San Diego Union-Tribune (Sunday)
Laughs, lessons on cancer
San Diego playwright’s ‘Red Jasper’ aims to guide people on what to say and how to act around breast cancer patients
San Diego playwright Michael Madden’s sister is a breast cancer survivor. But back when she was sick, she battled more than the disease. She and other cancer patients she knew also had to wrestle daily with misconceptions and sometimes unwelcome behavior and comments from well-meaning family and friends.
So Madden has written a new play that he hopes will not only entertain audiences and make people laugh but also educate them on what to say and how to act around women who are in a battle for their lives against breast cancer.
“Red Jasper,” which opened Friday at Lamplighters Community Theatre in La Mesa, is also a fundraiser for the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation. The June 11 performance will benefit the foundation, and Madden has also launched a Gofundme campaign (“how many wigs can we raise?”) to raise money to buy wigs for women who have lost their hair to chemotherapy.
“Red Jasper” is Madden’s second play. His first, the romantic comedy “Maybe This Time,” made its premiere at the 2016 San Diego International Fringe Festival and has since been produced in four other cities nationwide. “Red Jasper” also started out as a romantic comedy, but while creating backstory for his characters, Madden decided that the lead female character, Isadora, would be a breast cancer patient. In the play, she falls for Tom, a
man who both charms and infuriates her.
Madden went to two Susan G. Komen charity runs and interviewed more than 40 breast cancer survivors on their experiences. Several common themes emerged. He shared the script with local Komen foundation officials, and he said they felt that it reflected the experience of breast cancer patients so well that they’re co-promoting the show.
“My goal with this play is to give people a better idea of how to act around friends, family or strangers that are experiencing cancer or have experienced cancer, especially with chemo. It’s hard enough dealing with the illness and its ramifications without having to deal with wellintentioned but clueless people they run into on a daily basis,” he said, adding that the play is not a how-to lecture, but a comedy about love and relationships.
“Red Jasper” runs 8 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays and 2 p.m. Sundays through June 19 at 5915 Severin Drive in La Mesa. Tickets are $23-$25. Call (619) 3035092 or visit lamplighterslamesa.com.
Song recording from ‘Lempicka’ is now live
For the first time in San Diego, audiences will have the opportunity to see “Lempicka, A New Musical” in its pre-broadway tryout at La Jolla Playhouse, with performances beginning June 14. But fans of the musical about famed Russian painter Tamara de Lempicka don’t have to wait that long to hear star Eden Espinosa sing a number from the show.
On Tuesday, Sony Masterworks Broadway released for download the debut single from the upcoming “Lempicka” cast album, “Woman Is,” performed by Espinosa.
Lempicka was a painter who fled the Russian Revolution and built an international career in bohemian Paris with her sensuous paintings. Then, when the Germans entered Paris in 1940, she fled again to Los Angeles. Espinosa originated the role of Tamara in the musical’s 2018 world premiere at the Williamstown Theater Festival. The musical’s book, lyrics and original concept is by Carson Kreitzer, with book and music by Matt Gould. It’s directed by Tony winner Rachel Chavkin (“Hadestown”).
For information on the new song, visit masterworksbroadway.com.
La Jolla Playhouse hosts Native Voices
La Jolla Playhouse will present readings of two new plays by American Indian authors on June 4 as part of its longtime partnership with the Native Voices at the Autry’s 28th festival of new plays.
“Bad Medicine” by P.C. Verrone, who is a member of the Osage and Kiowa tribes, will be presented at 1 p.m. It’s a mystery story about an Indian couple who move to a small Massachusetts town where the wife, Aislin, has a new job at a natural history museum. But something insidious is haunting the town, and and her only Native co-worker has disappeared without a trace.
“Four Women in Red,” by Laura Shamas, a member of the Chickasaw tribe, will be presented at 4 p.m. June 4. The play looks inside the startling statistic of the 5,712 missing American Indian and Alaska Native women and girls. Four native women from different generations search for those who have disappeared and wonder if they’ll ever have closure.
Tickets are free, but reservations are required. RSVP to https://lajollaplayhouse.org/native-voicesnpf-2022.
‘Eighty-sixed’ extended at Diversionary Theatre
As the result of a COVID-19 outbreak among some cast members, Diversionary Theatre canceled a week of performances for its world premiere musical “Eighty-sixed” earlier this month. The show reopened Thursday and the run has been extended a week to June 19. For tickets, visit diversionary.org
Some local theater fans are still masking up
On May 20, the Broadway League in New York City announced plans to extend its mask mandate for ticket buyers at all of its 41 member theaters through June 30. The decision was based on fastrising COVID-19 case rates in the city.
In San Diego County, where cases have been ticking up, but not astronomically, local theaters continue to follow the state’s guidelines and are not requiring face masks. At shows I’ve attended over the past two weeks, I’ve noticed about one-third of patrons are still wearing masks for their own comfort and safety.
pam.kragen@sduniontribune.com
Roland Orzabal has no recollection of Tears for Fears’ soldout 1985 debut concert at the San Diego State University Open Air Theatre. But the rapturous — and near-deafening — response the English duo received still haunts Tears’ co-founder Curt Smith to this day.
Proof of their divergent memories of that performance was recently demonstrated by their reactions to hearing a small portion of that review read aloud to them during separate phone interviews.
Here’s the start of that review, followed by Smith’s and Orzabal’s responses earlier this month.
Tears’ concert a screaming success
By George Varga, July 10, 1985, San Diego Union
Judging by the rapturous reception accorded Tears for Fears at their sold-out concert here last night, Duran Duran mania has now succumbed to Tears for Fears hysteria.
Just how excited was the crowd? Well, consider the following. At 9:12 p.m. — more than five minutes before Tears for Fears actually appeared — several hundred fans rushed the stage. Two minutes later, with the house-lights still shining brightly, the entire audience rose to its feet in nearfrenzied anticipation.
Or take into account the following exchange between Tears’ front man Roland Orzabal and those in attendance prior to the introduction of “Pale Shelter,” the concert’s
third selection.
“Hello.” (Deafening screams.) “Hello, everybody.” (Even louder screams.) “Bitchin’.” (Still louder screams.) “This is the very, very first time we’ve been in San Diego. (Prolonged pandemonium.) “And um ...” (More screams.) “Um, what a lovely evening this is.” (Massive roar.) “Shakespeare ...” (a conspicuous absence of screams) “... Shakespeare said a lot of things, and I’m sure he once said something about an evening like this.” (Yep, more screams.)
“Well, I guess it’s time to play another song.” (Sheer bedlam.)”
Orzabal chuckled several times as he listened to the above paragraphs being read aloud to him by the same music critic who wrote the review 37 years ago. Smith laughed, but his comments could not have been more different from his band mate’s.
Orzabal: “I do not remember that, at all. I guess we were having fun, more fun than we may have admitted at the time. Because we are both happy to moan about anything, and (touring then) was hard work. But I see videos of us in 1985, playing live, and I see two very happy young men.”
Smith: “It’s a kind of a blur. But when I hear about or read that review, a lot of what’s in it is why I didn’t want want to do it (tour) anymore. That kind of (audience) hysteria ... just alienates me.”
Orzabal: “One part of you is gobsmacked and overwhelmed by the warmth and enthusiasm of the audience. The other part of you is going, “OK, what’s the next chord?’ So, it’s always tempered by the difficulty of your job, which seems to come naturally.”
Smith: “Having a reaction of just euphoria, when you don’t know that individual onstage — or individuals, in our case — is very peculiar. I still don’t understand it.”
Orzabal: “I wasn’t fazed by the success. I had a mission. I was driven by the same things that drive me now.”
Smith: “With audience responses like that, I guess you end up being kind of a pop idol. And that’s definitely something I’m uncomfortable with. All the screaming means is that they’re not listening to what you’re saying or to the lyrical content. They are really just screaming at what they perceive about the band.”
Orzabal: “The audience response you described in San Diego was wonderful. I don’t think it will be like that now!”
Smith: “All I remember of that (1985) tour are hotel rooms, nonstop interviews and playing live every night day ... it was souldestroying.”
george.varga@sduniontribune.com