CreaTV San Jose has a blast for 5th birthday
I’m not sure if the Founding Fathers envisioned Mike Hennessy’s “Car Guy” show when they wrote the Declaration of Independence, but they should have. Nothing says “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” like hearing a devoted car junkie like Hennessy pontificate about his passion. That goes for just about all the other community- created programming on CreaTV San Jose, the city’s communal soapbox.
CreaTV, the nonprofit group that manages four community channels on Comcast and online at www. creatvsj. org, celebrated its fifth anniversary Monday with a special three- hour show from its downtown San Jose studio. I stopped in for a few minutes, and it was already a wonderfully crazy circus of a telecast that was a cross between a pledge drive and a variety show.
Behind the scenes, I chatted with CreaTV Executive Director Suzanne St. John- Crane and board members Charlotte Powers, Gerry DeYoung and Brenda McHenry, but there was a lot more going on in front of the camera. Show producers — including Hennessy, Gabrielle Antolovich, Janice Edwards and Brian Stuckey — served as emcees, as guests sauntered in and out of the studio. There were appearances by dancers, elected officials, community leaders and even an Elvis impersonator.
Graffiti artists Adrian Avila of Silicon Valley DeBug and Sean Boyles from the Arsenal collaborated
live on a mural for the eight- foot- high Free Speech Wall. Not a bad way to celebrate some independence.
ARTISTIC ALUMS
GIVE BACK: Colin Israel, Aaron Albano and Kristen Oei— all graduates of San Jose’s Lincoln High School who are now working professionals in the performing arts— were among the alums who returned for “In the Heights: In Concert,” a special one- night performance held June 22 to support the Lincoln Performing Arts Coalition. The nonprofi t group of students, parents, alumni and other community members is aiming to raise $ 40,000 to support next year’s theater program ( You can donate or keep track of their efforts at www. lpac4arts. blogspot. com).
Another group of alumni, this time from San Jose’s Bellarmine College Prep, will be helping to open that school’s new theater with a production of “That Championship Season,” which runs July 11- 14. The cast includes
Brendan McCall, who is currently running a theater program in Australia; Bellarmine faculty member Matt Young; David Koppel, recently director of theater at Mountain View High; high school teacher Keith Larson; and Mark Maccora, a Los Angelesbased actor and producer.
Tickets to the Bellarmine Alumni Theatre production are $ 20 and are available at www. bcp. org. Contact Sal Pizarro at spizarro@ mercurynews. com. Follow him at Twitter. com/ spizarro.