, Regina Morones as Yerma, Linda Amayo-Hassan as Incarnación, Linda Maria Girón as Marta. Photo by Ben Krantz.

Director Rivera and her movement/intimacy choreographer Raisa Donato bring all of this to the forefront in a stunning scene of sexual awakening by Yerma as she conjures a horned bare-chested beast (played with god-pan abandon by Samuel Prince) surrounded by scarf-draped women dancing and ululating in wild abandon.

Composer/sound designer Sebastian Gutierrez heightens the stage with an original score of arias, duets and quartets bringing emotional weight and beautifully choreographed movement to the play. When the emotion is too ripe for simple words, we sing and the heart explodes.

The designers have supplemented the work with Nina Ball’s set of dirt piles, ramps and steps, and a beautiful painting in the center illuminated in a lush pallette of ever-changing colors by Sara Miel Saavadra. Valarie Coble has costumed the play with specific lived-in looks of the 1930s farm life.

It’s a beautiful and haunting play given a superb production at Berkeley’s renowned Shotgun Players. Lorca’s gifts of poetry and farce work together to create tears and laughter, hallmarks of his legacy. One can only imagine what else he could have written had he not come to such a tragic end at age 38.

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ASR Contributing Writer George Maguire is a San Francisco based actor and director. and a voting member of the SF Bay Area Theatre Critics Circle. He is a Professor Emeritus of Solano College. Contact: [email protected]

 

ProductionYerma
Written byFrederico Garcia Lorca.

Adapted and translated by Melinda Lopez
Directed byKatja Rivera
Producing CompanyShotgun Players
Production Dates
Video On Demand		May 20-June 25, 2023

Live streaming June 1 & 8
Production Address1901 Ashby Avenue, Berkeley CA 94705
WebsiteShotgunplayers.org
Telephone(510) 841-6500
TicketsDynamic Pricing Per Show --Call the Box Office
Reviewer ScoreMax in each category is 5/5
Overall3.5/5
Performance3.5/5
Script4.0/5
Stagecraft3.5/5
Aisle Seat Review Pick?----
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ASR Theater ~~ Let The Right One In – Adolescence Can Bite

By George Maguire

Take a bullied 12 year old boy, a bizarre female (or not) new neighbor, and tense and bloody serial killings in the town and you have the ingredients for a biting new play from the National Theatre of Scotland being presented at Berkeley Repertory Theater in its American cast premier.

Based on the novel and film by John Ajvide Lindqvist, and stage adapted by Jack Thorne, this new twist on vampire lore and teen coming of age angst is a must-see.

(clockwise from left) Jon Demegillo (Micke), Michael Johnston (Jonny), and Diego Lucano (Oskar) in the West Coast premiere of the National Theatre of Scotland production of “Let the Right One In.”
Photo by Kevin Berne/Berkeley Repertory Theatre

12-year-old Oskar (an astonishingly gifted Diego Lucano) is a bullied, sad and lonely child living revenge fantasies among the towering birch trees looming over the town. A jungle gym on the site, which will morph in Act 2 into an astonishing school swimming pool, dominates the right of the imaginative set created by Christine Jones.

Entering with gymnastic flair is Eli, a new neighbor with an older guardian and an interest in connection. They meet, they play, they tease one another and Oskar falls in love. Eli, played with remarkable physical agility and other-worldly acumen by Noah Lamanna, presents a perfect blend of female/male he/she characteristics which both intrigue and excite Oskar.

Eli asks “Would you like me if I turned out not to be a girl?” Oskar freezes and thinks this through responding, ‘Yes…..I guess so.”

Noah Lamanna (Eli) and Richard Topol (Hakan) at work in “Let The Right One In.” Photo by Kevin Berne.

Add another element of suspense and possibility as we watch Diego Lucano’s brilliant work as he listens, thinks a thought through, and reacts. This is a great young actor giving a master class in honest actor reaction.

…John Tiffany directs with minute precision for details…

As we settle into our seats, we watch the small cast trundle through the falling snow and then moments before the play itself begins they exhibit a sense of danger nearby and rush off. Simple set pieces are brought on representing a bed, a candy shop, a locker room or a living room, and then a large trunk which will dominate the play as a home for our vampire heroine.

The seven-member ensemble of supporting actors populates the town as parents, police, shop owners, and of course the three bullies who taunt Oskar constantly with “Here Piggy, Piggy!” shoving him into a locker. We know his revenge will occur.

Julius Thomas III (Halmberg) and Richard Topol (Hakan) at Berkeley Rep. Photo by Kevin Berne.

Director Tiffany and his movement associate Steven Hoggett were the inspiration behind Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, Blackwatch and the Tony award winning musical Once. Their combined sensitivity can work wonders as we watch Hoggett’s balletic movement enrich each scene with atmosphere behind and accenting the very terse script.

Olafur Arnalds and Arnor Dan Arnarson have composed a richly textured symphonic score enhanced by sound designer Gareth Fry and special effects designer Jeremy Chernick’s jolting, boo-creating shocks.

Act 2 turns the Rubik’s cube gym around and we are presented with the school swimming pool, one of the most shocking stage moments I can recall as the bullies bet that Oskar cannot hold his breath for three minutes in a pool clearly deeper than the actor’s height.

(l to r) Jon Demegillo, Nicole Shalhoub, Erik Hellman, and Jack DiFalco in the West Coast premiere of the National Theatre of Scotland production of “Let the Right One In” at Berk Rep. Photo by Kevin Berne/Berkeley Rep.

Vampire lore has been a fascination for centuries. Since Bram Stoker’s Dracula, we have seen True Blood, Anne Rice’s Chronicles of a Vampire, the teen Twilight series by Stephanie Meyers, Becoming Human and Buffy the Vampire Slayer, to name a few.

Stephen King’s Salem’s Lot is the hallmark of modern vampire books, combining young children with old vampire lore. As these damaged people find one another, we in the audience reflect on our own pasts, seeking revenge for wrong doings on us, anger at parental controls beyond our capability to understand, and of course trying with not much effort to hide our first hickey on the neck.

The blood and the gore of this production may not be to everyone’s taste but its relevance cannot be ignored.

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ASR Contributing Writer George Maguire is a San Francisco based actor and director. and a voting member of the SF Bay Area Theatre Critics Circle. He is a Professor Emeritus of Solano College. Contact: [email protected]

 

ProductionLet The Right One In
Written by John Ajvide Lindqvist
Directed by John Tiffany
Producing CompanyBerkeley Repertory Theatre
Production DatesMay 20-June 25, 2023
Production Address2025 Addison Street, Berkeley CA 94704
Websitewww.berkeleyrep.org
Telephone(510) 847-2949
Tickets$25-$103
Reviewer ScoreMax in each category is 5/5
Overall3.5/5
Performance3.5/5
Script3.5/5
Stagecraft4/5
Aisle Seat Review Pick?----
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PICK! ASR Theater ~~ “Cambodian Rock Band” a Must-See at Berkeley Rep

By Barry Willis

Human history is an appalling parade of atrocities. Warfare is among the worst recurring nightmares, but perhaps even worse are purges within one nationality or ethnicity when large swaths of the population are swept up in an insane movement to create a new society.

That’s exactly what happened in Cambodia in the mid-to-late 1970s, when the Khmer Rouge took over the country, hell-bent on eliminating the past, to such an extent that they called the date of their takeover “Year Zero.” And as always happens when zealots gain control, they rounded up Cambodian intellectuals, academics, trained professionals, artists, and musicians with the intent of eliminating them.

Inspired by the communist takeover of Indonesia in 1965 and the Chinese cultural revolution—the “Great Leap Forward”—the zealotry of the Khmer Rouge was so extreme that anyone with knowledge of a foreign language, or even wearing eyeglasses, was suspected of being a subversive and a class enemy. Approximately 25% of Cambodian’s population perished in what was called the “Super Great Leap Forward”—a genocide perpetuated by their own countrymen.

…superb actors, dancers, and musicians—a stunning assortment of stage talents…

That’s the background of Lauren Yee’s Cambodian Rock Band at Berkeley Repertory Theatre through April 2. The interlocking core stories include a musician named Chum (Joseph Ngo) held in the notorious S-21 prison—really an extermination center where of approximately 20,000 prisoners, only seven or eight survived—and his return in 2008 to see his American daughter Neary (Geena Quintos), there working with a multi-national investigative group. There are also tangential references to ethnic animosities among Cambodians, Vietnamese, and Thai people.

The depiction of life in S-21 is lengthy and grim (set by Takeshi Kata) but book-ended by upbeat rock music, much of it derived from L.A. band Dengue Fever. The show opens in the mid 1970s with Chum’s band finishing their first album in a studio in the capital city of Phnom Penh, an effort that runs so late that they can’t escape approaching Khmer Rouge troops.

The band at work in “Cambodian Rock Band” at Berkeley Rep. Photo: Berkeley Rep.

It closes with a rousing performance in the present by the same band—Ngo on guitar, Moses Villarama on bass, Jane Lui on keyboard and backing vocals, Geena Quintos on lead vocals, and Abraham Kim on drums.

They’re all superb actors, dancers, and musicians—a stunning assortment of stage talents. Prolific actor Francis Jue is outstanding as the MC, narrator, hyper-kinetic lead performer, and as the despicable head of S-21.

Francis Jue at work at Berkeley Rep. Photo: Berkeley Rep

The net effect for an audience is that Cambodian Rock Band is a sugar-coated historical horror story—the sugar coating being the opening and closing rock performances that help viewers forget their immersion in misery. Yee’s beautifully conceived and realized message is that art and music have power to transcend savagery.

We can only hope.

There’s widespread belief that Cambodian Rock Band originated at Berkeley Rep. In fact, the show has been performed many times over the past four years. Ngo and Villarama have performed in several productions. The set at the Roda Theatre was built at Berkeley Rep and will travel when the show goes on tour. However that plays out, Cambodian Rock Band is a fantastic spectacle and one of the most compelling productions so far this year.

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Barry Willis is a member of the American Theatre Critics Association and president of the SF Bay Area Theatre Critics Circle. Contact: [email protected]

 

 

ProductionCambodian Rock Band
Written by
Lauren Yee
Directed byChay Yew
Producing CompanyBerkeley Repertory Theatre
Production DatesThrough Apr 2nd, 2023
Production Address2025 Addison Street, Berkeley CA 94704
Websitewww.berkeleyrep.org
Telephone(510) 647-2900
Tickets$49 - $123
Reviewer ScoreMax in each category is 5/5
Overall4/5
Performance4/5
Script4/5
Stagecraft4/5
Aisle Seat Review Pick?YES!
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PICK! ASR Theater ~~ “Clyde’s” a Rambunctious, Enlightening Ride at Berkeley Rep

By Barry Willis

Four parolees do their best to thrive under an oppressive boss in Clyde’s, at Berkeley Rep through February 26.

Or at least, we believe they’re parolees—that bit of info is never made clear in Lynn Nottage’s brilliant scathing comedy. They’ve all done time behind bars, and they’re determined not to go back. They’re also determined to keep their low-wage jobs in the kitchen of a roadside diner, knowing how limited are employment opportunities for ex-cons.

Their boss knows that too.

A former convict herself, Clyde (April Nixon) lords it over her workers, making sure at every turn that they understand how tenuous their situation is. A voluptuous, wise-cracking beauty, Clyde appears at random at the kitchen’s pickup window or waltzes in unannounced to strike fear in the hearts of her underlings, in each scene sporting a wig more glamorous than the last and strutting her stuff in dazzling apparel. (Wigs by Megan Ellis, costumes by Karen Perry.)

…an incredibly uplifting and uproarious tale about hope…

Clyde is a malicious force of nature, the perfect blend of wicked witch and evil stepmother. Nixon clearly relishes her astounding role, one hugely appreciated by a full house at Berkeley Rep’s Peet’s Theatre during the Wednesday Jan. 25 press opener.

Louis Reyes McWilliams as Jason and April Nixon as Clyde in Lynn Nottage’s Tony Award-nominated play Clyde’s at Berkeley Repertory Theatre.
Photo by Kevin Berne/Berkeley Repertory Theatre

But Nixon’s not the only astounding member of this well-balanced cast. Three of them are thirty-somethings whose characters are serious about improving their lives and staying out of trouble. We don’t learn what Raphael (Wesley Guimaraes) or Letticia (Cyndii Johnson) did to land in jail, but new worker Jason confesses that he was convicted of assault after losing a union manufacturing job to “scabs.” To Letticia’s inquiry about the gang tattoos on his arms, face, and neck, he replies “I was trying to survive.”

The fourth member of Clyde’s kitchen crew is line cook Montrellous (Harold Surratt) an older gentleman with a sadhu’s demeanor. The anchor character in this quick-moving story, he’s very much the embodiment of an Old Testament prophet, bringing wisdom and enlightenment to a younger generation, the focus being his quest to create the perfect sandwich.

April Nixon as Clyde and Harold Surratt as Montrellous in Lynn Nottage’s Tony Award-nominated play Clyde’s at Berkeley Repertory Theatre.
Photo by Kevin Berne/Berkeley Repertory Theatre

The quest for the perfect sandwich, in fact, becomes both a metaphor for the kitchen workers to improve their lives and their self-esteem, and a competitive sport they undertake to impress each other and perhaps, their mean-to-the-core boss.

A subplot involves Raphael’s infatuation with Letticia, one that goes nowhere, despite his offers of flowers and chocolates and date invitations. It would be unfair to give away much of the bright (and dark) comedy in this lovely production, but a heartbreaking moment occurs when Montrellous confesses that he went to prison not for a crime he committed but for a moment of altruism. The embodiment of gravitas, Surratt is brilliant in the role.

Louis Reyes McWilliams as Jason and Cyndii Johnson as Letitia in Lynn Nottage’s Tony Award-nominated play Clyde’s at Berkeley Repertory Theatre.
Photo by Kevin Berne/Berkeley Repertory Theatre

Director Taylor Reynolds gets fabulous performances from her entire cast on designer Wilson Chin’s hyper-real set.

Lynn Nottage is on her way to becoming a national treasure. She has a wonderful ear and eye for the woes of the underclass, and a fantastic ability to mine deep emotional conflicts in her characters. In her poignant Intimate Apparel, set a century ago, a young black seamstress falls in love with a Jewish fabric merchant, an attraction he feels equally but which they both know is hopeless.

There’s deep truth in this production too, but no doom in Clyde’s. In fact, it’s an incredibly uplifting and uproarious tale about hope in the face of hopelessness. As Julie Andrews put it so succinctly in Mary Poppins — a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down.

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Barry Willis is a member of the American Theatre Critics Association and president of the SF Bay Area Theatre Critics Circle. Contact: [email protected]

 

 

ProductionClyde's
Written by Lynn Nottage
Directed by Taylor Reynolds
Producing CompanyBerkeley Repertory Theatre
Production DatesThrough Feb 26th
Production Address2025 Addison Street, Berkeley CA 94704
Websitewww.berkeleyrep.org
Telephone(510) 847-2949
Tickets$30 - $135
Reviewer ScoreMax in each category is 5/5
Overall4/5
Performance4/5
Script4/5
Stagecraft4/5
Aisle Seat Review Pick?YES!
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PICK! ASR Theater ~~ Compelling, Controversial “Wuthering Heights” at Berkeley Rep

By George Maguire and Barry Willis

Writer/director Emma Rice has deconstructed one of the most beloved English novels of the 19th century and has remade it into a pop-rock extravaganza, delighting some critics and outraging others. Her Wuthering Heights runs at Berkeley Repertory Theatre through January 1, 2023.

Traditionalists expecting a stage production of the dark 1939 film starring Merle Oberon and Laurence Olivier are likely to be disappointed. This frenetic, high-energy show is geared to a younger generation with a different aesthetic, but it can work equally well for those not necessarily tethered to the past. Innumerable classic stories have been reinvented for the sake of stage and screen entertainment. There’s certainly no reason why Wuthering Heights shouldn’t suffer the same fate, just as Hamlet can be reinterpreted as a modern business drama, or Romeo and Juliet reconfigured as a rock opera.

…The movement work in this show is inspiring. So is (the) mining of humor…

Controversy swirled at Berkeley Rep’s November 22 press opener. Some critics raved to their colleagues about Rice’s stunning production while others dismissed it as an abomination. ASR’s George Maguire and Barry Willis comment here:

BW: This is an amazing, dynamic production with multi-threat performers who can act, dance, do gymnastics, and in some cases, play instruments. Especially impressive are Jordan Laviniere, who plays the leader of the Yorkshire Moors, and Leah Brotherhead as Catherine. She’s also a great rock singer. TJ Holmes, who plays Dr. Kenneth, performs on cello and accordion when he’s not stage center. He’s a delightful comic actor, one of a cast of eleven, most of whom tackle multiple roles. Theatrical talent is everywhere in this show but the multi-casting can cause confusion among viewers because most of the characters are cousins with similar names.

GM: Yeah, Barry! It is a fairly faithful adaptation of Emily Bronte’s novel, and if you can stop conflating the story with her sister Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre, you’re a winner. The story itself is weighted down with so many generations of relationships, and births and deaths, with eleven actors playing all the roles. It’s often highly confusing.

Leah Brotherhead as Catherine and Liam Tamne as Heathcliff in the West Coast premiere of Wise Children’s “Wuthering Heights” at Berkeley Repertory Theatre. Photo by Kevin Berne.

BW: I’m no Bronte expert, but it looks to me like Emma Rice has adhered to the original plot, but uses story elements and characters to create something entirely new. I’m generally approving of prequels, sequels, and reinterpretations of classic stories — with the exception of Daniel Fish’s Oklahoma!, a real horror show.

Rice’s Wuthering Heights isn’t really the Bronte classic. I attended with my friend Marcia Tanner, an art curator with a degree in English Literature from UC Berkeley. She quipped: “It’s misleading to title this show Wuthering Heights . . . it should be Something Based on Wuthering Heights.” That’s a fair assessment.

GM: My biggest challenge was not hearing the play (technically, a musical), but frankly, it was not understanding what the cast was saying and singing.

BW: That was a problem for many in the audience, I believe. Thick Yorkshire accents were tough enough to understand during dialog, and impossible to decipher during the show’s many songs. I loved the music but couldn’t tell you what any of the songs are about. Marcia astutely observed, “They need superscripts.” The only words that appear on the large backdrop are a few lines from the novel.

GM: Etta Murfitt’s choreography is wonderful and eclectic, ranging from almost hoe-down, to Irish jig, to nonspecific elegance. A lovely and diverse musical score by Ian Ross keeps the play moving. The casting of eleven very accomplished members of the Wise Children’s troupe was a joy, as was watching them effortlessly morph into the manifold characters in the novel. Heathcliff (Liam Tamne, of multi-national background) is particularly inspired casting, making the orphan Heathcliff the dark, brooding, and very sexy creature he was — unlike anyone else in the Yorkshire moors.

BW: I was knocked out by the performers and the quick-moving stagecraft, especially the rolling doors-and-windows pieces that transformed into beds and other devices. The books-on-sticks-as-fluttering-birds bit is brilliant low-cost theatricality. So are the chalkboards that serve as erasable tombstones.

GM: The movement work in this show is inspiring. So is Rice’s mining of humor — she finds comedic potential in many of Bronte’s situations, something that to my knowledge has never been done. But this Wuthering Heights is no spoof — it’s an inspired reinterpretation.

BW: Was the love affair between Heathcliff and his adoptive sister Catherine considered scandalous when the novel was published? It might be seen as close to incest today even though the two were not biologically related. Save Dr. Kenneth and the narrator Mr. Lockwood, almost all the other characters in the production are cousins, nothing unusual in an isolated community.

Jordan Laviniere as the Leader of the Yorkshire Moors; Eleanor Sutton, Katy Ellis, Tama Phethean, Stephanie Elstob, and Ricardo Castro as The Moors in the West Coast premiere of Wise Children’s “Wuthering Heights” now showing at Berkeley Rep. Photo by Kevin Berne.

GM: A community that’s cold, damp, and dark! Rice and set designer Vicki Mortimer went over the top portraying that.

BW: I had no expectations about this show, and was delighted — especially by the incredibly dynamic first act.

My only prior exposure was reading the novel in ninth grade — required reading — and having watched the movie at some point not long after that on late-night TV. The subject matter wasn’t something that resonated for me and wasn’t anything I cared to revisit.

I have difficulty relating to the social structure and morality of the time, which makes playwrights like Ibsen, Strindberg, Chekov, and their contemporaries something of a slog for me. I never liked G. B. Shaw until I saw Major Barbara, but I hope to live a thousand years without enduring another Mrs. Warren’s Profession.

But I understand the appeal of Jane Austen and the Bronte sisters, especially for women. In their time, the only path to a better life was through choosing the right marriage partner. Mothers often bled to death after childbirth. Infant and childhood mortality were rampant, from conditions easily treated today. This whole pathetic milieu is background for Wuthering Heights, but Emma Rice makes it entertaining and enjoyable..

GM: In all, this Wuthering Heights is a truly nifty addition to the repertoire of Wise Children, a new theatre company founded by Ms. Rice, whose group brought The Wild Bride to life at Berkeley Rep a few years ago. Imaginative, enthralling and chillingly-thrillingly theater.

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ASR Contributing Writer George Maguire is a San Francisco-based actor-director and is Professor Emeritus of Solano College Theatre. He is a voting member of the SF Bay Area Theatre Critics Circle. Contact: [email protected]

 

ASR NorCal Executive Editor Barry Willis is a member of the American Theatre Critics Association and president of the SF Bay Area Theatre Critics Circle. Contact: [email protected]

 

ProductionWuthering Heights
Written by Emily Bronte
Adapted by Emma Rice
Directed by Emma Rice
Choreographed by Etta Murfitt		Saheem Ali (Conceiver/Director)
Producing CompanyWise Children / Berkeley Repertory Theatre
Production DatesThrough January 1, 2023
Production Address2025 Addison Street, Berkeley CA 94704
Websitewww.berkeleyrep.org
Telephone(510) 847-2949
Tickets$24 - $119
Reviewer ScoreMax in each category is 5/5
Overall4/5
Performance5/5
Script4/5
Stagecraft4/5
Aisle Seat Review Pick?YES!
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PICK! ASR Theater ~~ Waves of Racial Justice at Berkeley Rep

By George Maguire

There are theater pieces which resonate in such a profound place deep within the psyche that you are dwelling in your life’s past, contemplating the present, and hoping for the future.

Christina Anderson’s “The Ripple, The Wave That Carried Me Home” is just that for this writer. In it, segregated swimming pools become a touchstone for black families not allowed to swim in “whites only” pools. This memory play of a black woman spans the years 1956 in Kansas, to 1992 Ohio, and again Kansas, as Christina Clark’s Janice wrestles with a decision to return to Kansas to speak at a community center ceremony honoring her activist father.

…See this play and then look inside yourselves.

I’m an east coast boy, born and raised in the 1950s in Wilmington, Delaware and later Pittsburgh, PA. As a child and as a teenager, I knew no black families, and indeed at the Catholic grade school and high school I attended, there were no black students at all. Only when we moved to Pittsburgh for my final 12th grade, did I meet any black students, and even those were mostly bused to school from another area of town. Four years later, post university (where again I recall only one black student), I returned to my high school to teach. Much had changed. Black and Latino families were moving into the community, and their children became active participants in the school curriculum. Penn Hills, PA became a melting pot.

Memories of missed connections in retrospect created a post-show train of thought as I went home after the Berkeley Rep production, directed with precision and grand compassion by Jackson Gay.

This remarkable play opens with Janice (our narrator Christiana Clark) drinking a glass of water. She does so every day, reminding herself of the water of the pools which transformed her life. Her mother (a richly multi-faceted performance by Aneisa J. Hicks) taught swimming to black children at the black swimming pool in Brookside Center. Janice’s father (a swaggering and charm-filled Ronald L. Conner) eventually goes on trial for activism in promoting change.

(l to r) Aneisa J. Hicks (Helen), Brianna Buckley (Gayle), and Christiana Clark (Janice) in the world premiere production of Christina Anderson’s the ripple, the wave that carried me home. Directed by Jackson Gay. In association with Goodman Theatre.
Photo by Kevin Berne.

The “young chipper ambitious black woman,” played to absolute perfection by Brianna Buckley, wants Janice to speak at the dedication to her father of the new swim center’s pool. Circling all of this is the simultaneous Rodney King uprising and the death by drowning of three boys.

So many colossal matters of change in the lives of all Americans surround this period with pain, guilt—and eventual breath—making Tony nominee Christina Anderson’s play harrowing and heart wrenching. Change can happen, change MUST happen, and indeed, change has happened. The question is always: Is it enough, or is it never enough? No, it is not!

See this play and then look inside yourselves. The answers are always there waiting to be revealed.

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ASR Contributing Writer George Maguire is a San Francisco base actor-director and is Professor Emeritus of Solano College Theatre. He is a voting member of the SF Bay Area Theatre Critics Circle. Contact: [email protected]

 

ProductionThe Ripple, The Wave That Carried Me Home
Written by / Music & Lyrics by /
Choreography by
Christina Anderson
Directed byJackson Gay
Producing CompanyBerkeley Repertory Theatre
Production DatesThrough Oct 16th, 2022
Production Address2025 Addison Street, Berkeley CA 94704
Websitewww.berkeleyrep.org
Telephone(510) 647-2900
Tickets$24 - $70
Reviewer ScoreMax in each category is 5/5
Overall4/5
Performance4/5
Script4/5
Stagecraft4/5
Aisle Seat Review Pick?YES!
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Pick! ASR Theater ~~“Man of God:” Revenge is Sweet at Shotgun Players

By George Maguire

Have you ever had all-consuming revenge fantasies for acts of bullying, abuse, or sexual come-ons—whether real or perceived? Actions that hurt or damaged you emotionally, not just then, but into the future? Let’s face it: we all have!

Thoughts of “if only I had done this to the perpetrator” live on with us.

Such feelings of revenge surround four teen-aged Korean-American girls on a Christian New Seoul Church mission trip with their pastor to Thailand, a land of iniquity. As the girls acclimate themselves to their hotel room, one of them discovers a hidden camera tucked away in their bathroom.

…we laugh throughout as their Kpop-infused dialogue…

Who put it there? When the girls discover, to their horror, that it is the property of the church. They assume it was placed there by their pastor to watch them as they perform intimate functions in the expected privacy of their own bathroom.

Sharon Shao as Kyung-Hwa, Alexandra Lee as Samantha. Photos by Ben Krantz

“Man of God” presents the girls’ conundrum in flights of fancy, a dizzying array of wildly imaginative revenge scenarios from mafia-driven execution to machete kung-fu action to comedy blood-lust to ice bath disembowelment of vital organs. As they free-flight fantasize about their vengeance, we laugh throughout as their Kpop-infused dialogue brilliantly captures the patois of teenage girls while their imaginations fuel decisions they never make.

Boys are excused because it’s in their nature to “act out.” Girls, however are not doormats! “If we continue allowing ourselves this kind of abuse, it is actually on us!”

The girls understand the reality they live in, and they turn on a dime from spouting quick bursts of vital truisms of women in a patriarchal society to discussions of make-up and moisturizers.

Five very gifted Asian American actors embody the girls and the pastor. Each girl is distinctly depicted by playwright Anna Ouyang Moench and expertly guided by director Michelle Talgarow’s spot-on staging on Randy Wong-Westbrooke’s marvel of a set.

Sharon Shao as Kyung-Hwa, Lauren Andrei Garcia as Mimi, Alexandra Lee as Samantha, Joyce Domanico-Huh as Jen. Photos by Ben Krantz.

Joyce Domanico-Huh, Lauren Andrei Garcia, Alexandra Lee, and Sharon Shao are pure delights, bringing the language of their world alive. Did Pastor, played by Chuck Lacson, place the camera in the bathroom? That is not resolved until the final moments of this 90-minute one-act. To find out, you must see the play, as this reviewer certainly isn’t going to give it away.

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ASR Contributing Writer George Maguire is a San Francisco based actor-director and Professor Emeritus of Solano College Theatre.

 

 

 

ProductionMan of God
Written byAnna Ouyang Moench
Directed byMichelle Talgarow
Producing CompanyShotgun Players
Production Dates
Video On Demand		> thru October 2, 2022
> October 5-16
Production Address1901 Ashby Avenue, Berkeley CA 94705
WebsiteShotgunplayers.org
Telephone(510) 841-4500
Tickets$25
Reviewer ScoreMax in each category is 5/5
Overall4/5
Performance5/5
Script4/5
Stagecraft5/5
Aisle Seat Review Pick?Yes!
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Pick! ASR Theater ~~ “Goddess” at Berkeley Rep Looks Broadway Bound!

By George Maguire

Berkeley Rep’s “Goddess” opens with electrifying, high-energy afro-centric dance and music that encompass skat, jazz, and R & B, and introduces us to Moto Moto, a bar in Mombasa, Kenya. A loquacious and slitheringly sexy emcee Ahmed (Rodrick Covington) and company welcome us, the visitors, to an evening of high entertainment. “Moto Moto” means hot and fiery. Indeed it is.

Through a trio of always-present all-knowing spirits, we meet the bar’s owner Madongo (Lawrence Stallings), the snap-crackle-and-pop bar gal, Rashida (Abena), and the boy just back from Columbia University with a Poli-sci degree, Omari (the multi-talented quadruple-threat Philip Johnson Richardson). Suddenly the mood shifts from exuberant joy to a sense of fear and awe as we meet Nadira (the golden voiced Amber Iman). Nadira is the Goddess reaching into mortal elements trying to find that most human of virtues: love. Omari is smitten as she sings “That Love.” They meet and a bond of the heart begins.

…With some tweaking, this wonderful new musical should find its place on the Broadway roster of hits….

A weave of myth and legend, Nadira’s world is the African tale of Marimba, the Goddess of Music and Mother of Song. Nadira’s desire to understand the love possessed by mortals is hampered by a curse placed on her by her vengeful Mother, the Goddess of Evil—a curse that will be fulfilled should Nadira relinquish her power and attempt to come alive as human. The budding mutual passion she and Omari feel—and his own love of music (Mr. Richardson also plays a mean sax)—can only bring heartbreak.

(center) Isio-Maya Nuwere (Moto Moto Ensemble – Safiyah) (l to r) Teshomech (Grio Trio – Tisa), Wade Watson (Moto Moto Ensemble – Musa), Awa Sal Secka (Grio Trio – Zawadi), Quiantae Thomas (Moto Moto Ensemble – Amina), Zachary Downer (Moto Moto Ensemble – Sameer), Aaron Nicholas Patterson (Moto Moto Ensemble – Yusef), and (stairs) Rodrick Covington (Ahmed) in the world premiere musical production of Goddess. Directed by Saheem Ali, book by Jocelyn Bioh, music and lyrics by Michael Thurber. Photo by Kevin Berne and Alessandra Mello/Berkeley Repertory Theatre

Complications ensue as Omari’s parents and fiancée have other plans for him. He is tied to the roots of family and must marry and become the Mayor of Mombasa. The talented Kecia Lewis and Kingsley Leggs as the parents, and officious Destinee Rha as the fiancée, offer Omari no alternative but to get out of his situation and back to Moto Moto and Nadira.

In the sixteen-year development of this musical, this area still needs work. We need to see and understand how Omari is torn between wanting to honor the commitment he made to them before he left for NYC and his nascent love for Nadira.

(front) Phillip Johnson Richardson (Omari) (back, l to r) Wade Watson (Moto Moto Enemble – Musa), Melessie Clark (Grio Trio – Mosi), Quiantae Thomas (Moto Moto Ensemble – Amina), and Awa Sal Secka (Grio Trio – Zawadi) in the world premiere musical production of Goddess. Directed by Saheem Ali, book by Jocelyn Bioh, music and lyrics by Michael Thurber. Photo by Kevin Berne and Alessandra Mello/Berkeley Repertory Theatre

A magnificent production surrounds the world of Moto Moto with a detailed Afro-Arabic set by Arnulfo Maldonado, luminous lighting by Tony Winner Bradley King, magnificent costuming by Dede Ayite and special mention to the sound design of Nevin Steinberg. Literally every word spoken or sung is clearly understood. Music director Marco Paguia honors Michael Thurber’s original score with joy and specificity.

With some tweaking, this wonderful new musical should find its place on the Broadway roster of hits.

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ASR Contributing Writer George Maguire is a San Francisco-based actor and director and Professor Emeritus of Solano College Theatre.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

ProductionGoddess
Written by / Music & Lyrics by /
Choreography by
Jocelyn Bioh /
Michael Thurber /
Darrell Grand Moultrie
Directed bySaheem Ali (Conceiver/Director)
Producing CompanyBerkeley Repertory Theatre
Production DatesThrough September 25, 2022
Production Address2025 Addison Street, Berkeley CA 94704
Websitewww.berkeleyrep.org
Telephone(510) 647-2900
Tickets$38 - $104
Reviewer ScoreMax in each category is 5/5
Overall4/5
Performance5/5
Script3.5/5
Stagecraft5/5
Aisle Seat Review Pick?YES!
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ASR Theater ~~ A Family Divided: “Dreaming in Cuban” at Central Works

By Barry Willis

Political differences have shattered families and friendships since the dawn of history. Cristina Garcia’s “Dreaming in Cuban,” by Berkeley’s Central Works through July 31, examines the impact of the Cuban revolution on a family irreconcilably divided by the event and its ideology.

The time is 1979-80. Mary Ann Rodgers stars as Celia del Pino, a true-believer revolutionary whose two adult daughters have gone in vastly different directions. One, Lourdes (Anna Maria Luera) left Cuba to open a successful bakery in Brooklyn, NY, while her rudderless sister Felicia (Natalia Delgado) chose to remain on the island. Among the many “gusanos” (worms) allowed to depart in the wake of the revolution, Lourdes is adamantly pro-capitalist and anti-communist. Her mother is the opposite, with a near-religious faith in Fidel Castro and his cause.

Central Works has a tradition of performing new plays…

Living far apart, they’ve had little communication until the sudden death of Felicia brings Lourdes and her artistic teenage daughter Pilar (Thea Rodgers) back to the island for the funeral. The story of the two sides of the family unfolds in parallel, going back and forth between Lourdes/Pilar and Celia/Felicia.

Pilar proves to be one of the script’s most interesting and most malleable characters, with the biggest character arc. As a teenage lefty, she has doubts about the benefits of capitalism and some sympathy for the social experiment taking place in her ancestral homeland, somewhere she’s never visited until late in the tale.

Mary Ann Rodgers as Celia, Anna Maria Luera as Lourdes

In significant ways “Dreaming in Cuban” is told almost passively from Pilar’s point of view, and more assertively from the perspectives of Celia and Lourdes. Familial love runs deep, but not deep enough to fill the divide between those on opposite sides.

Pilar’s starry-eyed fascination with the revolution is tempered by a few days in Cuba. She’s the delicate suspension bridge between two previous generations. No longer enamored with communism, she comments near the end of her visit: “Utopias have a terrible track record.”

Working in a small space in the Berkeley City Club, Julia Morgan’s beautiful old building on Durant Avenue, Central Works has a tradition of performing new plays with almost no set, relying instead on a few essential props, some projected images, and great sound design by Gregory Scharpen, almost compensating for the emptiness and constraints of the space.

The cast at work in Central Work’s “Dreaming in Cuban”

The performers in this production are generally quite good, especially Rodgers, Rodgers, and Luera. Eric Esquivel-Guiterrez does a nice turn as Max, Pilar’s Brooklyn-based musician boyfriend, and as Ivanito, Felicia’s son. Steve Ortiz appears in two minor roles, and voices a couple of announcers.

Developed from her novel of the same name, and directed by Gary Graves, Garcia’s play has enormous potential, not fully mined in this production. The near-total lack of set requires the audience to do an unusual amount of filling-in-the-blanks that isn’t counterbalanced by impassioned performances and excellent sound design.

Theater goers may find a lot to like in “Dreaming in Cuban,” especially should it be undertaken in a larger venue. The City Club production won a “Go See” recommendation from the San Francisco Bay Area Theatre Critics Circle.

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Aisle Seat Review NorCal Executive Editor Barry Willis is a member of the American Theatre Critics Association and president of the SF Bay Area Theatre Critics Circle. Contact: [email protected]

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

ProductionDreaming in Cuban
Written byCristina Garcia
Directed byGary Graves
Producing CompanyCentral Works
Production DatesThru July 31, 2022
Production AddressBerkeley City Club
2315 Durant Ave, Berkeley, CA 94704
WebsiteCentralWorks.org
Telephone(510) 558 -1381
Tickets$22 - $40
Reviewer ScoreMax in each category is 5/5
Overall3/5
Performance3.5/5
Script3/5
Stagecraft2/5
Aisle Seat Review Pick?---

 

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An ASR Theater Review! Bold, Incisive “Dry Powder” at Aurora Theatre – by Barry Willis

One devilish deal leads to the next in Sarah Burgess’s incisive “Dry Powder,” at Berkeley’s Aurora Theatre Company, through July 22.

Directed by Jennifer King, this Bay Area premiere is a dark comedy that peers into the often impenetrable world of private equity—a niche of the financial world where companies are bought, sold, merged, or dismembered in pursuit of mind-blowing profits.

A high-stakes game with enormous potential for victory and defeat, and enormous potential to affect countless people, private equity is little understood by ordinary citizens except as a scapegoat for all that might and can go wrong on the grand economic scale. The show’s title refers to working capital—money in reserve, the industry’s primary tool.

Bay Area stalwart Aldo Billingsly, along with Jeremy Kahn, in ‘Dry Powder’ at Aurora Theater

Bay Area theater veteran Aldo Billingsly is brilliant as Rick, the volatile founder of a private equity firm that’s recoiling from some very bad press about his lavish wedding party in the aftermath of a buyout that threw thousands of people out of work.

Junior partners Seth (Jeremy Kahn) and Jenny (Emily Jeanne Brown) bring him potential deals, treatments for deals, financial projections for various scenarios, personal advice, and insider opinions about the probable public relations consequences of their deals—in this case, a proposed buyout of an American luggage maker with more than 500 employees.

Emily Jeanne Brown at work as Jenny, in ‘Dry Powder’

It’s a deal that Seth has been nursing for months, in the process forming a strong bond with Jeff (Kevin Kemp), co-owner of the target company. The two have such a pronounced “bromance” that Jeff is actually excited about the possibility of reviving the brand and re-jiggering its business model to create a whole new market for personalized luggage.

A math-whiz elitist with zero empathy for working people, Jenny dismisses Jeff’s ideas as feel-good nonsense and presents an alternate plan to buy the company, spin off its assets, and send production offshore—a plan with a larger potential upside but horrible social consequences. Numbers are all that matter to Jenny. The fact that this will render 500 people jobless is of no concern to her—”It’s their responsibility to learn how to do something else,” she flatly states.

Hilarious and horrific, ‘Dry Powder’ is a quickie tour of one of the outer rings of hell…

Therein lies the moral struggle in Rick’s office, depicted with superb energy and conviction on the Aurora’s simple, all-white thrust stage (set by Tanya Oellana, lights by Kurt Landisman, sound by James Ard). Jenny and Seth battle like adolescent brother and sister—much of it side-splittingly funny—and Rick alternately takes their counsel or reins them in. A couple of plot twists near the end drive home the Faustian nature of their business, including a desperate alliance with a Hong Kong financier so corrupt that he’s lost his Chinese citizenship.

Hilarious and horrific, “Dry Powder” is a quickie tour of one of the outer rings of hell—if you believe the old adage that the love of money is the root of all evil. In Berkeley, the message will certainly find an eager audience, who may be dismayed at the verity of another old adage: Everyone has a price.

Barry Willis

ASR Theater Section Editor and Senior Writer Barry Willis is a member of the American Theatre Critics Association and president of the San Francisco Bay Area Theatre Critics Circle. Contact: [email protected]

 

 

ProductionYear of Magical Thinking
Written byJoan Didion
Directed byNancy Carlin
Producing CompanyAurora Theater Co.
Production DatesThru July 28th
Production AddressAurora Theater Co.
2081 Addison St.
Berkeley, CA 94704
Websitewww.auroratheatre.org
Telephone510.843.4822
Tickets$49 – $60
Reviewer ScoreMax in each category is 5/5
Overall4.5/5
Performance5/5
Script5/5
Stagecraft4/5
Aisle Seat Review PICK?Yes!