Tuesday, September 28, 2010
One general problem I have with Greek tragedy is that I’m not Greek and, most days, not terribly tragic. I’ve experienced, a time or two, the feeling of catharsis that can come from bein…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 01:05PMSunday, September 26, 2010
Much Ado About Nothing can be one of Shakespeare’s trickier romantic comedies. It’s full of sparring lovers, great lines and thoroughly entertaining comic bits. But it also contains some…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 08:55PMThursday, September 23, 2010
If you want to see what funny looks like, you should see Bill Irwin in a comedy. In recent years, he’s been fairly serious, what with his stage work in shows like Who’s Afraid of Virgini…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 07:01PMWednesday, September 22, 2010
Comparing The Brothers Size, the second part of Tarell Alvin McCraney’s The Brother/Sister Plays cycle, to In the Red and Brown Water, the first part, is inevitable but ultimately unnecess…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 05:46PMSunday, September 19, 2010
The irony surrounding Friday's opening-night for La Cage aux Folles at San Mateo's Broadway by the Bay was sweet. Audience members showing up for this glitzy gay musical fairy tale were not …
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 07:55PMSaturday, September 18, 2010
I'm so sorry you missed my performance in Etiquette, the unique show brought to us by the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts' DARE program. I must say, not to be too boastful, that my performan…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 05:06PMFriday, September 17, 2010
It's so incredibly exciting to be enthralled by someone or something. In the case of Rinne Groff's Compulsion at Berkeley Repertory Theatre, it's someone and something.
The world-premiere …
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 08:25PMWednesday, September 15, 2010
>Tarell Alvin McCraney's In the Red and Brown Water feels like ritual. It feels like a party. It feels like living, breathing poetry. And that's a hell of way to begin a prodigious three-…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 09:24PMMonday, September 13, 2010
I'll just say it right up front: the first time I saw Teatro ZinZanni, I left the spiegeltent with a raging headache.
That was 10 years ago, and the show was, appropriately, Love, Chaos &a…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 10:06PMMonday, August 30, 2010
If only playwright Alice Childress could see Margo Hall's performance in her 1955 play Trouble in Mind now at Berkeley's Aurora Theatre Company.
Hall has long been one of those Bay Area ac…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 12:02AMFriday, August 27, 2010
Dreamgirls, as a movie, seemed apologetic that it was a musical at all. Set in the Motown-ish world of a Supremes-ish girl group, the story lends itself to abundant music without straining c…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 02:27PMSunday, July 11, 2010
If you need proof of how lively and diverse the San Francisco theater scene can be, let me direct your attention to two wildly different shows I've seen recently. One is about as old fashion…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 08:45PMFriday, June 18, 2010
First, two issues that need addressing:
- Why isn't Sam Harris performing his new gay marriage anthem "My Reclamation" at San Francisco's Gay Pride celebration? It's a beautiful, movi…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 03:21PMSunday, June 13, 2010
One of the most exciting things about the world premiere of American Conservatory Theater's The Tosca Project is that it shines a big old spotlight on the riches of the Bay Area.
Here is a …
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 10:57PMMonday, June 7, 2010
Spectacular things are happening at the Bruns Amphitheater – on stage and off.
At long last, California Shakespeare Theater is getting a performance venue worthy of its status as one of …
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 12:39AMFriday, April 30, 2010
Marin Theatre Company's Equivocation is enormously enjoyable theater.
I liked Bill Cain's play last summer when I saw it at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival in Ashland, and I still like its…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 03:10AMSaturday, April 24, 2010
There's no big anniversary, but there's still something to celebrate. Steve Silver's Beach Blanket Babylon is going on 36 years old and is brighter, fresher and funnier than ever. Members of…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 02:30PMMonday, March 22, 2010
>I loved it before and I love it even more now.
About a year ago, Word for Word and Theatre Rhinoceros joined forces for an evening of three shorts stories by gay writers adapted for th…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 11:00AMSunday, March 21, 2010
On the theatrical spectrum, this is the exact opposite of the sitcom-ready Sunset and Margaritas now at TheatreWorks (read my review of that play in the Palo Alto Weekly here), which is to s…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 05:48PMSaturday, March 20, 2010
You could describe Marilee Talkington in a number of ways, starting with the fact that she is going blind. She is partially sighted, visually impaired, visually handicapped, sensorily challe…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 03:59PMSunday, March 14, 2010
How strange it is to see two wildly different comedies at two different theaters and find they have something in common: plot twists that involve the restraining of characters by tying them …
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 08:23PMWednesday, March 3, 2010
Watching the audience on stage at Intersection for the Arts was a stunning experience. Sometimes theater companies trying to push boundaries and break down walls really do get it right.
Th…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 12:28PMMonday, March 1, 2010
Omoze Idehenre and Manoel Felciano in American Conservatory Theater’s The Caucasian Chalk Circle. Photo by Kevin Berne Theater is musical even when it’s not necessarily musical theater. …
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 09:00AMSunday, February 28, 2010
Opera’s not really my bag, but I had a fantastic time reviewing West Bay Opera’s Der Freischütz for the Palo Alto Weekly. The short run ended today (Sunday, Feb. 28), but the review liv…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 07:23PMThursday, February 18, 2010
The original cast of [title of show] included (from left) Heidi Blickenstaff, Hunter Bell (seated), Jeff Bowen (top), and Susan Blackwell. [title of show] will be presented as part of the 20…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 09:00AMSunday, February 14, 2010
EXTENDED THROUGH MARCH 27! The last major magic show to hit the Bay Area theater scene involved Siegfried and Roy giving their stamp of magical approval to a kid who sang show tunes while do…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 10:07PMFriday, February 12, 2010
Curtains, the final collaboration of legendary John Kander and Fred Ebb (Rupert Holmes came in to finish the show after Ebb’s death), is finally taking a Bay Area bow. Diablo Theatre Compa…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 07:47PMTuesday, February 9, 2010
Consider the last couple years in the life of local director Mike Ward. He received a San Francisco Bay Area Theatre Critics Circle Award nomination for best director and he was nominated fo…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 11:30AMMonday, February 8, 2010
EXTENDED THROUGH AUG. 1! Above: Kara Emry and William McMichael get Shanghaied in Pearls Over Shanghai. Below: Eric Wertz and Steven Satyricon dream of “un bel di.”Photos by David Wilson…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 10:30AMSaturday, February 6, 2010
The Sound of Music, Julie Andrews, 1965. TM and Copyright © 20th Century Fox Film Corp. All rights reserved. Courtesy: Everett Collection. Back in the dark ages of VHS, I remember being …
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 10:20PMThursday, February 4, 2010
There’s bad news aplenty in the world, so it’s always nice to discover some bright spots of good news, especially in the theater world. San Francisco playwright Trevor Allen, who had a s…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 10:30AM 
