Mission Mission

Guys. I was reading the excerpt from Nick Bilton’s forthcoming book about how Twitter was started in The New York Times and I realized something. I might have invented Twitter. I mean, I know I didn’t, but look at these pages that I blogged about a few years ago, it’s almost eerie. I explained my process in my previous post:

A long time ago in this very land (sometime in 2003) I sat alone in my living room, looking out the window onto Guerrero Street and wondered how I could connect with the people of the neighborhood, hear their thoughts, start a dialogue, without having to actually leave my house and face people in real life. Yes, it sounds sad and lonely. Whatever. The point is, I didn’t know about hyperlocal blogs or anything, so I made do with what I had. Which, apparently, wasn’t much. I figured I’d have to do some fishing.

One morning I tied a piece of paper onto a length of fishing line, attached a pen at the end and lowered them both out the window. I left my house for the day and when I came home that night I reeled the paper in (pen gone).

GOOD MORNING. (if evening, please reverse)

GOOD EVENING (if morning please reverse)

I mean, the bland prompt, time stamp, emoticons, timeline, it’s kinda weird. Before you jump all over me and explain why I didn’t invent Twitter or even Facebook, I know. But, maybe it demonstrates why something like that was ready to take off, that we were all ready to begin communicating in this specific manner. I guess I won’t sue. It’s not my style. And all I did was hang a piece of paper out the window. I guess I could have tried a little harder.

Found unattended on a parked car. Hmmm…cop trap? #ReverseEntrapment pic.twitter.com/S5D0iJK58l

— Palo Alto Police (@PaloAltoPolice) October 9, 2013

Yeah, the “Jack Off” movement. You know, to stop Fifth & Pacific’s upscale menswear chain, not the other kind of jack, how dare you think I was making a lewd inference in order to get you to read yet another article about this company. Both Ammiano and former President of the Board of Supervisors Matt Gonzalez support a new appeal. The two are authors of the formula retail ordinance, and believe that the company has acted in bad faith, not holding a hearing and muscling their way in through technicalities.

But they love our gentrification!

Andy Blue sends in the press release, describing the next steps to keep the shop out of the Mission. Full text after the jump:

JACK SPADE OPPONENTS RETURN FIGHT TO CITY HALL
WITH EXPANDING SUPPORT FROM POLS AND COMMUNITY GROUPS

Author of formula retail ballot measure, Assemblymember Tom Ammiano:
“Jack Spade has operated in bad faith”


Matt Gonzalez, Aaron Peskin; Supes Campos, Avalos,
and Mar support the appeal.

SAN FRANCISCO –– Backed by the original drafters of San Francisco’s formula retail ordinance, the coalition fighting to stop designer menswear line, Jack Spade, from opening a new store in the Mission District, heads to City Hall this Wednesday, October 9 (City Hall, Room 416, 5:00pm) to request a rehearing before the Board of Appeals.

(more…)

Jacob sends in a video that he captured from a lil’ drone helicopter flying over Bernal Hill and looking out over the Mission and beyond, via OverSF. Cool stuff.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1tZO_4lDKao&feature=youtu.be

It’s like 29.97 Instagrams a second!!

Reader Byron sent us this pic of someone getting a couple handfuls of Batman in the BART station. Most likely the brooding hero was making his way back to the cave from the Superhero Street Festival last Saturday.

Byron adds:

It was at the 24th Bart street station
The person in the batman outfit was really intoxicated and was posing for pictures

You can see pictures from past Superhero Street Festivals on their site.

Scott writes in to let us know about this fundraising event for Marshall Elementary:

We are that small public elementary school on 15th and Capp. Our families are not wealthy, and we are struggling to figure out how to raise money for our school to fund the things that the school budget doesn’t. And that is pretty much everything outside of teacher salaries.

This year, we are teaming up with Lucha Libre – Mexican wrestling. Lucha Libre is a form of wrestling, popular in Mexico and other Spanish-speaking countries, that is characterized by colorful masks, rapid sequences of holds and high-flying maneuvers. Should be more fun than the typical bake sale or silent auction! We will have some food to buy as well.

We set up a site to buy tickets and it would be great to get some of our community to come in and support our fundraiser.

$10 adults / $5 kids

OCT 6, Sunday, Doors open at 1:30 PM.

Looks pretty amazing.

Fall is a great time for seeing live theater, as the Indian Summer winds down and temperatures drop into that horrible 50-60° range, warm theaters are a welcome sanctuary. Katie & Brittany are on a roll, seeing all kinds, even though they’ve been overall less impressed than they hoped to be, but more on that later. Here they are with a report from Hush at Z Space:

Andrew Ward (top) and Felipe Barrueto-Cabello (bottom) perform in Hush; photo by Margo Moritz

Z Space is one of our favorite live performance venues in San Francisco, not just because it’s a beautiful warehouse theater, with not a bad seat in the house, and an art gallery in the lobby but also because there is always something new and different. Last week they premiered Hush a dance-theater piece created by the Joe Goode Performance Group. It had been featured on the cover of Theatre Bay Area and has been generally buzzed about, so we were very excited at opening night . . . maybe too excited.

Brittany: There were a lot of good things about this show. They were all really talented dancers. The foley and music was awesome. I loved watching the sound effects happen live. The set was pretty cool. The problem was the story was disappointingly trite, so the piece didn’t live up to the hype.

Like any play, once the plot was established I felt like the relationships between the characters should be driving the piece, but that didn’t happen. They established that there were specific relationships between specific actors, and that those people were playing the same roles throughout the play, but they were so focused on dancing they didn’t let the relationships develop. Great dancers don’t necessarily make great actors I guess. It felt like the piece lacked an emotional through line.

If this same story was told in 30-40 mins, instead of an hour fifteen, I would have probably walked away feeling like this was a perfect dance-theater piece, but for me it dragged.

Katie: Right! Wow, I couldn’t have said it better . . . so I won’t even try.

The Verdict: Do you love, love, love dance pieces? You need to see this show! Are you more into a well told story that happens to have beautiful movement and awesome music, then we don’t think you will be blown away by this piece as a whole.

The Drama Talk: All the elements to make an amazing dance-theater piece were there: talented people, a very awesome space, insane cool music and sound effects, however this was one time the whole was not greater than the sum of its parts. Falling short on the storyline, and indulging in few too many artsy repetitions of dance movements, made the show a little long and as a whole get a little . . . [we so don’t want to say it, because we HATE this word] boring.

The Drinks: Since the characters worked a dive bar we thought it would be best to go to the Homestead a few blocks away. We got our usuals and poured one out for unrealistic expectations.

Hush runs through 10/5 at Z Space, and tickets can be purchased through their website. Ticket prices vary. You can get seats way in the back for $15-20, but the best seats in the house will run you closer to $65-70.

Yet another Drama Talk that I was bummed to miss. I love Sam Shepard, murky and complicated as I am. Brittany and Katie sent in this report of Buried Child at Magic Theatre:

Bradley (Patrick Kelly Jones, right) prepares a rude awakening for his father Dodge (Rod Gnapp) in Sam Shepard’s Buried Child at Magic Theatre through October 6. Photo: Jennifer Reiley

It was a rare beautiful sunny Sunday in San Francisco. America’s Cup festivities had Fort Mason abuzz with the kind of exuberance that can only come from the carefree joie-de-vivre of rich people and their fancy hobbies. After strolling along the waterfront and looking at all the beautiful things and people, we ascended the stairs into Magic Theatre to see their recently opened revival of Sam Shepard’s Buried Child. As we entered the theater we were transported to a decaying gray house in farm-town Illinois on a desperately rainy day. We knew we were in for some Drama Talk & Drinks.

Brittany: I’m a little confused, but I think that ‘s the intent of Shepard. It’s supposed to be a play you come away from feeling uncomfortable and confused. Like “OMG what did I just see? I just saw a family, or the remains of a family, crumble on stage”.  There’s something about watching something so raw, so uncomfortable, and so unhappy. I don’t know if I’d tell people to run out and go see it, unless they’re really up for a depressing evening, but I do think it was a good production. Although, I couldn’t stand the actor who played Halie (Denise Balthrop Cassidy).

Katie: Right, it felt like she was reading directly from the script half the time. Other than her, I thought all the actors were very good. Like the actor who played Dodge (Rod Gnapp), he was really remarkable. The set was really good too. I loved the porch and the real rain.

Brittany: Yeah, loved the set. Magic is such a small space, the way they built out the stairway into the wings made the space look huge, and really gave it the feeling of a big old decaying country house. The sound design was on point too. That sad guitar at the beginning had such a lonely harsh sound. With the rain, and dirty decaying set, it set the stage for the rest of the play which is just a raw look at an American family destroyed.

The Verdict: What a depressing show. Shepard really knows how to ruin a beautiful Sunday. It was a good production, with some really strong actors, great design, and good direction, but MAN. Wear a cup because Shepard is going right for the balls with this play, and the Magic cast led by Rod Gnapp as Dodge, shows no mercy.

The Drama Talk: This show is not for everyone. If you like Sam Shepard, and therefore like having your guts wrenched, you’ll probably enjoy it. Otherwise be forewarned. As the name implies, think of the most messed up depressing things that could be buried within a family. Those will be dug up and thrust in front of the audience throughout the show.

The Drinks: After watching that much desolation on stage we needed a strong drink. Since we were in the Marina, we decided to follow the advice of Mission Mission friend, Stuart Schuffman, and head to Horseshoe Tavern. There were thankfully very few Marina folk, just 49ers fans, so we could wallow freely without the company of too many crisply starched polos and gaily printed Lilly Pulitzer frocks. The whole first act transpired during a massive on-stage thunderstorm, so Katie appropriately ordered a Dark and Stormy. Brittany contemplated ordering whiskey straight up, but it was only 5pm and we had one more show to see that day, so whiskey ginger it was.

Buried Child has been extended through October 13th, so you have a few weeks to catch this show before it closes. Tickets are available on the Magic Theatre website and are $45-55 on Tues-Thurs, and $50-60 Friday-Sunday. There’s also a senior and “educator” discount available, so if you’re either of those just bring an ID.

We couldn’t find anything on GoldStar yet, and there’s no mention of student or under 30 discounts, but Magic does say “Keep checking our Facebook page, blog and website for updates and announcements on rush tickets, discounts and special promotions.” so there’s that.

For this installment of the good old drama talk with Katie & Brittany, the duo went to see the 12th Annual Bay One Acts Festival – Program 1. Here’s their report.

When we heard that there was a festival going on that brings together local artists and many different theater companies we were really excited to check it out. So, this past Sunday night we headed to the Tides Theater in Nob Hill for the 12th Annual Bay One Acts Festival to see 6 different short form plays. Since there are so many pieces we decided to break it down a little differently than usual, just giving you our first thoughts on each of the plays. Jump to the verdict if you don’t care about our initial reactions to the specific plays.

#1: Modernizing the Afterlife – A dead Google developer gets recruited by St. Peter’s nephew to optimize their afterlife processing.

Katie: It made me think of the time I went on an online date with a guy that developed apps for a living . . . and just like this piece I left that date slightly intrigued, slightly confused and wanting more.

#2: Desiree – A woman copes with the aftermath of ten years in captivity.

K: One word – Awkward. All I could do was compare it to the Cleveland woman tragedy. It was the one piece that no one knew when it ended.

Brittany: There were a number of pieces that fell short because of the acting, this one fell short because of the writing more than anything else.

#3: Write Dirty to Me – Dead writers operate literary phone sex lines.

B: This show is what an english major, who is crazy nerdy, thinks is funny. But if you are not deep into english major land you have no fucking clue was is going on.

K: Which was me.

B: This show also reminds me of the time I saw the Vagina monologues during high school and afterwards we said “cunt” over and over again because we thought it was funny. Dirty words just aren’t that funny when you’re an adult.

Intermission

#4: Love Song of Aflred J. Prufrock – A T.S. Eliot poem set to movement.

B: This show made me think of the time I was at a bar when I was 21 and a 50 year old hit on me.

K: Awkward.

B: Yeah.

#5: Red All Over – In the wake of a school shooting tragedy, new relationships begin.

B: Remember that thing we said last time about story arcs . . . there wasn’t one.

K: There wasn’t even a story . . . to be arced.

B: Also, why does a lesbian romance have to happen at a child murder scene…I don’t get that.

#6: Last Couples Therapy Session on Earth – The Zombie Apocalypse has happened, but that doesn’t mean that this couple is done working through their problems.

B: Well written, cute, vignette. It was the best piece in the series.

K: It would have been hilariously bizarre, Modern Familyish, if not for The Walking Dead.

[pic of The Royal Tug Yacht Club by Rose Garrett for Eater SF]

The Verdict: We really, really, really wanted to love this festival. It’s a great idea executed in a really cool space. We wanted to walk away feeling like we saw some fresh, innovative, well developed, entertaining theater, unfortunately we did not. We did only see Program One, so we can’t speak to the festival as a whole, but if Program One was any indication of what Program Two will be like, this festival is best left for an audience of friends of the artists and/or other artists that want to learn from watching artists, the general public might be disappointed.

The Drama Talk: Bay One Acts is a great platform for local directors, writers, and actors to collaborate, but when it comes down to it people are paying $15 to be entertained and moved and we just really weren’t. We want to bring new audiences to the theatre, not just support art just for the sake of supporting art. We don’t think a new audience would be that impressed by what should be some of the best new works in the SF theatre scene. At least for Program One, the writing itself is really what fell short for us.

The Drinks: We heard of a new bar that opened a couple months back just a few blocks from the theatre. The Royal Tug Yacht Club was the perfect place to discuss the evening, a small, almost empty, interestingly decorated (there’s a huge octopus on the ceiling, what is better than that) dive bar with great, strong cocktails. Brittany had the “Seek and Destroy”, which was what she was hoping this festival was going to do (you know, just “kill it”) and Katie got the “Washed Up”, which was what she felt she was after seeing this show.

Bay One Acts Festival

Street artist Tyme sent us this cool timelapse of him putting a piece up on a streetside door.