Jim Allen

IN CHARM’S WAY Turning a beloved French film into an American stage musical is a dicey proposition at best, but that’s precisely what Berkeley Rep has done with Jean-Pierre Jeunet’s 2001 Oscar-nominated film, Amélie. It is  charming, visually appealing and succeeds on numerous levels, calling for just a bit of tweaking before it heads for the…

MAY THIS SHOW NEVER BE  FROZEN One of the first rules of etiquette I ever learned was: if you can’t say something nice, don’t say anything at all. Were I inclined to heed that sage advice, my review of Call Me Miss Birdseye: A Celebration of Ethel Merman would end right here. However, as a journalist…

MY KINGDOM FOR SOME INSULIN Known by many as “the most wonderful time of the year,” Christmas has richly earned its reputation for gooey sentimentality, decking the halls with mucho kitsch, and spreading good cheer to all of those people you’ve managed to ignore all year. Despite its questionable source material, Elf, Will Ferrell’s hit…

NOT ONLY WILL YOU FLOAT OUT OF THE THEATER, YOU MAY EVEN FLY Have you ever wondered how the original “lost boy” became Peter Pan and what his life was like before flying out the Darling’s nursery window with Wendy, Michael and John in tow? Adapted by Rick Elice, with musical interludes by Wayne Barker,…

COOL RACH TAKES BACK SEAT TO HOT BARTí“K It’s a strange thing about expectations. San Francisco Symphony made it clear who the headliner was for last night’s program, but Slovakian guest conductor Juraj Valčuha’s rendition of Bartók’s The Miraculous Mandarin outdid pianist Garrick Ohlsson’s Rach III. Valčuha kicked-off the first half with Steven Stucky’s brief,…

SWAN IN A MILLION Featuring a live performance by the Berkeley Symphony with guest conductor Nicolette Fraillon, The Australian Ballet’s Swan Lake comes to Zellerbach Hall this weekend, October 16-19, 2014. While this is one of the world’s favorite ballets, expect this rendition’”created by Australian choreographer Graeme Murphy’”to be unlike any that have come before….

DO I FEAR A WALTZ? Musicals are generally “lost” for any one of a number of reasons: the libretto may be filled with once topical socio-political humor now meaningless to contemporary audiences; it’s too expensive to produce; the score may have gone out of fashion; or the show itself just doesn’t work. The latter is…

THE GREATER GOOD When is “enough” enough? Where do you draw the line? How far would you be willing to go for the “Greater Good”? These are some of the difficult questions posed by playwright Aaron Loeb’s darkly hilarious and deeply disturbing satire, Ideation, which opened San Francisco Playhouse’s 12th season.   Originally developed and produced…

JOURNEY BEYOND THE STARS Stanley Kubrick’s decision to use the first section of Richard Strauss’s exquisite Also Sprach Zarathustra, Opus 30 (1896) to underscore the opening sequence of his classic 1968 film 2001: A Space Odyssey may have been a master stroke; but the average moviegoer was, and still is, unfamiliar with the entire symphonic…

EVERYTHING OLD IS NEW AGAIN As a child, I always hated clowns. At best they were weird; at worst just plain scary. And, to top it off, they weren’t even funny, at least not to me. Why then were they always hovering at birthday parties like some ill-dressed stalker? Was there something I was missing?…

THIS WICKED MAGIC SHOW WILL CAST AN ENCHANTED GODSPELL Teddy Bear’s; Fanny’s; Trinity Place; 132 Bush; the Plush Room; The Mint; Josie’s; the list goes on and on. Time was when San Francisco was overrun with cabarets and showrooms; a close-knit circuit of performance venues, where, for a small cover charge and the price of…

THE CAT’S MEOW MEOW: PURRRRRFECT When you hear the words “performance art,” do you envision a motionless Marina Abramovic allowing a 10-foot boa constrictor to wrap itself around her head? Well, prepare to have your preconceptions, and your mind, blown away by the fabulous Meow Meow.   This gorgeous and accomplished singer, dancer, librettist, lyricist, comedienne,…

HE COULD HAVE SUNG ALL NIGHT Handsome, self-effacing, and charmingly humble, singer/songwriter, Broadway actor (Xanadu, Finian’s Rainbow) and film/TV star (United 93, 30 Rock) Cheyenne Jackson could do no wrong in the eyes of his adoring fans, who packed Davies Symphony Hall for the premiere performance of Hello, Gorgeous!, his newly created tribute to songs…