Mission Mission

Right on the illustrious corner of 6th and Mission.  What do you think, guys?  Is it still there?

Interview edition! Here’s Brittany and Katie’s report:

A few days after Brittany attended a Jazzy-Hip-Hop dance class at City Dance, a review request came across the DT&D desk (aka email) for a new musical, Mr. Irresistible, by D’Arcy Drollinger & Christopher Winslow. Still sore from all the booty-popping, Brittany recognized D’Arcy’s name as her fabulous dance instructor. We decided this would be the perfect opportunity to do a pre-show chat and get our groove on. So we donned our spandex and leg warmers, and went to D’Arcy’s Sunday Skool Sexitude dance class. After an hour and a half of sexitudeiness, we sat down with D’Arcy to get the scoop on his new show Mr. Irresistible that opens tonight!

Brittany: How did Mr. Irresistible come to be?

D’Arcy Drollinger: When I first moved to New York, I had a dare going with my friend. She was going to write a novel in 45 days, and I was going to write a full musical in 45 days, and so that’s actually when I started writing Mr. Irresistible, early in ’98. Flash forward to about a year ago, I had been talking with the artistic director at ODC, and I told her about this show I had never completed, and she liked the idea, so I began an artist residency at ODC. At the time I was also working on a different piece with Christopher Winslow, the composer of this show, a musical parody of Flowers in the Attic. So I asked him if he wanted to take a break from that and work on Mr. Irresistible. We spent six months tearing apart the old show, rewriting the songs and putting it back together. After readings at ODC, La Mama offered us a two week workshop in New York, which sold out, then we got a letter from SFAC that we got a seed grant to produce the show here and add in a lot more of the video elements, so we started looking for a theater.

Katie: Tell us a little about the show.

D’Arcy: This show starts as a real traditional musical, and then about ⅓ the way through it, it turns into a horror musical, when Mr. Irresistible starts killing everyone because he doesn’t understand metaphor. At the end, it turns into The Terminator, an action thriller with laser fights. It gets a little dark and heavy, but it’s still a happy ending.

K: I hate to be the person who asks this, but are there “concessions”?

D’Arcy: There are drinks, people can can buy booze before the show, and during intermission. Unfortunately it can’t come into the theater.

B: You’ve worked and lived in NY and SF, but made SF your homebase, how’s it working out for you?  Is this a viable place to make a career as an actor or artist?

D’Arcy: I was born in San Francisco, and then in junior high we moved to Nevada City, so I grew up there. I came back to SF for college at SF State, then a few years after college I was transferred to New York for work. New York is such an industry. I was missing the lifestyle here. The food, the mellow pace. I love New York, especially for the theater and the dance, but it has been better for me to be a Bay Area local artist. I have a community here that rallies around what I do. I think that’s the great thing about San Francisco audiences, they really rally around things. I’ve been making a decent living here making theater, which is CRAZY. If I didn’t know anybody here, I don’t think this would be the first place I would come to do theater. As I’m sure you know, in the last couple years this place has become so expensive and so many small venues have had to close. But there’s a lot of community support that’s hard to get like somewhere in New York.

K: What do you think about the future of theater and arts in San Francisco?

D’Arcy: I wish places like Google and Twitter would invest in more nightlife experiences for people that work for them that aren’t just bars. To keep this as a first class city we can’t destroy the downtown underground arts scene, and only have the big touring shows and a bunch of bars and nothing in between. People want hip stuff to do. I did a lot to make Rebel into a cabaret space, because there wasn’t anything like that, and now someone bought the building and is turning it into condos. I’m working very hard with some partners to create a cabaret space within a bar, where we can have a little more security knowing the building won’t be sold out from under us. But we need more viable nightlife, and a place for smaller productions.

B: What is your hope for Mr. Irresistible next?

D’Arcy: I’ve done nine musicals, and in a way this feels like my most commercial venture. It’s wacky, it has the love story, the thriller aspect, you’ve got your gay characters, you’ve got your drag queens, you’ve got Joey the Exterminator who the straight guys can identify with, it’s got the Sci-Fi aspect so all the Sci-Fi nerds can geek out on that. I could see this being a fun regional show. Start with a bigger production here, and then tour it, but with San Francisco roots. I can’t wait to show it to everyone. I feel so fortunate.

Mr. Irresistible runs June 4 – 8, 2014, Wednesday – Saturday at 8:00 pm and Sunday at 7:00 pm at the Alcazar Theatre (650 Geary St. in SF). Tickets are $25 each and can be purchased on the Mr. Irresistible eventbrite page. There are also half priced tickets available on Goldstar. Even if you can’t make it out to this show, make sure to check out one of D’Arcy’s incredibly fun sex-positive dance classes, or another one of his many upcoming shows.

Show love for your Bay Area actors, and do your part to keep SF a first-class arts city.

Fun DT&D fact: Katie, Brittany and I work together at BAYCAT, and one of the most famous shots in cinema history, the hallway shot from The Right Stuff, was shot in the hallway right outside our door. Legend goes that Walter Murch (personal hero of mine) was editing right here in the Dogpatch’s Northern AIC building, and they needed a pick up shot of the astronauts walking in slo-mo to really capture the gravitas. I did a little comparison as “proof” back in 2006, with myself as a piss poor stand in for the mightiest of hero shots.

Anyway, Sam Shepard was nominated for an Oscar® for his role in that film, as Chuck Yeager, the first human to break the sound barrier. Last week Katie & Brittany saw the Magic’s newest take on Shepard’s works. Here’s their report:

Sam Shepard, playwright, actor, director and Patti-Smith-ex, is turning 70. As part of Magic Theatre’s “Sheparding America” festival (Shepard was a playwright in residence at the Magic Theatre in the 70’s), Bay Area theaters are producing a series of shows that celebrate this great American playwright. While other productions are honoring Shepard by performing his plays, Word for Word member Amy Kossow decided to do something a little different. Taking a year to sift through five of Mr. Shepard’s collections of short stories, Kossow created 36 Stories by Sam Shepard, which weaves together Sam Shepard’s shorts about America’s desert highways into a single piece about a writer’s struggle as he searches for inspiration.

Word for Word’s production of 36 Stories by Sam Shepard, at Z Below 5/21/14 through 6/22/14. L to R: Carl Lumbly, Rod Gnapp. Photo by Mark Leialoha

The Writer (Rod Gnapp) has a philosophical discussion with the spirit of the severed head (Carl Lumbly).

Brittany: It was artsy, so I liked it. But, I thought the way the piece was constructed was a bit problematic. It was essentially a play about about a writers’ struggle, but I didn’t care as much about the writer’s struggle, as I cared about the stories he was telling. All the actors were great, and I thought the piece as a whole was really well done. Rod Gnapp did an amazing job with a character I didn’t think was compelling. But it was a little hard to stay fully engaged when the stories kept switching. That being said, I thought it was a really good production, and some of the actors’ individual performances were really remarkable, especially getting to see their range as they played different roles.

Katie: The actors were great but that didn’t help me to care about what was happening. It just didn’t work for me. I don’t know Brittany….I guess I just don’t get it because I just don’t understand how this is entertaining…maybe I just don’t know Sam Shepard enough. The set and the staging were good though. The actor who played guitar was really good and really cute. They should have just turned Sam Shepard’s short stories into songs and he could of just been on stage the whole time singing. I’d be into that shit.

B: I would say if you are interested in seeing a very well acted series of stories, you should go.

K: I would say skip this one.

The Verdict: If you enjoy poetic language and are interested in seeing it very well acted out in a series of stories, this is the show for you. If you know, and like, Sam Shepard’s writing, this is the show for you. If neither of those things apply, this is not the show for you.

The Drama Talk: This is a Bay Area all-star cast. It was well staged, and well performed. Word for Word does plays word-for-word, this means reading stage directions as well, so be prepared for that. Although Shepard’s stories themselves are intriguing, the piece which is used to tie them together is not as strong as its parts.

The Drinks: Everything Sam Shepard writes is a little dark, so after an evening of All-American ennui, we decided to go in for some All-American fun and check out Urban Putt. Brittany got the Seasonal Shandy and Katie got a Calimocho (red wine and Coke, classy), and we watched the many revelers (who waited in line for over an hour on a Wednesday to play putt-putt) take in a Bay Area fantasyland.

36 Stories by Sam Shepard runs through 6/22 at the Z Below, and tickets can be purchased through their website. Ticket prices vary from $30-$55 depending on how close you are to the stage, but it’s a small theater so any seat is good. There are also ½ price tickets available on Goldstar.

I’ve long been against the Don’t call it Frisco thing, mainly because I don’t like rules, and also because I like nicknames and abbreviations.

Today on Thrillist, local treasure Daisy Barringer digs into the history of the issue, and proves we should actually probably all be calling it Frisco all the time. I mean, sorry for the spoiler, but even Herb Caen himself relented, way back in 1977:

It’s okay, you may call it ‘Frisco’ now. The gray-beards, the ones who objected so strenuously and endlessly to the ‘irreverent’ sailor-spawned nickname for San Francsico, are mostly gone now — and so, it must be added is a large part of the city they loved and helped to build, the city that spawned world legends and legions of worshippers.

Suck it, gray-beards!

Read on for a ton of great history and the rest of Daisy’s very compelling argument.

Definitely a new record:

1. Angst in My Pants – Sparks
2. I Don’t Wanna Dance – Eddy Grant
3. Rush – Big Audio Dynamite
4. Another Nail in My Heart – Squeeze
5. I Don’t Wanna Grow Up – Ramones
6. Diane Young – Vampire Weekend
7. You Don’t Know Me – Ben Folds & Regina Spektor
8. Nasty Habits – Oingo Boingo
9. Musta Got Lost – J. Geils Band
10. Subway Girl – The Audacity
11. All My Friends – LCD Soundsystem
12. Die Die My Darling – Misfits
13. Bang a Gong – T. Rex
14. I’ll Be You – The Replacements
15. Crosseyed and Painless – Talking Heads
16. Got My Mind Set on You – George Harrison
17. You Shook Me All Night Long – AC/DC
18. Jackson – Johnny Cash & June Carter
19. Black or White – Michael Jackson
20. A New England – Billy Bragg
21. My Baby Just Cares for Me – Nina Simone
22. Let’s Dance to Joy Division – The Wombats
23. Shine a Little Love – Electric Light Orchestra
24. In a Big Country – Big Country
25. Centerfold – J. Geils Band
26. Later – Dr. Dog
27. Susanne – Weezer
28. Linoleum – NOFX
29. 1901 – Phoenix
30. Party Hard – Andrew W.K.
31. Real Wild Child – Iggy Pop
32. Little L – Jamiroquai
33. Supersoaker – Kings of Leon
34. Reflektor – Arcade Fire
35. Tarzan Boy – Baltimora
36. Bad Is Bad – Huey Lewis and the News
37. Gotta Serve Somebody – Bob Dylan
38. Hot Child in the City – Nick Gilder
39. Take It Easy – The Eagles
40. Use Somebody – Kings of Leon
41. Workin’ for the Weekend – Loverboy
42. My Life Would Suck Without You – Kelly Clarkson
43. Killing in the Name – Rage Against the Machine
44. Juicebox – The Strokes
45. You Only Live Once – The Strokes

The point is, just in case you weren’t aware, you can sing a lot of cool songs at karaoke these days. Support your local karaoke night!

That’s the main thing. Here are some other things I like about Chino:

• They’ve got lumpia, and it is goooood
• The Singapore Slings are really good instead of really bad
• The chicken salad is the bomb
• The dumplings!
• The noodles!
• Their logo is cool
• Super nice staff
• Open late (’til 1 starting tonight I think)
• Perfect volume level; you can be boisterous and not bother anyone
• It’s really fun to order “four Singapore Slings please” over and over
• A server asked how our dinner was and I stood up and did a bootie dance and she was pretty chill with it
• Even the cucumbers they tell you not to eat are actually pretty good

Chino rules!

This week’s “Drink of the Week” is a very special review by the very talented Podboy:

Guess what.

I don’t really want to tell you because I hate it so much I promply tried to forget it. I’ll give you a hint though which is: it is the same amount round as red as it is gross. In case you couldnt guess from those clues I did BUZZ-BALLS. Unluckily even if you guessed right your still wrong because to be honest it was more like BARF-BALLS.

“BUZZ-BALLS RUM-JOB” NAME doesn’t even make sense except unless you count how feeling like drinking it is a STRESSY JOB!

To be honest the strawberry flavor is quite sweet and fresh but the rest of it is very hot on your tounge and barf-like. If I could say one thing to the maker of this it would be you should make it all the way round so it rolls away from me.

Do I reccomend this drink? In fact I DO reccomend this drink. I do reccomend this drink is never drank by a human that is!

Ha! Thanks, Podboy! (Be sure to check out the Podboy archives for some killer X-Files and Walking Dead fanfic too.)

[via Podboy]

3D City is a year long stereoscopic photography project by Doctor Popular

Now that The Galley is doing their thing at Clooney’s Pub, I’ve spent more time hanging out there than I did the 3 years that I lived directly across the street. Some regulars pass the time playing pool or liar’s dice, and occasionally you’ll hear some really weird tune, like Los Pikadientes de Caborca’s tuba heavy cover of “Billie Jean“, blasting on the jukebox.

Another shot after the bump.
(more…)

Let’s party! RSVP and invite your friends!

Wait, what? Oh… I just love Natalie‘s dream:

Had this dream in which Mike Keegan built a miniature human robot, but the Roxie was broken into and the robot was stolen, along with one chocolate and one plain beignet.

Whaaaaaaaat! I want this to be a feature-length motion picture! (There’s more, but that was the meat of it.)

[Photo via the Roxie on Facebook]