This week on Open Air, KALW’s radio magazine for the Bay Area performing arts, host David Latulippe talks with cast members Michelle Beck (pictured, center) and Rosie Hallett (left) of Top Girls, the season opener at the American Conservatory Theater, ongoing through October 13.
Written by playwright Caryl Churchill in 1982, Top Girls centers around Marlene, a career-driven woman in 1980’s Britain, who is heavily invested in women's success in business. According to the New York Times, Top Girls is "A blistering yet sympathetic look at women who achieve success by adopting the worst traits of self-made men [...] Truly original." Performances are at A.C.T.’s Geary Theater (415 Geary St.) in San Francisco.
We talk with actors Julia Brothers and Indiia Wilmott from the San Francisco Playhouse production of Dance Nation by playwright Clare Barron. This award-winning play about pre-teen competitive dancers features a large cast of women of all ages portraying 13-year-old girls.
Becca Wolff directs the production, with choreography by Kimberly Richards. Dance Nation runs through November 9 at SF Playhouse (450 Post Street) in San Francisco, at the 2nd floor of the Kensington Park Hotel.
Also stopping by is Marilyn Levinson, to discuss the 16th season of Bay Area Cabaret, featuring Broadway and jazz vocalists in the historic Venetian Room of San Francisco’s Fairmont Hotel. The new season opens on Sunday, October 13 (7:30 pm) with Broadway legend Maurice Hines performing Tappin’ Thru Life, together with the DIVA Jazz Orchestra.
Plus, we talk to Cory Combs, executive director of InterMusic SF, about the twelfth edition of the free annual music festival, SF Music Day, on Sunday, October 6 (noon to 7:30pm). Joining him are Cornelius Boots, who leads the Heavy Roots Shakuhachi Ensemble; and Rohan Krishnamurthy, who leads the Alaya Project (fusion of Indian classical music and jazz/funk).
Throughout SF Music Day and into the early evening, thirty San Francisco Bay Area ensembles will perform on four different stages of the War Memorial Veterans building (401 Van Ness Ave.) in San Francisco.
The festival is free to the public, and showcases the range and diversity of Bay Area performers, composers and ensembles. The 2019 edition’s theme is ‘Rebels and Renegades’, and invites each group to highlight musical innovators and visionaries in their repertoire.
Open Air with host David Latulippe; heard live on Thursday, October 3 at 1pm. Listen now or anytime...