Bookwaves/Artwaves

Bookwaves/Artwaves – June 25, 2020: Ayana Mathis – Mart Crowley

Bookwaves/Artwaves is produced and hosted by Richard Wolinsky.

Announcements.

Pride 2020:
Playbill/Pride Plays: The Men from the Boys by Mart Crowley, directed by Zachary Quinto, streams through June 29, 2020. Pride Spectacular Sunday June 28,2020 at 5 pm Pacific.
Global Pride live stream, focusing on Black Lives Matter, and featuring guests ranging from Joe Biden and Nancy Pelosi to Adam Lambert and Lavern Cox and the Dixie Chicks, starts Saturday June 27, 2020 at 7:30 am Pacific time, continuing through Sunday.
San Francisco Pride is hosting two days of live events, with multiple streams featuring musical guests, panel discussions and more, starting Saturday morning and continuing through Sunday. Sunday main stream special guest is singer Thelma Houston, along with W. Kamau Bell and BLM co-founder Alicia Garza. A second stream features community programmed stages The Oasis Pride Drag Show starting on Saturday June 27th at 7 pm.
Theatre Rhino  Post-pride Zoom community mixer with Peaches Christ on Monday June 29 , 7 pm. Register at therhino.org
New Conservatory Theatre Center A Night Out with Katya Smirnoff Skyy Tues., June 30, 6 pm.

Other Announcements.

The Playground is presenting, in honor of Black Lives Matter, a Juneteenth Theatre Justice Project: Polar Bears, Black Boys & Prairie Fringed Orchids by Vincent Terrell Durham, Streaming through June 30th. Co-sponsored by 30 companies, including Berkeley Rep, Marin Theatre Company, Custom Made Theatre, Cal Shakes, Cutting Ball, etc.
Bay Area Book Festival. Merlin Sheldrake and Michael Pollan on Entangled Life, Tuesday July 7, 2020, noon Pacific.
The Booksmith lists its entire June on-line schedule of interviews and readings on their website, which includes Lockdown Lit every Tuesday at 11 am.
Book Passage author events: Dominique Crenn, Sat. June 27, 4 pm Pacific; Jill Biden, Sun. June 28, 4 pm Pacific. Registration required.
Theatre Rhino Thursday play at 8 pm June 11, 2020 on Facebook Live is Frank Kameny: Eyes on the Stars, conceived and performed by John Fisher. The Death of Ruby Slippers by Stuart Bousel, on Zoom, July 7, 2020, 7 pm, register in advance.
Shotgun Players. Streaming: The Claim, workshop production. The Niceties by Eleanor Burgess, July 9-12, 7 pm. Registration required.
San Francisco Playhouse.\Every Monday, SF Playhouse presents Zoomlets, a series of short play table reads. Monday June 29, 7 pm: Rules of Comedy by Patricia Cotter.
Kepler’s Books presents Refresh the Page, on line interviews and talks, June 25, 7:30 Mohsin Hamid. June 30, 7 pm: Joyce Carol Oates with Leila Lalami
National Theater At Home on You Tube: A Midsummer Night’s Dream.

 

Bookwaves

Ayana Mathis, author of The Twelve Tribes of Hattie, in conversation with Richard Wolinsky. Recorded in January 2013.

The Twelve Tribes of Hattie revolves around the matriarch of a black family of the Great Migration and her children and grandchildren, and was an Oprah Book Club selection. From the New York Times review: “Hattie Shepherd, the title character of Ayana Mathis’s piercing debut novel, is at once a tragic heroine with mythic dimensions and an entirely recognizable mother and wife trying to make ends meet. Her story, set in 20th-century Philadelphia, is one of terrible loss and grief and survival, a story of endurance in the face of disappointment, heartbreak and harrowing adversity.” This was a debut novel.

Complete 44-minute Radio Wolinsky podcast.

 

Arts-Waves

Mart Crowley, author of “The Boys in the Band” and its sequel, “The Men from the Boys,” in conversation with Richard Wolinsky on October 31, 2002.

Mart Crowley’s play The Boys in the Band, which deals with the lives of gay men in the 1960s burst upon the off-Broadway scene in 1968 and ran for a thousand performances, becoming a film directed by William Friedkin two years later. In 2002, he wrote a sequel titled The Men from the Boys, which took place 35 years later, after Stonewall and after the AIDS epidemic. It premiered at San Francisco’s New Conservatory Theatre on November 9, 2002. This past year, Broadway saw a revival of The Boys in the Band, featuring Zachary Quinto, Matt Bomer, Andrew Rannels and Jim Parsons. Several members of that cast, including Mario Cantone and Denis O’Hare return to their roles for a live stream of The Men From the Boys, directed by Zachary Quinto, streams through June 29, 2020 on playbill.com/prideplays

Mart Crowley died of a heart attack on March 7, 2020 at the age of 84. Complete 62-minute Bay Area Theater podcast.

 

 

Playlist

Artist Song Album Label
Matthew MontfortAmberGuitar WorksNarada Productions, Inc.
QuanticMishaps HappeningMishaps HappeningTru Thoughts