Typical Humboldt theatergoer Ricky Plantagenet fondly recalls that as a young sprout helping Aunt Mary and Uncle John with the harvest, he and his buds amused themselves in the fields by reciting Monty Python and the Holy Grail word for word. Now semi-retired from selling plague insurance in Fortuna, Ricky has just seen the musical […]
theater
Posted inArts + Scene
God’s Sitcom
The structure of Making God Laugh, now onstage at Redwood Curtain in Eureka, is straightforward. A nuclear family of five is presented in four scenes: Thanksgiving 1980, Christmas 1990, New Year’s Eve becoming New Year’s 2000 and Easter 2010. It’s like Same Time Next Year, the family edition. With a crucifix on the wall, the […]
Posted inArts + Scene
All the Stage’s A World
In ancient Greece, Athenians of all classes and in great number attended the tragedies and comedies of the spring festival. Much of what we know today as theater began there, including a profound purpose. Through the vision and artistry of one playwright combined with the performances of skilled actors, society could examine itself: its rational […]
Posted inArts + Scene
Plenty of Fields
North Coast stages depend on a relatively small number of producers, directors, designers and actors who often work on several shows in a given year before moving on or staying for decades. But even within this context, Michael Fields had a remarkable 2013. Fields directed four major productions and was responsible for the final script […]
Posted inArts + Scene
Christmas R Toys?
Apart from the deeper meanings, it comes down to: Christmas R toys, right? And not just for children. (Or do I have to give back my Enterprise com badge and Doctor Who sonic screwdriver?) And what’s better than toys that come alive? Among the many shows that play with this idea is Victor Herbert’s 1903 […]
Posted inArts + Scene
Is Happiness a Warm Musical?
After Nancy and Sluggo and before there was Doonesbury, the bright spot on the comics page was “Peanuts.” Named after the “peanut gallery” on Howdy Doody in the 1950s, the popular daily strip broke out of newsprint to become best-selling books (Happiness Is A Warm Puppy), animated films and a couple of stage musicals, which […]
Posted inBest Of Humboldt
Best Cathedral from the Glory Days of Timber
At the height of empire, you’ll always find excess (think Caligula). In 1920, the Pacific Lumber Co.’s industrial empire was at the pinnacle of its wealth and power — and Scotia was its capital city. Between 1920 and 1923, the company town’s corporate benefactor erected the Scotia Inn, the Scotia Hospital, the First National Bank […]
Posted inArts + Scene
Our Town Meets Frankenstein!
A year after Kaufman and Hart’s You Can’t Take It With You won the Pulitzer Prize in 1937, Thornton Wilder won it for Our Town. You Can’t Take It With You ends its run at North Coast Rep this weekend, while Our Town opens at Ferndale Repertory Theatre. Thornton Wilder was a classically educated teacher […]
Posted inArts + Scene
Can’t Buy Me Love
The 1937 Pulitzer Prize-winning play You Can’t Take It With You, now on stage at North Coast Repertory Theatre in Eureka, is a madcap comedy about an eccentric extended American family. A few columns ago I quoted an interview I did with Jason Robards Jr. backstage on Broadway. The play he was doing was the […]
Posted inArts + Scene
Drive, She Said
In writing specific plays, contemporary American playwright Steven Deitz has been inspired by Chekhov, Ibsen, P.G. Wodehouse and Arthur Conan Doyle. For his 2008 play Becky’s New Car, now on stage at Redwood Curtain in Eureka, he appears to have been inspired by Oprah. Or is it a coincidence that one character gives away lots […]
Posted inArts + Scene
States of Plays
As we pause after the traditional end of last season and before the start of the next, here’s a retrospective question: Where do the plays we see on the North Coast come from? For many decades the answer would have been easy: New York. But that’s no longer true. Back in the mid-1980s I interviewed […]
Posted inArts + Scene
Hesse Fit
Suppose you’re an edgy but also starving New York performer, concocting scripts allowing you to impersonate various movie divas but in genre B-movie stories with vibrant titles like Vampire Lesbians of Sodom and Psycho Beach Party (which then actually becomes a B-movie). But after writing the book for a failed musical, you are told by […]