Return of the Prodigal Son
Playwright Luis Alfaro returns to Magic Theatre with the start of an epic American trilogy.
Read my review on KQED Arts. Read more
Can You Hear Me Now?
“Nobody told me it was going to be this noisy going deaf.”
My review of Nina Raine’s Tribes at Berkeley Rep is on KQED Arts. Read more
Buried Child Revived
Magic Theatre brings back one of its most famous premieres, 35 years later. My review of Buried Child is on KQED Arts.
Witch’s Brujaja
Playwright Luis Alfaro dazzled Magic Theatre audiences two years ago with Oedipus el Rey, his lyrical barrio gangster update of Sophocles’ ancient Greek tragedy Oedipus Rex. It was hardly his first go-round with the Greeks; his 2003 play Electricidad explored the Electra tale in the same modern setting. Everyone knows Greek tragedies come in threes, so now Alfaro completes his trilogy of sorts (drawing from three completely different story cycles in different eras of classical mythology) with Bruja, a new version of Euripides’ Medea set among recent Mexican immigrants in San Francisco’s Mission District. This world premiere reunites Alfaro with Magic producing artistic director Loretta Greco, who directed his Oedipus and now helms Bruja.
Stages of Grief
It’s hard enough dealing with grief when you understand what happened, and why and how it happened, but when what’s happening to someone you love is completely incomprehensible, it’s mighty hard to get your mind around it and resign yourself to anything. For whatever reason, plays all over Berkeley depict families dealing with highly unconventional versions of loss.
