Woody Guthrie For All
Independence Day last week featured, as it always does, dozens of renditions of Woody Guthrie’s classic anthem This Land Is Your Land. Like many influential figures, though, Guthrie’s actual life and ideas are more illuminating and interesting than the mythology that sprang up in his wake. This is the point of the show Woody Guthrie’s American Song, playing now through July 22 at the Freight and Salvage Coffeehouse in Berkeley.
Peter Glazer, who directs this performance, wrote the original play in 1988 based on Guthrie’s essays, letters, and prose writings, which he used to “set up a landscape for his songs to inhabit.”
“People may not realize how fiercely observant Guthrie was and that he was really a great chronicler of the ‘30s and ‘40s. It was a singular moment in the American ethos ... And that’s one reason his ideas resonate so profoundly now; he tapped into essential issues of America as a nation: racial divisions, class differences, worry about immigrants.”
Glazer stresses the point that this “life of the rambling folk singer through his words and music” is not a documentary: Rather, it’s an attempt to convey the power of Guthrie’s work and his persona, which was built on his interaction with all the people he met in his life.
“When I first got the idea to do the show,” says Glazer, “I realized that Guthrie got his music and his ideas and histories from the people he encountered every day, whether on skid row in New York or on the road. And so I didn’t want to do a one-man show, because that didn’t give me the ability to explore the relationships he had with these people. The protagonist here is never one person. The “I” moves through the entire ensemble, everyone takes on the first person voice, and in that way I’m spreading his voice around, I’m filtering Guthrie through these different sensibilities.”
Glazer adds that the power of Guthrie is also very personal.
“My father was a folk singer and performed with Guthrie and that whole collection of singers that formed around Allan Lomax. I never met Guthrie myself and for that reason I was not that conscious of Woody as a person. But years later when we got the songbook, I was aghast at the emotional content of the material.
“When the show started, my dad, Tom Glazer, was still alive, and he would come up to me during rehearsals sometimes, and he would say, 'you know there’s actually another verse that would fit in this scene' or 'there’s a particular harmony you might consider here.' He brought his own sensibility when he would come to see the show. And after all, he lived it. But this gave the two of us something that we shared, in its content and quality, and it created the ability to have a conversation about music that we’d never had before. It gave us a whole new aspect to our relationship.”
This musical is intergenerational then, and seems tailormade for kids nine and up, especially those who might think that history is boring. Don’t miss the free open house on Woody’s birthday, July 14, from 1 p.m.-5 p.m., featuring performances by the cast, and viewing of the exhibition of letters that runs concurrently with the show.
Woody Guthrie’s American Song, Freight and Salvage Coffeehouse, July 11-22, tickets $22.50 (in advance).
Teen Angst at Diablo Theatre
Tony Conaty, 19, plays Link Larkin in the Stars 2000 Teen Theatre production of Hairspray. (Stars 2000 is an educational arm of the successful Diablo Theatre Company.) It’s Conaty’s 13th and last show. He’s been doing this since 2005, since he played the rabbi’s son in Fiddler on the Roof, and now he’s aged out.
He’s working on his BFA in musical theater at Ithaca College and intends to make a career on the stage.
“It’s my life,” he said the other day. “After the first couple of summers, I kept coming back. When did I first know this was for me? I suppose when I saw The Lion King in San Francisco, in whatever year that was. I remember watching the little kid that sang Simba and I was just so jealous. That lit my flame.”
We asked Conaty about playing Link Larkin, the teenage heartthrob who becomes the love interest of an overweight girl named Tracy.
“The part is great. The show itself is very 1960s, big, exuberant. I guess my favorite moment in the show is singing, Without Love. I think that suggests the nature of the musical and also about how we feel performing it. Everyone wants to be here, everyone is excited.”
Conaty added, “As you get higher up, you sometimes find people who don’t feel so excited, who do see it as a job. And that’s too bad because an audience doesn’t want to watch actors who may have lost track about why they’re doing this. I can’t imagine ever getting to that point. I think I’ll always have the love for it. At least I hope I’ll always be able to carry that wherever life takes me.”
Hairspray, Diablo Valley College Performing Arts Center, Pleasant Hill, July 20-29, tickets $13-$18.
Broadway Retro: The Marvelous Wonderettes
Photo by Mark Kitaoka
If there was ever a celebration of the 1950s, this musical comedy is it: The Marvelous Wonderettes features not only a score of golden oldies, including Dream Lover, Respect, Lollipop, and so on, but it showcases that upbeat, blue-sky sense of the future, which may not have been the 1950s at all, but is how we remember it.
We spoke to Amanda Folena, who directs and choreographs the show for Redwood City’s Broadway By the Bay and who, herself, projects the enthusiasm of the characters. “It’s just all so positive, so inspiring,” she said.
The initial casting call drew more than 80 people. Among the qualifications was that each actor look young enough to be a high school senior, but also be able to look 10 years older.
“We asked them to sing one song from the first act and one song from the second act,” says Florena, “so that we could see how they handled the character arcs.”
“But beyond being able to portray distinct personalities, we wanted the group to catch the nuances of real friendship. This story is about an emotional journey, and in that sense it’s both sincere and meaningful. The first act is full of energy and bubblegum, but in the second it’s a coming-of-age story and really pulls at the heartstrings. This is not just cotton candy.”
The show also draws the audience into the act when a vote is taken for prom queen. The show is recommended for 12 and over.
Roger Bean wrote the original script ten years ago, originally for the Milwaukee Repertory Theater. It has since been performed Off-Broadway in Manhattan. Bean, 50, wrote the musical on the basis of stories told by his mother, Lois Bean.
Like the Diablo Theatre, Broadway By the Bay has an educational wing, with year-round programs.
The Marvelous Wonderettes, Broadway By the Bay, Fox Theatre, Redwood City, July 12-29, tickets $22-$48.
The Wizard of Oz With the S.F. Symphony
Great as the old movie studio orchestras were, it’s a special thing to see a movie with the San Francisco Symphony providing the musical support. These shows have become ever more popular events at Davies Symphony Hall.
John Oberman, the producer of this unusual performance with the San Francisco Symphony, has won 13 primetime Emmys and is best known as the creator of Live at Lincoln Center. He is also the creator of this new form of film/concert presentation, known as “Symphonic Cinema,” which is focused on 20th-century symphonic works composed for film and orchestra.
“There’s a lot of great music written for film — and, of course, bad music,” says Oberman, “but the great stuff is heard best when you can see why it was written, how the music was adapted to a particular dramatic structure and emotional character. And that’s what the great film composers did.
“As a mechanical matter, you’re stripping away the orchestra’s sound, but leaving the sound effects and dialogue. So in this case, when you hear Judy Garland accompanied by the San Francisco Symphony, you realize it’s a performance of the film, rather than a screening.
“It’s a little bit like opera, although there you have give and take with the soloists. Here there’s no give. And so naturally there’s a big risk in all this. What if the timing is off, what if a horn player misses a note at a crucial point?
“There’s a tremendous amount of music in the Wizard of Oz and here you are with this big beautiful picture and then this live music. You’re just carried along by it. It’s pretty something.”
Audience members are encouraged to come in costume and enter a raffle for great prizes.
The Wizard of Oz, Davies Symphony Hall, July 26-27, $12.50-$75.
Summer Sing-Ins
If you’re a singer in search of a song — or a choral group, you might try the Tuesday night sing-ins sponsored by the Oakland Symphony Chorus. Various directors lead the groups each week. For example, on July 17, Michael Morgan, the music director of the Oakland East Bay Symphony, will lead choruses from Bach’s St. Matthew Passion.This is a wonderful opportunity for amateur singers, no audition required. Enthusiasm requested. Check the website: oaklandsymphonychorus.org. Participation is $15.
Equally, if you’re on the Peninsula, you can satisfy the singing bug with Schola Cantorum, along with other choral enthusiasts at Los Altos Methodist Church. Its “Summer Sings” have some top-notch guest conductors, including Vance George, conductor emeritus of the San Francisco Symphony Chorus. Check the website: scholacantorum.org.