The Marsh's Twentieth Anniversary: ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ BANG

Twenty Stars with many BANGLES OF PRAISE for the Marsh on its Twentieth Anniversary. The awful red seats are at least that old but Stephanie Weisman has promised new seats by the time her third grandchild is born.

What a day it was at the theater on June 20, running into old friends and seeing so many familiar faces. To paraphrase performer Jeff Greenwald, the Marsh is the sourdough starter that gets the whole process rising. So many talented people have come through these doors, and yesterday, like lemmings on fast rewind, many came back to do fifteen or twenty minutes as a Thanks, Yo to Stephanie and the Marsh.

In one two hour stretch we saw shorts by Wayne Harris, Mark Kenward, Dan Hoyle, Mark McGoldrick, Jeff Greenwald, Josh Kornbluth, Scoop Nisker and W. Allen Taylor, and that doesn't include Charlie Varon and Ann Randolph and Marga Gomez and so many others that kept the candles lit up brightly all day and into the night.



Thank yous aside -- there is something amazing that happens when solo performers become part of a Greatest Hits show. One feeds off the other and nobody wants to be outdone. Performers like Kornbluth really excel at stream of consciousness, while everyone else brings out their very best fifteen minutes, or Act One of their current or past show. This reviewer wants to buy that Greatest Hits album. Are we listening, Stephanie Weisman? The proceeds might buy a new red seat or two.

RATINGS: ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ BANG

The San Francisco Theater Blog Awards Division awards The Marsh's Twentieth Anniversary Marathon Twenty Stars with many BANGLES of PRAISE. Seeing as Five Stars is as high as we go, you can decide for yourself what it means.

To us it's simple: The Marsh gives our city community-based theater that is first rate. Performers get an audience and an audience gets a shot of on-stage magic. Make jokes not war. It sounds simple, but it's not. That's why you get a BANGLE. That's why we love the Marsh.



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The Marsh Theater
1062 Valencia Street, San Francisco