Stage Fog: The Making It Up As We Go Along Edition
In this week's stage roundup, we'll take "Improvised Game Shows" for $200, Alex:
You Bet Your Improvisor at the Temescal Art Center
It's been a while since we saw improv. It's been even longer since we saw good improv. But improv can be good, and hey, who doesn't want to be on a game show? So the Un-Scripted Theater Company decided to put the two together. Genius! From an email we received from one of the players: "Comedy improv theater meets old-school game show in this out-of-the-ordinary night of improvised entertainment. It's your choice: sit back and enjoy the show or submit your name for a chance to become a contestant. Script-free from beginning to end, this is one live comedy game show you can see again and again. Laugh! Win prizes! It's an exciting night of Un-Scripted fun that's never the same show twice." Preview tonight ($5 as opposed to the normal $10/$7 students/seniors), opening tomorrow, and playing Fridays and Saturdays through March 26. All shows at 8 p.m., except for the "special PG-rated" Sunday matinee, March 20 at 3 p.m. (kids 12 and under get in for $5).
More stage picks for the weekend after the jump...
Not About Nightingales at the Rhino
Even if you don't like the play, you can probably say that at least it lives up to its title. We don't know for sure, though, as we've never read it. But the Rhino is putting on Tennessee Williams's brutal 1938 play about prison abuse, based on a real event. The play was apparently considered so shockingly gruesome, it wasn't produced for 60 years. From the company's website: "Based upon an actual newspaper story, the play follows the events of a prison atrocity, which shocked the nation: prisoners leading a hunger strike were locked in a steam-heated cell and roasted to death. A political piece of theatre about social injustice." Through March 13.
Bay One-Acts Festival 4 at the Eureka Theatre
Each weekend features a different lineup of short plays (averaging about 20-30 minutes each, we imagine) written by people who may live right down the block from you. Seeing plays this way is kind of like doing a bunch of beer samplers, you know what we mean? Hey, you might even discover your new favorite local playwright! Through March 13.
And hey, not for nothin', but the lesbian Othello is still playing in Berkeley (full disclosure: this contributor is the one mentioned in SFist Eve's glowing review of the show).
For more stage options, check out the listings at the Guardian, the Express, the SF Weekly, and the calendar on Theatre Bay Area's website.