This week on Open Air, KALW’s radio magazine for the Bay Area performing arts, host David Latulippe talks with cast member Siobhan Doherty, and artistic director Ariel Craft about Cutting Ball Theater’s reprise production of The Tenderloin Tour, which runs through January 26 at community sites throughout San Francisco’s Tenderloin neighborhood.
First produced on Cutting Ball Theater’s stage in 2012, The Tenderloin Tour is a live collage of interviews with Tenderloin residents, a tribute to the unheard voices of a complex and vibrant neighborhood. Performances will be hosted at venues throughout the Tenderloin, such as Glide Memorial Church, Boedekker Park, the San Francisco Public Library, the Tenderloin Museum as well as Cutting Ball’s own venue at 277 Taylor Street.
Also stopping by are Nick A. Olivero, the originator of The Speakeasy and founding artistic director of Boxcar Theatre, and David Owen, co-founder of SF Sketchfest, to share details about their partnership in SF Sketchfest at The Speakeasy: An Immersive Comedy Experience, which runs for three consecutive weekends, Fridays and Saturdays from January 11 to 26.
Within the many different rooms of various sizes inside Boxcar’s Palace Theatre (the venue of The Speakeasy), national headline acts are featured at 7:30 pm and 9 pm each night, while local favorites and up-and-coming names will perform simultaneously throughout the rest of the theater. Among the performers are Michael Ian Black, Tom Kenny, David Cross, Janeane Garofalo, Jen Kirkman, Sabrina Jalee, Dana Gould, John Hodgman, Paul F. Tompkins; and “Improv All-Stars” featuring Second City alumni Scott Adsit (30 Rock) and Tami Sagher (Inside Amy Schumer), and others.
We meet with musicians Ben Todd (band leader and drummer) and Camilla Bäckman (singer/violinist) of the Cirque du Soleil production Volta, currently under the Big Top at AT&T Park in San Francisco (through February 3), and from February 13 - March 24 at the Santa Clara County Fairgrounds in San Jose.
Plus, the touring production of the Broadway musical Come From Awayopened this week at the SHN Golden Gate Theater in San Francisco. Come From Away tells the remarkable true story of 7,000 airline passengers who were stranded after the September 11 attacks in 2001, and of the small town of Gander, Newfoundland, that welcomed them.
We meet with cast member Julie Johnson, and with Bay Area resident Meghan Schwartz, who was one of those stranded. She was traveling with her husband and a 7-months old baby when she became stranded in Gander. Her experience of 9-11 has been defined by this event and she has a 17-year old daughter whose own experience of 9-11 has been shaped by her Mom’s status on that date.
Come From Awayruns through February 3.