This is Drama Masks, a Bay Area performing arts column from a born San Franciscan and longtime theatre artist in an N95 mask. I talk venue safety and dramatic substance, or the lack thereof.
With each passing day, I’m increasingly glad that AI hasn’t invaded theatre the way it has other media. Argue all you like that “it’s just a matter of time,” but I think theatre’s low status in the public consciousness may have inadvertently spared it a full-fledged invasion from the environment-killing, law-breaking, plagiarizing slop machines, for now.
Too bad the same can’t be said for politics. We’ve known for quite some time that AI is horrible tech, so it should come as no surprise that it’s being utilized by some very horrible people. As I write this, I’ve recently finished reading Tim’s latest piece about the Wiener campaign resorting to racist, misogynist, elitist AI slop to attack Connie Chan. Those of us familiar with Wiener’s bullshit aren’t surprised by this: take the words “AI slop” out of the previous sentence and it’s we’ve gone back a decade to his similar attacks on Jane Kim. Whereas that previous campaign used a combo of old media machinations and social media skullduggery, Wiener’s new AI oligarch pals have streamlined his propaganda down to a single cruel prompt.
Plus ça change…
As a person of color, a registered voter, and a born-and-raised San Franciscan, all the above would offend me even if I hadn’t personally interviewed Chan two weeks ago (at an important event where Wiener was nowhere to be seen). But it goes further for me. As you’ve probably noticed from reading this column, I’m also an arts critic. Wiener & Co.’s slop-peddling is 1) just bad art, and 2) proof that they don’t care about the very constituents they want to represent.
Not only do AI companies currently have obscene amounts of money (which I personally can’t wait to see vanish after the inevitably bubble bursts), but Wiener’s campaign has brought in an equally obscene amount of campaign contributions. The latter could have easily hired actual human artists—even CG artists—to put together something that has a personal touch to it. Instead, with the touch of a button, he refused to give work to local artists so that he can peddle out enough cookie-cutter propaganda to kill an entire forest.
The kick of writing about art for an overtly political website means writing about how art and politics are inextricable from one another. Wiener has a long, dirty history of showing nothing but disdain for art and cultural legacy in San Francisco. Like all hegemonizing entities, he reveals himself through his disdain of art. Like our oh-so-illustrious mayor, Wiener has occasionally shown up for a photo op at an arts venue, but couldn’t tell you anything about SF’s rich art history if his life (or campaign) depended on it. Both of them, however, will jump for a Jollibee.
As Chan’s campaign picks up more speed with each passing day, Wiener’s desperation becomes all the more obvious. Like all bullies, he tries to paint himself as the victim as his attacks get more vicious. Both the arts critic and registered voter in me are eager to see how this ends, because nothing would be more hilarious than a career villain finally realizing he can’t pass himself off as the hero anymore. Not even with slopaganda on his side.
In a Memory Place world premiere at Z Space
As I watched In a Memory Place, whose world premiere ran through August 1 at Z Space, SF, I found myself thinking back to another recent show. Both rely on unorthodox theatre techniques to tell stories involving senior citizens whose lives and minds are slowly slipping away. Having personally cared for a senior ‘til the end of her life, it’s a dramatic subject I can watch with a specific level of expertise. Like all parts of our system, elderly care and mental health assistance in the US are broken (particularly, in the last year-and-a-half). There’s also an unsettling element in the way the aforementioned theatre techniques attempt to dramatize a patient’s affected mental state.
Such was the intent of In a Memory Place’s creator, Edith Newton. The play has the skeleton of a story, but only sticks to it so much, as the portrayal of detached mind and space take precedence. What little plot there is finds a nameless woman (Gulshirin Dubash) arriving at a hospital to see someone. She ends up encountering another woman (Mika Oskarson-Kindstrand) in the midst of mental decline, yet possessed of such sharp memory that there are hints she may know the first woman.
We learn that the elderly woman was once a high-profile fashionista in Vienna before she and her Jewish lover were forced to flee the Nazis. (The line “immigration became increasingly difficult” carried a particularly strong resonance, in light of recent headlines.) Decades later, she’s essentially a walking ghost of the talented, vivacious person she used to be.
Newton’s piece amalgamates elements of dance, chorus, and Japanese Noh theatre (with members of SF Theatre of Yugen popping up in both the chorus and ensemble). There’s no doubting the amount of care that went into this reality-inspired work, but it doesn’t all quite fit together. The technique itself overshadows. Truly haunting techniques, like projections of characters continuing to walk after the performers have stopped, do leave a lasting impression, but it’s too overwhelming to take in all at once and hold onto a connection with the characters.
Playing in Z Space’s main auditorium, I was once again one of the few masked, but CO² levels on my Aranet4 remained mercifully low, peaking at only 521ppm by the final bow. That’s a relief, given the disturbing connection between Covid and Alzheimer’s. The depiction of the latter in Newton’s play is compelling, but the piece quickly becomes an exercise in style over substance.
Urinetown by Ray of Light
Not having seen a Bay Area production of Urinetown (through August 29 at the Barbary Stage, SF) since Berkeley Playhouse in 2017, I’m surprised it isn’t performed here more often. Not only is it a blatantly anti-capitalist work, its title aligns with right-wing media’s stereotypical idea of SF.
Leave it to Ray of Light to bring the satirical meta-musical to the City by the Bay. The story of paying to piss, and the road to Hell being paved with good intentions, is just as sharp now as its award-winning debut. What’s more, the company throw all their resources behind it, with an all-around winning cast and excellent choreo by director Isaih Boyd, for a production that easily blows away any BroadwaySF offering this year.
Once again, I have to credit the newly-renovated Barbary Stage for HVAC. CO² levels went no higher than 935ppm during the two-act show. That’s practically a victory lap for a production that shows an independent Bay Area theatre pulling off a production that most major houses would kill to produce.
URINETOWN runs through August 29 at The Barbary Stage, SF. Tickets and further info here.
