Sights & Sounds is your weekly guide to the Bay Area arts scene through the eyes and ears of local artists. This week, our guest is Oakland-based writer and theater performer, Sango Tajima. She’s the co-founder of a new theater ensemble called Dirty Hands, and she also works with two other theater companies, The Bonfire Makers, and Ragged Wing Ensemble. Tajima swung by the KALW studios to chat with Jen Chien and give her weekend picks for cool arts happenings in the bay this week.
Lower Bottom Playaz are performing August Wilson’s play King Hedley II at the Flight Deck in downtown Oakland. King Hedley II is part a series of ten plays written by Wilson, which span through the 20th century, a decade at a time. Each one focuses on the inner city lives of African Americans. Fridays and Saturdays at 8pm and matinees on Saturdays and Sundays at 2pm, until 9.6.
https://vimeo.com/98353541">Lower Bottom Playaz: The American Century Cycle
Sango Tajima: In the century cycle, in each decade, we see the same characters coming up against the same problems over and over again. The Lower Bottom Playaz are making history by staging full productions of all 10 plays in chronological order.
Inferno Theatre and the Actor's Ensemble of Berkeley are putting on a production of King Lear at John Hinkel Park in Berkeley. Saturdays and Sundays at 4pm, until Labor Day 9.7.
Sango Tajima: The performers playing fools are professional clowns who have really mastered physical comedy and timing. In Shakespeare plays, having someone who can bring tragedy to comedy is really important.
Saturday evening 8.29 Motown recording artist Erykah Badu performs at the Warfield in San Francisco at 8pm.
