"Waitin' 2 End Hell": ☼ ☼ 1/2 BANG baub

The pity of Willam a. Parker's "Waitin' 2 End Hell" is that he didn't end it at Intermission. This Northern California Premiere has an Act One that is so funny, so interesting and so full of set-up and promise that at intermission the audience is buzzing about what might happen next. Will Dante get it on with Shay? Is Alvin heading for a fall? And what about big Larry?

Dante Jones, played deliciously by Alex Morris, has been married to Diane (PJay Phillips) for twenty years. But she has roving eyes and a basic dissatisfaction with being married to her parole officer husband. Dante, on the other hand, is committed to keeping his family together. He is the black man who black women say no longer exists, a man who is loyal and thinks of his family first. But that's not enough for Diane. She is looking for Mark (Allen Hurtt), a fast-talking attorney who is the exact opposite of Dante. We see in Diane's eyes just how she is really feeling during the Anniversary Toast Dante offers her at the beginning of the play.



The show revolves around the dialogue between three men (Donte, Alvin (Michael Wayne Rice) and Larry (Michael J. Asberry). They talk about man's superior role in the world: "It's in the Bible!" thunders Larry. "Corinthians. 'Man is the head of the woman!'"

We also have three women (Diane, Shay (Natasha Noel) and Angela (Charisse Loriaux) reacting to these men. But the men have all the good lines, such as Larry's observation: "We're men. We fix shit. What we can't fix we destroy." The women are far less perfectly drawn, which becomes fatal in Act Two.

Each scene is punctuated with the perfect musical cue, such as James Brown's "This is a Man's World."



In Act Two, the author attempts to make us feel sorry for all three women. He does not succeed. Diane is acting like a fool supposedly because her father mistreated her mother and therefore she can't trust men. Shay secretly is in love with Dante and Angie's childhood was traumatic. But it's all talk. The biggest problem is that PJay Phillips as Diane does not give forth any emotion other than depression and it's not helped by overwrought dialog. She's hard to empathize with on any level. On Opening Night there were two occasions in Act Two when the audience burst out laughing at lines that were meant to expose deep angst.

This Lorraine Hansberry Theater production is being presented at the PG&E Conference Center downtown. "Waitin' 2 End Hell" has a three week run. If they iron out the female roles by the end of the run they will turn a good show-with-potential into an excellent one.

RATINGS: ☼ ☼ 1/2 BANG baub
The San Francisco Theater Blog Awards Division awards 'Waitin' 2 End Hell' one star for Alex Morris's largeness of size and craft. This is one terrific actor. Michael Wayne Rice is also very good in the best friend role, as is Michael J. Asberry as the focus of male enlightenment (he has already been married twice, as he keeps reminding Dante). A star for them. Half a star goes out to David Hines's fabulous selection of sound cues (he did the same thing for Brian Copeland's 'Not a Genuine Black Man'). If any of the three women had standout roles, the play would rise to the Three Star Level.

The Bangle of Praise is for Allen Hurtt's Mark -- he's exactly who he says he is, and does not see Diane's attraction to him as anything but automatic. He is a bright light.

The bauble of despair -- the gun. And it misfires twice.
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"Waitin' 2 End Hell"
PG&E Auditorium
77 Beale Street, San Francisco
Thu.-Sun. through March 1
$20-$36

" Burn the Floor:: ☼ ☼ ☼ BANG

"Toto, this is not Union Square anymore," we were thinking, as we sat in the lobby of the Post Street Theater, waiting to take our seats before the Opening of "Burn the Floor." For one thing, the audience was easily a full generation younger than usual, with far less jewelry and considerably hipper shoes. For another thing, there was an honest excitement in the air. Premieres always evoke a sense of being where one is supposed to be, but this was more -- ballroom dancing has become nationwide now, thanks to "Dancing with the Stars," and the packed SF theater audience had come to see these folks dance.

As for this theater reviewer, he was thanking God he wouldn't be in for another night of witty banter interspersed with depressing angst.

Judging from audience reaction, the dance people got what they wanted. They cheered loudly and enthusiastically, usually the second one of the boy dancers took off his shirt. The theater reviewer found moments to cheer about too, but he would not be honest if he did not comment that 75% of the show looked and sounded like a taped Super Bowl Dance-o-Ganza on the Cirque du Soleil model.

Two excellent live percussionists took up the entire top of the set, with six stairs between them, down which would descend various singers and dancers with canes, wearing gowns of every color or tuxes with no shirts. There was NO fat to be seen on stage. The women had gorgeous bare backs and the men had rippling bare fronts.

The best moments of "Burn the Floor" were when the taped music (augmented by the live percussionists) died down and the beautiful Australian pair Damon and Rebecca Sugden took the stage. In the first act, they waltzed, she in a white gown and he in a black tux; and in the second act they, oh I don't know what it was, but it was very beautiful. These two made it look like touching and connecting really was the point here, instead of the man dancer strutting across the stage carrying a chair like a lion tamer's weapon, with his partner grimacing like she had just blown out a hammie.



It was also quite appealing when the dancers danced up and down the aisles. People sitting near an aisle got to see just how athletic and graceful these dancers are, as the lights caught their sweat as well as their smiles.

"Burn the Floor" was created in 1997 by Harley Medcalf, after the famed 50th Birthday Party in England for Sir Elton John, at which Medcalf was a guest. The act was amplified and taken around the world. Then Australian dancer Jason Gilkison took it over and made it into what it is today: a very successful, traveling company of muscular and va-voomy dancers, doing ensemble cheesecake, with lots of sass, strut, gorgeous costumes and man cleavage.

The costumes are something to behold, perhaps reaching a peak in Act One during "Knights in White Satin," where red, green and purple gowns are joined by blue and magenta.

The Slovakian dude did have some impressive pecs, lats and abs. There was one dancer who appeared to be off-white, but only one, as far as we could tell. Does this matter, in San Francisco in 2009? Dunno. It did to us. This is not your grandpa's ballroom dancing, but it may be yours.

RATINGS ☼ ☼ ☼ BANG

The San Francisco Theater Blog Awards Division acknowledges that it knows less than it should about dance. As a dance performance, let's say we'll give it three and a half stars, because the dancers danced with great energy and dynamism. As a theater piece, let's say two and a half stars, because everything was on one level, the first act went on a long time with only two or three fine moments, and though Act Two topped Act One, it stayed on the same emotional plane. The Basic Laws of Mathematics say: THREE STARS with a BANGLE of Praise. The BANGLE is earned for the versatility of both percussionists. A live band would have made this show a lot less TV and a whole lot more memorable.




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"Burn The Floor"
Post Street Theatre
450 Post Street, San Francisco
Tue-Sun through Mar 15
$49-$69

"The Landscape of the Body": ☼ ☼ ☼ Severed Head

Last night, after seeing a San Francisco Playhouse revival of John Guare's "The Landscape of the Body," which was written in New York in 1977, not exactly a high water mark period for optimism in The Big Apple, we came home and got out our reference books of voluminous theater criticism (it's called "Google") and read everything we could about how people reacted to this play when it first came out, and how that reaction has changed in the nearly 35 years since its premiere.

The answer is: not much has changed and neither has John Guare. Guare plays are famous for texts and subtexts and sub-subtexts and sometimes they pull together. Sometimes they don't. Director Bill English has a lot to contend with because he has to try and balance the real (woman run over by crazed bicyclist) with the surreal (same woman singing sappy torch songs afterward from Heaven). On the whole, he pulls it off.

The terrific Gabriel Marin plays two principal characters, Raulito, the Ricky-Ricardo-like small time huckster and Durwood Peach, the insane one-time ice cream man, and manages to give both over-the-top characters enough heart for you to actually believe they could be real.



But nobody answers the biggest issue of all: why did Betty (Susi Damilano) leave her comfortable life in Bangor, Maine, and try and assume the life of her sister Rosalie (Rana Kangas-Kent) in Greenwich Village? This is a fair question, since Rosalie is a hustler by day and porno actress by night. Without even a suggestion as to the reason for this switcheroo, the story flattens out. Damilano does an admirable job as Betty, who seems to be sent adrift by whichever wind blows through first, but is she, as the promo suggests, childlike? Not really. Is she just hollow inside? Maybe, but then what she does with her son Bert (Alexander Szotak) is so irresponsible that we have to work not to lose whatever empathy we may have had for her.



Oh, those creepy, creepy kids.



Like we said, this is one tough cookie of a plot. Guare's view of humanity, at least when the show was written, is a desperate one. Would Betty really look twice at the evil police captain (Andrew Hurteau) at the end? After all this, why the hell not?



RATINGS ☼ ☼ ☼ + Severed Head
The San Francisco Theater Blog Awards Division awards "Landscape of the Body" Three Stars with a Severed Head. The three stars are because the show makes you think. Whether or not you will enjoy your night at the theater may depend on how you feel about a cute kid having his head cut off. No hearts and flowers here.
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"The Landscape of the Body"
San Francisco Playhouse
533 Sutter Street, San Franciso
Tue.-Sun. through March 7
$40

"Betrayed": ☼ ☼ 1/2

The Iraqis who believed the strongest in America's intervention against Saddam Hussein, and who enthusiastically went to work translating for the American army, believing they could help to create the New Iraq, ended up in the worst position possible: distrusted by Americans because they were Iraqis and hated by Iraqis because they were working for Americans. This is the central theme of George Packer's "Betrayed," based upon a series of articles he wrote for The New Yorker. The theme both involves and repels us.

Let us say immediately: "Betrayed" would be a terrific Frontline report or magazine expose, but it is Packer's first play and feels like it. Although the story is never less than fascinating -- we want to jump onto the stage, grab the ignorant American soldier and scream at him: "Don't you see what you're doing?" -- the dialog is not only hard to understand at times but spotty in its focus, and Robin Stanton's direction and staging, with so many changes of scene taking place and black-clad techies running in and out with props, feels awkward.

When the cast is good, they are very good. The two men, the Sunni Adnan (Bobak Cyrus Bakhtiari) and the Shia Laith (Amir Sharafeh), are at their best both able to show us the inconsistencies of the life-and-death situation in which they are imprisoned. When Intisar (Denmo Ibrahim) arrives, a woman whose dream is to ride her bicycle through Baghdad without being ostracized for doing so, a very interesting dynamic develops between the three.



At one point, the American security chief (James Wagner) is lecturing the three on security issues in the Green Zone, where they all work. He warns them to never trust anyone in the Red Zone. "Excuse me," Ibrahim asks, "but where is this Red Zone?"

"The Red Zone is everywhere outside the Green Zone," says Wagner. In other words, where Iraquis, including the translators, all live.

But their boss Bill Prescott (Alex Moggridge) doesn't get it, the head of security (James Wagner) doesn't want to know about it, and the Ambassador (Keith Burkland) doesn't even want to hear about it. As Adnan, Bakhtiari gives us the most reason to care about what happens to him, but there are no arias here -- no stunning pieces of dialog to capture our attention.



Of course, as we write this, and on into the near future at least, America is still fighting in Iraq. Nothing has changed. Perhaps this is the play's biggest difficulty -- the issues are still charged. The audience walks from the theater in silence.

RATINGS: ☼ ☼ 1/2
The San Francisco Theater Blog Awards Division awards "Betrayed" two and a half stars. It could be three stars, but three stars implies you should consider seeing this show - definitely. We feel that way -- almost. Perhaps the show will gain some electricity as the cast becomes more familiar with each other during this run. That would put it over the top for sure.



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"Betrayed"
Aurora Theatre
2081 Addison Street, Berkeley
Wed.-Sun. through March 1
$40-$42

"Geezer": NO REVIEW REQUESTED (But It's Really Funny)

It was one-night only, no review requested, but every seat at the Marsh was taken to see Geoff Hoyle read through "Geezer," his latest work-in-progress. Charlie Varon was there. Hoyle's son Dan was there too. It's too bad we're not supposed to report on the performance, because it was pretty damned funny. So you don't know about the phlebitis, and the jokes with the violin, and you don't have to worry about the poor man's blood pressure, like the guy in the front row (in whose lap Hoyle was sitting) had to.

We can't wait 'til he finishes the show, which he will do unless life finishes him first. Some day you'll see Geezer and laugh as hard as we all did.

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RATINGS:
The San Francisco Theater Blog Awards Division sits on its hands this time.

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"Geezer"
The Marsh
1062 Valencia Street, San Francisco
NO FURTHER PERFORMANCES AT THIS TIME

"Twentieth Century": ☼ ☼ BANG

In 1934, in the heart of the Depression, when escapism ruled the entertainment world and the Hays Act forbade any inkling of sex on stage or screen, America yearned for a new form. They got it with the stage play "Twentieth Century," directed by George Abbott. It ran for 152 performances, then was turned into a successful film starring John Barrymore and Carole Lombard. It was then, and is now, a wacky farce set aboard the famed Twentieth Century Limited, a luxury train that ran between New York and Chicago.

The trouble is it's not very funny anymore and after two generations of train caper movies and plays, it's not even very original. Ken Ludwig's modern adaptation keeps the fast dialog and seamy characters while Dan Hiatt and Rebecca Dines try gamely to make themselves believable within their roles of corrupt producer and fading starlet. Gerry Hiken turns in a very enjoyable performance as the crazy religious fanatic masquerading as a wealthy tycoon and there are terrific costumes and a very fine set that simulates three rooms aboard a moving train.



But yawn. Who cares? We didn't. 'Twentieth Century' looks great but there's not much there there. Like a speeding locomotive, it went by very fast, but when it was done we hadn't moved an inch.
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RATINGS: ☼ ☼ BANG

The San Francisco Theater Blog Awards Division awards "Twentieth Century" Two Stars with a BANGLE of Praise. The Bangle is for those train windows by Scene Designer Andrea Bechert. We never could take our eyes off them.


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"Twentieth Century"
Mountain View Center for the Performing Arts
500 Castro Street, Mountain View
Tue-Sun through Feb. 8
$23-$61

"Rich and Famous": ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ BANG

John Guare plays always make you think ('Six Degrees of Separation,' 'House of Blue Leaves,' the screenplay for Louis Malle's 'Atlantic City'), but 'Rich and Famous' is not only deep but really, really funny. Guare's dialog and John Rando's direction are only a banana peel or two shy of slapstick, but the belly laughs are tempered by disbelieving gasps of discovery. The acting is tremendous. Several set pieces are classics. You leave the theater wide-eyed and bushy-tailed. So what's not to like?

...NOTHING! The grumpy old reviewer loved every minute!



Mary Birdsong just about steals the show. In real life, she sings in a band called 99 Cent Whore. So it is fitting that she plays four roles in this production and, in her finest moment, ends up in a bottomless trashcan pulling her press clippings behind her. As famed Broadway agent Veronica Gulpp-Vestige, Birdsong looks like a decrepit Katharine Hepburn and sounds like a deranged Ethel Merman. She has achieved everything in her show biz life except for the thing she craves: a comeback. To have a comeback she needs a failure. This is why she has latched on to the first produced play of wannabe playwright Bing Ringling (played to perfection by Brooks Ashmanskas).

(John Guare is a lyricist. Did he hire Ashmanskas to finally find a word that rhymes with Kansas? Just asking.)

Birdsong is fabulously slimy as Veronica, but she kills us dead as Bing's Mom. She has had his soiled baby diapers bronzed. She tries to put the grown man on her lap on the sofa and give him a bottle. Parents throughout the audience turn to each other and whisper: "Honey, that's not us, is it?"



And let's not forget to mention Stephen DeRosa as Dad with the American Legion hat in the photo above, and as the unforgettable songwriter Anatole Torah. Guare has written that Torah is the combination of Leonard Bernstein, Jerome Robbins and Joe Papp. Add in Larry, Moe, Curly Joe and Don Music from Sesame Street. DeRosa is really good. And Scott Bradley's two bedroom sets for the Anatole Torah and Mom and Dad scenes, the second one green and the first one pink, are classic.



Gregory Wallace, as always, is wonderful as Aphro, both onstage as an actor/unemployed transvestite hooker, and offstage as we hear him crucify poor Bing's dialog. Wallace's syntax is so distinctive that it is probably inevitable that by show's end every character is talking exactly like him.



So what's it all about, Aphro? The message might be that you shouldn't drink the glamourous Kool-Aid of success, but it might also be that you should. For sure, don't buy the cufflinks. You might end up like Tybalt Dunleavy (also played by Stephen DeRosa), who is probably the only man on Earth who actually likes Bing's play.

It's fabulous. Go see this show and go see it now.



RATINGS: ☼ ☼ ☼ ☼ BANG
The San Francisco Theater Blog Awards Division awards "Rich and Famous" Four Stars with a BANGLE of Praise. Acting, direction, story, pacing -- the four stars are easy. It's harder to pick which line of dialog deserves the BANGLE:
(1) (Bing describing how bad his play was): "I'm not into Zen, but I just heard the sound of one hand clapping."
(2) (Veronica talking about her future): "I'll be the greatest comeback since Jesus."

You choose.

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"Rich and Famous"
A.C.T. Theater
415 Geary Street, San Francisco
Tue-Sun through February 8
$15-$55