Results tagged “improv”

SFist Tonight

ART: It's your last chance to view the current exhibitions at SF Camerawork. The Summer Exhibition Cool-Down Party features Ersatz Group Exhibition, Leaving A Mark: Cutter Photozine, and The 2009 James D. Phelan Art Award in Photography. The publication of the Ersatz exhibition catalog will also be announced.

SFist Tonight

THEATER: CASA (Children’s After School Arts) is having a musical theatrical extravaganza, Adventures at Camp Itchy Scratchy, starring 85 kindergarten through fifth graders. "Looking to escape their school-year stresses, a group of kids travel to Camp Itchy Scratchy only to find themselves embroiled in a battle of power and blood." The event is a fundraiser for CASA.

You know that Improv Everywhere group? Most people have seen their work in those videos of people standing motionless in train stations or staging a surprise musical in a shopping mall. But you've probably known about them for because you heard about them on This American Life back before they were famous.

Neatorama pointed this out on our reader and since we're big fans of food courts and confusion (and spontaneous bursts of musicals), we thought it'd cheer your Wednesday morning. It starts off a bit slow, but hang on until the end. It's worth it. Thanks, Improv Everywhere! This sure goes well with Singing Guy below.

Let's get a look at your legs, San Francisco! Saturday, January 12 is the annual "No Pants" subway ride, as originated in NYC by Improv Everywhere and elevated to fame by Ira Glass. The details are as follows:

-- Cabaret for Humanity: Cabaret isn't just about getting drunk while telling self-centered stories about your life. Sometimes they give back. One of the city's best venues is getting all benefitt-y on our asses. This evening (and tomorrow night) they host an all-star lineup of local talent including, Tony Koester Kim Kuzma, Irene Soderberg, Veronica Klaus, Paul Elia, Basic Black & the Rob Evans Quartet, Joe Collins, Meg Mackay, Ethyl Merman, Mark Miller, Mercedez Munro, Tom Orr, Carly Ozard, Blue Blanket Improv, Brian Yates-Sharber, Katya Smirnoff-Skyy, Bebe Sweetbriar, Jonathon Reisfeld, Artemis Chase, and more. Net proceeds go to HHSF efforts, which provide homes for San Francisco families. (Hey, agoraphobic single fellas with cats need homes too, you know!) Starts at 7:30 p.m. (tonight and tomorrow night, folks) at the Empire Plush Room; $40.

There aren't a hell of a lot of Wendy's left in SF. The one on 658 Market closed all too soon, and we're dying to sample the Baconator. (We really are.) Although we appreciate the noble and expensive slow-food movement, we'll always prefer Wendy's square-cut meat patties cooked in record time.

This past Sunday, under blazing blue skies in the City's snuggly warm SOMA bosom of Yerba Buena Gardens (YBG), there were no microphones, no stage lights, and no admission fees (and sadly no news coverage). There was plenty of energy though in the form of 10,000 spectators watching 267 actors in 77 different shows on 10 stages for the fourth annual San Francisco Theater Festival (SFTF).

The festive and well-attended public event filled not only the outdoor venues of the YBG like the Stone Stage, the Waterfall, and the Rock Circle, but also filled up indoor venues the Metreon and Zeum.

The San Francisco Theater Festival is an annual free event intended to build the theater-going audience by acquainting people with live-theater performance in the Bay Area. "It's always a bit of a crapshoot" SFTF Executive Producer Bill Schwartz told SFist on Tuesday, but he loves what he does and hopes that people will continue to join him in making the Bay Area a truly great theater town.

-- The Cribs, Sean Na Na, and the Hugs: popscene presents a surprisingly not-so-greasy group of Britrockers, the Cribs, performing along with Sean Na Na and the Hugs. (Aw.) Show starts at 8 p.m. at Slim's, 333 11th St.; admission is $13.

Saturday.... in the park... wish it were the Fourth of July! (That's the Tokyo Ska Paradise Orchestra performing the Chicago classic above). Here's your events for today:

Still plenty of shows for the Frameline , SF Improv, and the Hole in the Head festivals....

SF Improv Fest kicks off tonight with Emo Phillips, performing with Bassprov and 3 For All, at the Buriel Clay Theatre. Get tickets in advance here. Show starts at 8pm, 762 Fulton St, SF.

Ask a MacArthur "Genius" - ROVA presents a Q&A with composer John Zorn as part of its Improv 21 series. As well as being a composer and saxophonist, Zorn runs a music venue in NYC and his own label that releases an eclectic range of music, from free jazz to Japanese noise, to klezmer. Subjects for Q&A will be chosen improvisationally and jump-cut from topic to topic, probably including discussion of Zorn's artistic influences, his concepts on the artistic process, his mammoth recording output, and more. SF Performing Arts Library & Museum (401 Van Ness @ McAllister), 7pm.

We know we're saving up our money for countless Halloween-themed events this weekend, so tonight we're all about the free stuff.

420wrtw.jpgLast week's winner, the SF Weekly: Letters: Pro-sex worker letter, and a letter pointing out race- and class-based disparities in local coverage of murdering moms. Matt Smith on the DeYoung parking shenanigans. Ways to avoid paying your taxes (shouldn't this article have run before taxes were due?). Videojournalist Josh Wolf gets subpoenaed by the feds over last year's anarchist riots. Cover article: SFIFF. Improv actors pick the theater critic's how-we-met story to act out on stage -- hilarious. Meredith Brody takes more relatives out to eat. She has a very large family, doesn't she, Ced? Matmos. The Bouncer's not drinking this week -- take care of yourself, Bouncer! You sound a little down. And Savage Love -- whatever you do, don't burn your youthful hijinks onto a CD-Rom, fool! Next up, the San Jose Metro: San Jose should stop embracing sprawl. The Fly: Fast food politics, with a Subway application and some political donations shenanigans by King Eggroll. There's an excellent picture of a kid slaying a dragon in the California Theater Company's production of "The Reluctant Dragon," but it's not online. Curse you, Metro! Cover article: the San Jose downtown district 3 election. The chef from Campton Place's new restaurant in Mountain View. Project Runway winner Chloe Dao is in San Jose this weekend. SFIFF. Pick out the fake hyphy-related vocabulary words from this list. And SFist Eve's horoscope: rescue a talking parrot from a burning pet store. Get on that, Eve! The EBX, the Guardian, and the pick of the week after the jump. Picture from the Weekly's Sucka Free City column.

Free to be.... you and Wednesday. Tonight: Cue poignant accordian music, read post in Gallic tones. The Alliance Française is screening L'Affaire Valérie, an award-winning documentary by François Caillat about the legend of a woman who killed a Canadian before disappearing into the Alps. This is the first part of a three-part French documentary series that the Alliance is putting on this spring. $6 ($3 for Alliance members), 7 p.m., 1345 Bush Street (at Larkin). [Thanks for the help in coding html accents, folks!]

Have we ever mentioned how much we love the Primitive Screwhead? Our infatuation began when we attended their final performance of Evil Dead: Live, and we've been slavering to see what they'd do next. They'd mentioned something about a Re-Animator: Live, but, dude, we're part of the OnDemand generation and we want something NOW!

Lewis Black to appear at the Improv in San Jose.

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