Those in the luxury real estate business in San Francisco are excited that one of the highest-end properties on the market just traded hands for the first time, and for a relatively high price.

The unique four-bedroom, 10-bathroom home was the most expensive residential property on the local market when it went up for sale last June, listed at $38 million. As SFist discussed earlier, the modern mansion was designed custom for its empty-nester clients, the wealthy couple Fritz and Lucy Jewett. George "Fritz" Jewett was an heir to the Weyerhaeuser logging fortune and "had a long career in the forest products industry," as the SF Business Times reports, and the couple were avid sailing fans and philanthropists.

Lucy Jewett passed away at age 94 in 2023, and their son George was selling the home.

The Jewetts built the home at 2990 Broadway in 1987 as a space for entertaining, giving themselves a lavish primary suite on the upper level, and devoting the entire main level to entertaining space, with a balcony overlooking the Bay that spanned the width of the home. The house also comes with a seven-car garage, and a lower level houses an in-home spa and gym.

While situated in a prime spot with no neighbor and just the Presidio Wall on one side, the house's specific design likely hurt its chances of fetching top dollar — and it appears there was a price reduction last year, because the Business Times says it was listed at $32 million, not the original $38 million.

Still, it is the second-most expensive property to change hands this year, after 260 Sea Cliff Avenue, which sold off-market for $30 million in January.

When your #Hamilton alarm doesn't go off and you log on 6 min late...only a mere 99,405 people ahead of me 😭 #hamiltonSF pic.twitter.com/Cyh7WugSYM

— Kelsey (@Kelsey_001) December 12, 2016

Bay Area theater fans have their pantaloons in a bunch this morning as Hamilton tickets went on sale to the general public at 10 a.m. PT. As of press time for this article, the online Hamilton ticket sales platform has not crashed. But SFist can confirm (as saps who are in the queue, clutching our credit card nervously) that there are more than 100,000 interested ticket buyers waiting online. Some reports from social media said the queue hit more than 100,000 within a minute of sales beginning — though one SFist staffer can confirm they got within 44,000th from the front within minutes, and another was at 103,000th as of 10:10 a.m. As of 12:40, that latter person still had 92,000 souls in line ahead of them, with little hope in sight. Another of us got in at 85,855th, and we're not giving up!!

The queue is slowly getting smaller, but only moving at a rate of about 6,000-7,000 online buyers per hour. Each buyer is allowed to purchase up to six tickets, and by our estimates, there were somewhere between 250,000 and 300,000 tickets to sell today, following pre-sales and subscriber sales.

Meanwhile, at the actual box office on mid-Market, tensions have been running high as ne'er-do-wells have tried infiltrating a line that hundreds of people have been in for many hours, some as early as noon on Sunday. According to a police sources, "entitled people" perhaps unfamiliar with how passionate their fellow theater fans can be, have made the atmosphere more fraught than one might expect a theatrical queue to be, and rumor has it the police have been called to settle disputes more than once Monday morning.

Tickets in this official sale cost between $100.00 to $197.00, or $524.00 for what are described as "premium seats," which are simply center orchestra in the first few rows.

Meanwhile on StubHub, these same tickets are already going for as much as $5,000 a pop.

SFist will keep you posted on the status of today’s online ticket sale. Hamilton runs March 14 to August 5, 2017 at the Orpheum Theatre, and "best availability" according to the queue system at noon was after May 23.

It remains to be seen what kind of rush ticket system SHN may end up using for this extremely popular show, which will lead to the kinds of lines and lottery madness that has gathered around the Broadway production's theater every day since fall 2015, when the buzz around the show reached its fever pitch.

Update 1:22 p.m. - Welp, looks like the line is now more than 130,000 buyers.

On a more encouraging note, buyers who reserved a spot in the queue at 10 a.m. are now moving up the queue much more quickly. In the last hour, this SFist staffer moved up by more 12,000 slots.

We do have some updates from SHN on the dates with the best availability, should you actually manage to soldier through this line of more than a hundred thousand buyers.

But with each buyer in the queue allowed to purchase as many as six tickets, it would appear likely that Hamilton San Francisco tickets will sell out this afternoon. We’ll continue to keep you posted.

Update : 2:30 p.m. - The queue just keeps getting bigger and bigger, now with close to 150,000 buyers logged in. By our running count, the system appears to be processing between 10,000 and 15,000 orders per hour, so don’t give up hope if there are still tens of thousands of buyers ahead of you. SHN's latest update says that "Saturday evenings are filling up. Plenty of inventory available for all other performances May 23 - August 5".

Update: 3:30 p.m. - There are now more than 150,000 Hamilton wanna-sees waiting in the online queue. The latest update from SHN, issued shortly after 3 p.m., advises that “Best availability Tuesday and Wednesday performances June 27-July 26”.

Update: 4:50 p.m. - Wait, people are still joining the online queue? Apparently so, as the digital line is now 160,000 deep. But hope continues to flicker, as the show is still not sold out. At about 4:40 p.m., SHN advised “Best avail[able] Prime Orch & Prime Loge - 3/14 & 3/15 and April 27-August 5 perfs.”

Update: 5:39 p.m. - Hamilton tickets are still on sale, but it looks like you can no longer buy seats next to each other unless you’re willing to pay the “premium” $524 price for each seat. That still compares favorably to StubHub, where tickets are priced from $578 to $2,850 for Hamilton tickets with the occasional seat under $500 if you’re really willing to search and be flexible on dates.

Note: SHN SF is an SFist advertiser, but this was not a sponsored post or directed in any way by the advertiser.

Related: Meet The People Who Camped Out Overnight For Hamilton Tickets

Today tips off a Tulip mania the likes of which the Bay Area ticket market has never seen. Tickets for the runaway smash hit musical Hamilton went on sale to the general public at 10 a.m. today, after a pre-sale last week that sold out with more than 60,000 disappointed would-be buyers still waiting in the queue. Determined to avoid that fate, devoted fans of the hip-hop historical musical lined up with their folding chairs, yoga mats, and tiny tents to camp overnight last night outside the Orpheum Theatre in hopes of getting the box office tickets. SFist kept an eye on the process, with the line beginning to form at Noon on Sunday and growing to about 70 people as of 1 a.m. this morning.

The very first Hamilton fan in line was Loti Bowman, an SF State student from Sacramento who grabbed her spot at approximately noon on Sunday. “It’s Hamilton! It’s supposedly the best Broadway play ever.” she told SFist. Ms. Bowman had tried unsuccessfully to buy tickets in last Monday’s presale. “I was 68,000th in line,” But she was first in line for this morning’s box office sale, and dug in for what will constitute a 22-hour wait until the box office opens.

The third spot in line was occupied by Jill R. Feng Shui, who had the good sense to pitch a tiny two-person tent. “I support the arts and I love plays and Broadway,” she said. "Specifically in this time and era, what we’re in.”

With a nearly 22-hour wait, one has to wonder how these people went to the bathroom “There’s a porta-potty down there,” said the No. 2 person in line Majestic Rodriguez, pointing down Market Street. “And there’s the Burger King and Carl’s Jr. so you can use that too.”

The scene at approximately 1 a.m. Monday morning (Joe Kukura/SFist)

As the evening wore on past midnight, a number of genuinely homeless street campers joined the line to take advantage of a safe outdoor sleeping location with security staff on hand. “I’ve seen a lot of freaky people,” said one Hamilton camper-out who declined to give his name. “They’re not bad, it’s just a little chilly out here,”

As of press time, we still don’t even know whether these people got their Hamilton tickets. As with Hamilton online ticket sales, the box office will not begin selling tickets until 10 a.m. today.

Update: From the looks of the SHN SF video embedded below, it would appear that the line was substantially longer than 70 people when the box office opened this morning.

Note: SHN SF is an occasional SFist advertiser, but this was not a sponsored post or directed in any way by the advertiser.

Related: San Francisco 'Hamilton' Tickets Go On Pre-Sale Monday Morning, General Sale December 12

As you likely already know, the absurdly popular Hamilton is set to come to San Francisco this spring — opening on March 14 and running through August 5. We now learn via SHN that those eager to get their hands on what will surely be coveted tickets can do so as early as this Monday morning. If they have a specific credit card, that is.

According to the SHN SF Twitter account, American Express cardholders will be able to purchase tickets on Monday starting 10:00 a.m. PST with a limit of 6 per household. Tickets will be made available for purchase to the general public on December 12, also at 10:00 a.m.

Those hoping to attend the show will want to bookmark the special website created by SHN for the occasion, and also be prepared to shell out anywhere from $100.00 to $197.00 per ticket for regular performances or $524.00 for premium seats.

Following the completion of the SF run, the show is set to move to Los Angeles.

Note: SHN SF is an SFist advertiser, but this was not a sponsored post or directed in any way by the advertiser.

Previously: San Francisco Dates For 'Hamilton' Run Finally Confirmed

The Grammy, Tony, and Pulitzer Prize winning musical Hamilton is coming to San Francisco next spring, and we now for the first time have the official dates for the five-month run. The Mercury News reports that the production will open on March 14 and run through August 5.

As you probably already know, the hugely popular show chronicles the life of founding father and the first US Treasury Secretary Alexander Hamilton, and has enjoyed a sold-out Broadway run over the last year. A Chicago production opens this fall, but separately the first national tour begins with a new cast in San Francisco. The New York production will continue while the show tours, and The New York Times reported in January that producers are considering a London production as well.

Following the SF run, the show is set to move to Los Angeles, with other cities possibly to follow.

The surefire way to see the performance was to buy a SHN subscription — an option which is no longer available. Now, if you want to score what is absolutely going to be the hottest ticket in town, you'll need to purchase single tickets. While you should expect those to be fairly expensive, a few of you lucky souls might swing tickets for as little as $10.

SHN is launching a lottery that will allow an as-of-yet undetermined amount of theater goers to grab tickets for the next-to-nothing price. Producers did the same thing in NYC, but if that's any guide, don't get your hopes up — the number of cheap seats was extremely limited each day, and drew huge crowds.

Tickets have yet to go on sale, and the on-sale date also hasn't been announced. When that does happen, we recommend you act fast.

Note: SHN SF is an SFist advertiser, but this was not technically a sponsored post or directed in any way by the advertiser.

Previously: Hamilton' Comes To SF For Five Months Starting In March 2017, LA After

On June 15, 2016, three days after the deadly hate-motivated massacre in Orlando and three days after the Tony Awards, dozens of recording artists, Broadway stars, and other celebrities gathered in a New York studio, "We Are the World" style, to record an ensemble cover of the 1965 Burt Bacharach hit "What The World Needs Now Is Love." You can download the track here, which was orchestrated by Sirius XM's Seth Rudetsky, with 100% of the proceeds going to the GLBT Community Center of Central Florida.

Not only are Carole King, Sarah Jessica Parker, Kristin Bell, Whoopi Goldberg, Gloria Estefan, and Lin-Manuel Miranda a part of this, but so are Broadway legends Bernadette Peters, Tommy Tune, Idina Menzel, Alice Ripley, Chita Rivera, Audra McDonald, and many more.

The star-studded roster and the lyrics they sing are below, and you can see a video of the powerful recording session above.

SARA BAREILLES: What the world needs now is love, sweet love
CAROLE KING: It's the only thing that there's just too little of
BERNADETTE PETERS: What the world needs now is love, sweet love
AUDRA McDONALD: No not just for some, but for everyone
BRIAN STOKES MITCHELL: Lord we don't need another mountain
WAYNE BRADY: There are mountains and hillsides enough to climb
SEAN HAYES/ANDREA MARTIN: There are oceans and rivers
MATTHEW BRODERICK: Enough to cross
LIN-MANUEL MIRANDA: Enough to last
MARISSA JARET WINOKUR/ROSIE O’DONNELL: Enough to Last
SEAN HAYES/ANDREA MARTIN/MATTHEW BRODERICK/LIN-MANUEL MIRANDA plus JANET METZ:
'Till the end of time
KRISTEN BELL (with chorus): What the world needs now is love, sweet love
SARAH JESSICA PARKER: It's the only thing that there's just too little of
GLORIA ESTEFAN (with chorus): What the world needs now is love, sweet love
IDINA MENZEL: No not just for some, but for everyone
WHOOPI GOLDBERG: Lord we don't need another meadow
BILLY PORTER: There are cornfields and wheat fields, enough to grow
JOSE LLANA/ANDREA BURNS: There are sunbeams and moon beams, enough to shine
LEN CARIOU/TOMMY TUNE: Oh listen, Lord
CHITA RIVERA: If you want to know
JOEL GREY: If you wanna know
LILLIAS WHITE: Whoa!
CHORUS: Whoa!
RENÉE ELISE GOLDSBERRY (with chorus): What the world needs now is love, sweet love
ALICE RIPLEY: It's the only thing that there's just too little of
KIMIKO GLENN: What the world needs now is love, sweet love
BD WONG: No not just for some
JESSIE MUELLER: But for everyone.
KELLI O’HARA: What the world needs now is love, sweet love
ANN HAMPTON CALLAWAY/LIZ CALLAWAY: What the world needs now is love, sweet love
ROSIE PEREZ: What the world needs now is love, sweet love
CHORUS: What the world needs now is love, sweet love (repeats)
ORFEH What the world needs...
KEALA SETTLE : We need love!
CARMEN CUSACK: What the world needs now
LILLIAS WHITE: What we need now!
KEALA SETTLE: What we need is love
ORFEH: What the world, what the world, what the world needs now
KEALA SETTLE: Let me hear some love
LILLIAS WHITE: Sweet love!
CARMEN CUSACK: Love
ORFEH: What the world, what the world, needs now
CARMEN CUSACK: Love, love, love, love.
Chorus: Sara Bareilles, Kristen Bell, Wayne Brady, Matthew Broderick, Andréa Burns, Ann Hampton Callaway, Liz Callaway, Len Cariou, Paul Castree, Michael Cerveris, Joshua Colley, Lilla Crawford, Carmen Cusack, Darius de Haas, Fran Drescher, Gloria Estefan, Kimiko Glenn, Whoopi Goldberg, Renée Elise Goldsberry, Joel Grey, Sean Hayes, Nina Hennessey, James Monroe Iglehart, Julie James, Carole King, Judy Kuhn, Nathan Lane, Anika Larsen, Zachary Levi, Jose Llana, Rebecca Luker, Andrea Martin, Audra McDonald, Idina Menzel, Janet Metz, Lin-Manuel Miranda, Brian Stokes Mitchell, Jessie Mueller, Donna Murphy, Rosie O’Donnell, Kelli O’Hara, Rory O’Malley, Orfeh, Sarah Jessica Parker, Christine Pedi, Rosie Perez, Bernadette Peters, Billy Porter, Alice Ripley, Chita Rivera, Seth Rudetsky, Keala Settle, Kate Shindle, Jennifer Simard, Will Swenson, Rachel Tucker, Tommy Tune, Jonah Verdon, James Wesley, Juli Wesley, Lillias White, Edith Windsor, Marissa Jaret Winokur, BD Wong and Tony Yazbeck.

Related: Local Author Launches #TwoMenKissing Meme, Which Goes Viral In Response To Orlando

Forget the forefathers of American democracy and financial systems: The next hit Broadway musical could take its cues from the forefathers of the PC and the Mac. As the New York Times foreshadows in its opening night countdown coverage, Nerds, a new Broadway production that first saw the stage in North Carolina, bills itself as a "A Musical Dot-Comedy" and seeks to capitalize on much-belated Jobs nostalgia in addition to renewed interest in musical theater as Hamilton hysteria sweeps the nation. That hit show, by the way, graces San Francisco in March 2017.

Casey Hushion directs Nerds which has been delayed slightly — as it sounds from the Times coverage, casting Jobs was not so easy — so previews at the Longacre Theatre don't begin until April 1st. That's according to Broadway.com, who also note that opening night is set for April 21st.

Of course, the Steve Jobs story has been pretty fully canonized by now, told a great number of times and in a great variety of ways. Notably, in its latest iteration, the film Steve Jobs, even Michael Fassbender couldn't arouse much public interest and the production was pronounced a box office flop. But maybe by including Gates' story in tandem with Jobs', a story of nerdy rivalry will recapture our attention.

Last, of course you remember that Jobs could command a stage during Apple launch events. But how about Gates? Have a look at this dynamite find from the Windows 95 launch.

Let's hope that the musical has the rights to the Stones' "Start Me Up," a so-bad-it's-good computer pun.

Previously: 'Hamilton' Comes To SF For Five Months Starting In March 2017, LA After

We heard a couple weeks ago that the first national tour of the wildly popular Broadway musical Hamilton would be kicking off this fall in Chicago, with definite stops in San Francisco and Los Angeles, and today we get clarification about the dates. The show will be coming to SF first, in the spring of 2017, but these are extra-long engagements that aren't typical for Broadway tours: They are all upwards of five months long.

The Chicago opening is set for September 27, 2016, as earlier reported, but the show won't move on to SF's Orpheum Theater, under the SHN umbrella, until March 2017. It will be a 21-week engagement here, and then the tour moves on to LA's Pentages Theatre, opening on August 11, 2017, as the LA Times reports.

As the New York Times explains, "The New York production will continue to run indefinitely, and Hamilton is also exploring a likely production in London."

The show, if you somehow haven't heard, uses pop, R&B, and hip-hop song styles as well as a multicultural cast to tell the story of Alexander Hamilton, the founding father, right-hand to George Washington, author of The Federalist Papers, and the nation's first secretary of the Treasury, as well as his nemeses Aaron Burr and Thomas Jefferson. And if that somehow sounds like dry material, the score by Lin-Manuel Miranda, who plays Hamilton in the Broadway cast, keeps it anything but. As the NYT's Ben Brantley wrote that the show is "is making its own resonant history by changing the language of musicals," and is "proof that the American musical is not only surviving but also evolving in ways that should allow it to thrive and transmogrify in years to come."

Producer Jeffrey Seller previously assured us that he's going to recreate the Broadway experience inasmuch as he possibly can, saying, "When we come [to these cities], it won't just be a tour. The entire creative team will come [t]here, live [t]here for a month to give this show the same tender loving care they gave it in New York."

Today he announced that the decision to kick off the tour in these cities is based on the previous success of shows like Wicked in both SF and LA. "We make these decisions based on the size of the market and the power of the market to sell tickets for long periods of time,” he said. “Both cities have accommodated shows for even longer stays."

The casting of this tour is likely to get a lot more attention that other national tours as well, with the show breaking Broadway records and earning more national buzz than probably any other show since Rent. No casting decisions have yet been made public, though both Broadway and Hollywood talent will likely vie for a few of these parts.

San Francisco theater fans are encouraged buy subscription packages for SHN for next year to assure themselves seats — otherwise single tickets will go up for grabs later and likely sell out as fast they have been in New York — and perhaps faster than Book of Mormon, which has already sold out several tour engagements here over the last few years.

Otherwise, as the Onion AV Club explains, the first time you may see the show will be when NBC eventually airs it on TV in a few years — because network chairman Bob Greenblatt is an investor in the show.

Note: SHN SF is an SFist advertiser, but this was not technically a sponsored post or directed in any way by the advertiser.

Previously: Hamilton The Musical Will Be Coming To SF And LA, Possibly By Fall

By the time Carol Doda died from complications of kidney failure in San Francisco on Monday, the woman who described herself as having "started a sexual revolution that spun as fast as twirling tassels" had lost her hearing, struggled with debt, and reportedly shrank to a mere 60 pounds over a long period of dialysis.

But the stripping pioneer whom Chronicle columnist Herb Caen once called “the Susan B. Anthony of this particular liberating movement” was "never an old lady," according to Ron Minolli, the man behind the bar at Doda's preferred North Beach watering hole Gino & Carlo.

"[Carol] wasn't just a dancer that would show her breasts," he said, his 62-year-old face lighting up like a boy's as we discussed his friend of four decades. "We're losing more than just the woman who started the topless thing. She was a comedian, she was a dancer, she was a showperson, and she was a fun person."

Near the end of her life, when she had gone completely deaf, Carol "had a guy that would write things down for her, and everything else. And somehow she would take over the conversation. She could pitch and catch with the best of us, meaning that if you joked with her, she would joke back with you."

One of Doda's jokes concerns her infamous 1964 "debut." A cocktail waitress and somewhat-clad go-go dancer, Doda descended on a hanging piano to perform an impromptu topless number at the Condor. Even in liberal San Francisco, the act of "indecency" was unheard of and technically illegal. But Doda cared not a whit, writing that "The owner and I ended up in the slammer... [and] I was back slamming on stage in two shakes of a stripper’s tail."

She was 26 years old.

Outside the Condor Club Thursday night, a man in a top hat and fur overcoat who calls himself Norman the Doorman said, "Not a night goes by when I'm out here that at least one but usually something like two or three people come ask me if Carol Doda is here.They say things like 'When I was in the army, I came here to see Carol Doda.'"

But Doda's relationship with the Condor Club, whose enormous sign long bore her name, was strained. Sitting in the Condor's darkened "champagne room," club manager Francis Huinh told me, "For a long time she had a little bit of animosity toward this place. We did our 50-year anniversary here, but she wasn't a part of it."

Whatever it did to social mores, Doda's move to the "monokini," as she called her garb, likely improved her fortunes. Payment and tips reportedly went up across the board for the dancers who followed suit up and down Broadway, which nearly all of them did within months of Doda's topless debut. Just a month prior to the 1964 Republican National Convention, delegates heard the news, arriving in North Beach in droves. Soon enough, the movement spread across the country. The New York Times' obituary for Doda reveals that at one time, Doda was likely earning today's equivalent of $4,000 a week from her act.

But references to Doda in Herb Caen's columns over many years reveal a woman constantly negotiating and renegotiating her value, likely out of necessity. In 1972, he wrote that "Carol Doda signed a new one-year contract at the Condor, having got the raise she was threatening to hold in for." Later, as she exited her job as a cheeky spokesperson for KICU in San Jose, she quipped that the channel "is so cheap they make the Condor... look like the Ford Foundation."

When Doda left the Condor for good in 1986, having danced her way to age 49, she did so feuding. Even after her departure, the Club left her name on its sign, so Doda "commanded her lawyer, Haig Harris Jr., to file suit against Condor owner David Benson," Caen wrote. 'It's not fair to the tourists,' pouts Carol. 'They want the real things.'"

Inside the Condor, a poster of Doda remains, the largest of several. In black and white, she bares her 44DD breasts and smokes a cigarette."I began my chilly dancing career as a 19-year-old with modest but perky 34Bs," Doda wrote candidly. "My horizons expanded. I have no secrets. The procedure involved direct silicon injections, which are now banned because the plastic tends to migrate... [but] I never experienced any problems."

In The Pump House Gang, Tom Wolfe referred to Doda's breasts as "great blown-up aureate morning-glories." That's nice, Tom. Others called them the Twin Peaks, referencing those twin parts of San Francisco's geography. Somewhat inescapably, these are terms of objectification. But there's an argument that Sarah Katherine Lewis voices on Alternet that goes like this. "If a woman chooses to objectify herself — shedding her clothes to obtain power through money — is she helping to eliminate gender inequality or simply degrading herself?"

But to the question "Can stripping be a feminist act?" Lewis basically responds "Well, should it have to be?" As she writes, "the unglamorous truth about my experience as an adult entertainer is that I felt empowered — as a woman, as a feminist, and as a human being — by the money I made, not by the work I did.... I find it interesting that the very people who complain about the objectification of women's bodies are the ones who have little to say about the objectification of poor people's bodies, of all genders."

Until 2013, down the block from the Condor was the Lusty Lady, something of a unicorn as America's lone unionized strip club. The "Lusties," as they called themselves, owned their means of production — and, of course, the business itself. Lily Burana wrote of her experience working there in the Atlantic, "For an enterprising artist, social reformer, or student who was willing to dive into the sex industry but didn’t want to feed her soul to it, the Lusty was a reliable, companionable choice."

Though Doda's image at the Condor serves as a reminder of the Club's past (and, as some dancers told me, an inspiration, though none I talked to had met her) the club today is lurid, not louche. Let's just say it doesn't pass a feminist smell-test. But to be specific, there was the music. Doda was well known for her singing, which could be heard as recently as last year at Tupelo on karaoke nights (they paid her for it, as presumably she insisted). In the 1980s, she was even the frontwoman for a rock band, the Lucky Stiffs, which performed throughout the Bay Area.

"We keep up the musical tradition here," Huinh said of the Condor, and live bands play on weekends. But the typical background soundtrack is nothing short of depressing. A dancer humorously rolled her eyes when Dave Matthews' "Crash" played.

"It's definitely modern compared to what [Doda] was used to," Huinh continued. That's one way to put it, but retro and regressive might be more accurate. The Condor in 2015 struck me as a slightly sickening kaleidoscope for the most leering male gazes, and it likely had to have felt similar in Doda's era, at least on some nights.

Not being an aficionado, I don't have a lot to compare the place to. And the Condor is known, by official city plaque, as "where it all began."

My feelings aside, and although Huinh wouldn't discuss how much dancers at the Condor make, I got the sense that everyone was doing alright for themselves and no one was unhappy to be there. I imagine that's something Carol would have liked to see.

"It's this great mix of classy but also dirty and fun," one young dancer told me, adding that she has no trouble with her rent in the Lower Haight. As far as the clientele, "I try to make connections with the guys, if I can," she said, something which she seemed to have no trouble doing.

"You can’t go on stripping forever," Doda herself acknowledged, but neither can one go on doing anything forever, I'd add. Of Doda's finances, Minolli says "she didn't have a lot of money, I know that for a fact. She may have been in debt, but she was paying her bills. Your beauty and your breasts can only go so far," he said, and Doda no doubt cannily pushed them as far as they might go.

She never married, though Minolli tells me she took up with a widower later in life who left her some money when he himself died a few years ago. For her last act, Doda opened Carol Doda’s Champagne and Lace Lingerie Boutique in San Francisco. People love it on Yelp. "I wait on customers personally," she writes. "Big can be very sexy." And sexy, as Carol knew, can be very powerful.

Related: Carol Doda, '60s Stripping Sensation And Cultural Icon, Dead At 78

Playing now at the Orpheum Theater is the newest touring production of Chicago, direct from Broadway. The cast includes J. Peterman himself, John O'Hurley in the role of attorney Billy Flynn, and a pair of incredible dancers/triple-threats, Bianca Marroquin and Terra C. McLeod as Roxie Hart and Velma Kelly, respectively.

This latest touring production arrives in San Francisco, playing through November 16, just as the Broadway production is about to become the second longest-running show in Broadway history, surpassing Cats. Chicago opened in its current revival in 1996, and has been running 18 years straight, with nearly 7,500 performances.

The touring ensemble also includes a group of fantastic dancers who carry this intense dancing musical on their backs and thighs, literally. And unlike in the Oscar-winning 2002 movie musical, you really get an appreciation for how hard, and impressive, this kind of dancing is watching this crew slither and tango through each and every number.

Tomorrow, Tuesday, November 11, I'll be live-tweeting from backstage at the Orpheum, just to give you a glimpse of what a Broadway musical looks like from back there — and trying not to get trampled as the dancers run on and off stage.

This will all be starting around 7:30 p.m. on SFist's Twitter, so please follow us if you don't already. (And I'll be posting stuff to our Facebook page as well.)

When 81-year-old Broadway legend Chita Rivera spoke with the San Francisco Chronicle to promote her upcoming appearances at the Fairmont, you might have expected her to talk about her work in West Side Story, Nine, or Kiss of the Spider Woman. Less expected, perhaps, was her announcement of a role that has yet been out of reach: that of a zombie on AMC drama The Walking Dead.

"Just this last week I was watching the show with my daughter, and I told her that I would be a zombie in a minute if they'd let me," Rivera told the Chron. "I'd really like to be a walker."

Rivera, who broke ground for Hispanic women in the worlds of dance and musical theatre, has more credits that we can count, including roles in the original Broadway cast of Bye, Bye Birdie, West Side Story (she was Anita before Rita Moreno was), and Chicago (she was the first Velma Kelly, the character Catherine Zeta-Jones played in the film). She's been nominated for nine Tony awards, and has won twice. She was the first Hispanic woman to be awarded a Kennedy Center Honor, and received the the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2009.

And now she wants to play a zombie (the show calls them "walkers" or "biters")! AMC, are you listening? Surely somebody knows somebody who has connections at The Walking Dead? Because we gotta make this happen.

Rivera appears in Chita: A Legendary Celebration at the Fairmont on Sunday, February 23.

[Chron]
[Chita: A Legendary Celebration]

Tomorrow is going to be a big day, ladies and gentlemen. Tension is high. So is the optimism. Please take a moment to listen to the great Andrea McArdle, age 14, playing Annie in the original Broadway production in 1977. [Hat tip: Patrick Connors]

Stephen Sondheim's Sweeney Todd stands as one of his most popular shows, thanks in large part to that iffy Tim Burton film released in 2007 (which boasted Johnny Depp as the titular barber and his knife, and Helena Bonham Carter as Mrs. Lovett, who, alas, was no Angela Lansbury). A remarkable feat considering the show involves a serial killer, rape, murder, green finch and linnet birds, and pools of blood. For this local production of Sondheim's noted classic, the musical bloodbath gets the small-scale treatment care of Ray of Light Theatre under the direction of Ben Randle. And you should check it out..

Sure, some reviews have been so-so. SF Weekly notes, "The material might be rich, but it gets lost in Ray of Light's production ... The six-piece band often overwhelms the singers, and many performers fail to take their characters to the heights the script demands." And SF Appeal says, "It's maybe a little too bright ... and, as with any performance viewed from twenty feet away, sub par performances are blaringly apparent. Fortunately, there are few of these." But when do you get to hear such Sondheim classics as "By the Sea," "Worst Pies In London," and "A Little Priest"? Not often enough, that's for sure.

Runs until August 13 at the Eureka Theatre (215 Jackson), SF. Ticket info.