It's been a very mixed month in San Francisco and the greater Bay Area.  With every indication of a healthy theater scene, there's another article about the horrendous real estate market which is driving Art out of the City.  How is it possible in such a short few months for downtown SF real estate to outstrip Tokyo and Paris?  No doubt that nearby communities will jump on this opportunity, but how much charm can you find in mud flats out by the airport? It hurts to see things change too quickly and radically especially when the Bay Area prides itself on progressive attitudes.

So, onto movies. A review in the San Francisco Chronicle says "there's still a lot of moxie in San Francisco's Barbary Coast tradition".  He's referring to the documentary "Live Nude Girls Unite!"  Our own North Beach Lusty Lady strippers went union and their story is fascinating stuff.  And even though it's staged, "Girlfight" gives us another look at strong women, literally and figuratively.  Michelle Rodriguez looks like that love story sidebar wouldn't have been her first choice, but she's ever so gracious.  So how do you go from those role models to "Dr. T. and the Women"?  You tell yourself it's Robert Altman! Helen Hunt is marvelous; I hope she's not headed for overexposure, because I've seen her in at least three trailers since then.  "Pay It Forward" has some fine ensemble work. "Billy Elliott" gives more work to Julie Walters, and I'm always on the side of older actresses, but I wish the hype machine would take a dive right off a cliff.  So the kid dances, so what? So did Shirley Temple. I'm prejudiced, I admit it -- my earliest memories of ballet class include seeing my teacher's three sons at the barre with me so it was never a big deal. I read somewhere that Steven Spielberg monkeyed around with the final cut of "The Contender" however it is certainly no worse than "West Wing". Joan Allen is like Allison Janney without the sense of humor.  For politics with the sense of humor we go to "Butterfly", a locally produced documentary on the tender young woman who spent two years of her life in the upper reaches of the 270 foot tree she called Luna. I asked the filmmaker, who spent six days and six nights with Julia Butterfly at one point during filming, how he managed to sleep up there (he is 6' 3 ") on a six-foot by 8 ft. platform containing in Julia's words, her living room, bedroom, kitchen and office, not to speak of bathroom, and he replied that they didn't have much choice: they just figured it out. One night however, the wind was very high and the platform which was not permanently attached to Luna for obvious reasons, shook like a ping-pong ball during the lottery pick. In a panic he woke up Julia and said we're going to die and she replied, nah, go back to sleep. For politics with very little sense of humor, entirely forgivable, Spike Lee's "Bamboozled" brings back some ancient memories.  The time is early '60s, the place is Seattle WA, the title is "Civil Rights in a Cracker Barrel", a minstrel show on tour with our very own SF Mime Troupe. Of course those were the good old days when the mime troupe regularly kicked butt, but beating Spike Lee at his own game is tough. Not to one-up the master, since at that point he was in short pants, but these guys, white and black performers, did the whole show without indicating who was what.  The shocker was when they took off their gloves at the end to reveal ethnicity. Some folks up in the Northwest have never quite recovered. Check out "Bedazzled": Elizabeth Hurley's costumes are way cool.  The cast of "Lucky Numbers" is littered with big-name male stars, but Lisa Kudrow steals the show.

Luck was not mine sad to say when Dublin's Gate Theater came to Berkeley.  Sterling productions of "Krapp's Last Tape" and "Waiting for Godot" -- not to be missed, but sold out. I understand the complete taping of Beckett's oeuvre with fabulous casts is being done as we speak. They even caught Gielgud's last performance. I know our ears are trained otherwise, yet hearing an actor with those lovely Irish tones say "GODot" puts us to shame. Speaking of which, our own Valerie Weak led us to believe that her show "Brain in a Box" would embarrass us. Happy to say not so. My observation would be to the playwright: scissors, please.  Much as I love Michael Ondaatje, an entire evening consisting of bits from "The Collected Works of Billy the Kid" does not a play make.  A very earnest cast in a great space upstairs at the Marsh, scene of such wonderful one person shows from folks like Charlie Varon, just can't quite get lift off. And Billy's way too tall, psych! That's why they call him "the Kid". The Barbary Coast ends our month with a snappy production of "All's Well That Ends Well" in a bar in the Mission under ninety minutes complete with whips, torture devices, sex toys & gratuitous gay groping. It works!

© 2000 Claudine Jones ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

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