Plays
All the world: Here a stage, there a stage
By Rosalind Warfield-Brown
copy@readthehook.com
When melancholy Jacques says in As You Like It, "All the world's a stage," he might have been thinking of Charlottesville. It seems that at almost every turn there's a group of eager performers offering plays, concerts, improv-- this year even a carnival!-- for our entertainment and edification.
    The local scene is enlivened in summer by operas at Ash Lawn-Highland, productions at UVA's Helms and Culbreth theatres, and the second cycle of the yearly offerings at the American Shakespeare Center in Staunton. Four County Players in Barboursville can be counted on for a wonderful summer experience under the stars in the Ruins, and then for fun productions in their playhouse during the year.
    The Live Arts folks never fail to amaze with the variety and quality of their productions on two stages, just as Offstage presents eclectic shows in bars all over town in the annual "Barhoppers" series. Piedmont Virginia Community College not only hosts New Lyric Theater Gilbert and Sullivan productions (this year The Pirates of Penzance), but the school's theater department can also be counted on to bring in fascinating shows.
The Old Michie Theater and Ash Lawn both offer delicacies for kiddies, including marionette and puppet shows as well as magic, juggling, and other imaginative fare. The Improfessionals and the Bent Theater troupe make it up as they go along, but the shows are no less stimulating for all that-- some might say they're even more fun than players reciting memorized lines!
    Of course the Paramount looms over all local performance lovers, with its seasons of breath-taking variety-- this year everything from Bo Diddley and the Four Tops to The Chieftans and Ricky Scaggs to the Capital Steps and the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater-- and that's just the tip of the iceberg. No one will be able to say there's nothing to do this winter!
    Add to the mix productions at local schools like Tandem, CHS, and the Albemarle Players (from the high school of the same name) (who this year were invited to the prestigious Edinburg Fringe Festival in Scotland), and it's clear that Jacques was right, at least about "the world" of Charlottesville and Albemarle. Truly all our town's a stage-- and, it seems, a good many of the men and women (and children and even a few pets) more than merely players.

Live Theater and Dance
American Shakespeare Center. Watch the best of the bard and more in the Shenandoah Valley's recreation of the original Blackfriars Playhouse. In addition to the current series of plays (Othello, Macbeth, As You Like It, and The Tempest), the 2006-2007 schedule includes A Christmas Carol, The Santaland Diaries, A Midsummer Night's Dream, Hamlet, The Duchess of Malfi, The Devil is an Ass, The Brats of Clarence, Pericles, Julius Caesar, and Cyrano de Bergerac. 10 S. Market St., Staunton. $10-26. 540-885-558810 S. Market St., Staunton. $10-26. 540-885-5588

Arts Center Ensemble. As Central Virginia's professional theater ensemble, Arts Center Ensemble (ACE) believes in the power of physical theater (mask, clowning, circus, commedia, melodrama, etc.) to communicate to youth and adult audiences in an immediate and accessible way. ACE offers physical theater workshops to theater students of all levels, and ACE's educational outreach programs use theater to enliven classroom experiences. Look for shows like the currently touring ensemble production, Lewis, Clark, Nature and His Brother. Residencies, workshops and productions can be designed for all age groups. Fees vary. 466-8852

Ash Lawn Opera Festival. This long-running Opera Festival performs opera and musical theater in English in the beautiful Boxwood Gardens of Ash Lawn-Highland, home of President James Monroe. Performances run from the first of July to mid-August, and generally include two major works, a music at twilight series, and pre-concert lectures. Puppet shows delight kids in "Summer Saturdays" events. Free apprentice recitals are also offered on weekends through August at First Presbyterian Church on Park Street. Tentative 2007 schedule: La Boheme and The Music Man. $10-24. James Monroe Parkway. 293-4500

Charlottesville Salsa Club. All are welcome at the club's weekly boogie night: Sundays at the Outback Lodge, 917 Preston Ave. Enjoy traditional and contemporary Latin tunes and be prepared to dance with different people. A basic lesson starts the night at 8pm. Last dance around midnight. Membership, $25. Salsa night, $2 members; $5 all others. 979-7211

Four County Players. This nonprofit volunteer community theater is the oldest continuously operating community theater in Central Virginia. 4CP produces several shows throughout the year and holds a Summer Theater Camp. Thi summer the troupe performed All's Well that Ends Well as its annual Shakespeare production at the Barboursville Vineyards.  Barboursville Community Center, 5256 Governor Barbour St. 540-832-5355

Improfessionals. The Improfessionals are an improv acting troupe in Central Virginia, performing short- and long-form. Shows are primarily humorous. The Improfessionals are Bob Taibbi, Brad Stoller, Ray Smith, Ray Nedzel, Rain Krause, Andy Kaufman, Ron Heller, Bette Dzamba and Mala Cunningham. Mecca Burns, a talented force on vocals, plays piano and all the instruments in her velvet bag.

Live Arts. This community theater group formed in 1990 offers a range of theater experiences in its new custom-built, architecturally distinguished arts complex off the Mall on Water Street. Since 1990, Live Arts has fostered the creation of over 200 shows ranging from new interpretations of classics to avant garde performance art. A professional staff works with volunteers to produce a full main-stage season, extensive educational programs, and smaller experimental works. Schedule 2007: Amadeus, Helen of Troy (re-imagined by Ellen McLaughlin, Ain't Misbehavin', Thom Paine (Based on Nothing), The Pillow Man, The Good Times are Killing Me, The Violet Hour, Harold Pinter's Old Times, and Tennessee Williams' A Streetcar Named Desire. $10-15.123 E. Water St. 977-4177

New Lyric Theatre. Since its premiere in 2000, the New Lyric Theatre Company, composed of volunteer actors, directors, musicians, singers, and technicians, has produced Gilbert and Sullivan operettas. This October they tackle The Pirates of Penzance, their seventh production with a cast of 35 and full orchestra, in the Dickinson Performing Arts Center at Piedmont Virginia Community College. $15-17. 977-7478 newlyrictheatre.com

Old Michie Theatre. This theater and drama school seeks to inspire students with the joys of live theater and puppetry arts. The Theatre offers a wide variety of classes throughout the year for children ages 5-17, as well as a series of Saturday morning puppet plays and dramatic productions. $1 to $7.50. Class fees vary. 221 E. Water St. 977-3690

Paramount Theater. Possibly the most anticipated renovation project in Charlottesville. Between Second and Third streets on the Downtown Mall, this 1931 movie theater has been remade into a first-rate venue for concerts, plays, and more. The Paramount's 2006-07 offers such delights as The Richmond Ballet (September 19). Trisha Yearwood (October 11), Itzhak Perlman (October 19), The Four Tops (yes, they're still around!) (November 12), Whoopi Goldberg (January 13), Art Garfunkel (January 20), and Lily Tomlin (May 3). $19-100. 979-1922

Piedmont Virginia Community College. In addition to hosting New Lyric Theatre's productions of Gilbert and Sullivan, Piedmont Virginia Community College puts on main-stage and chamber theater productions during the year, as well as a children's theater series. The schedule for 2006-07 includes The Koresh Dance Company (September 16), The Troublesome Creek String Band (October 28), Harlem Gospel Choir (January 15) and the Princely Players (February 3).  501 College Drive. 961-5376

Play On! A new nonprofit community theater group in Charlottesville, Play On! plans to offer comedies, dramas, musicals, and revues at various sites in Charlottesville and Albemarle County. Organizers plan to mount the group's first production in the spring of 2006. 296-2238

UVA Drama Department. Besides offering undergraduate and graduate degrees in performance and theater design, the UVA Drama Department mounts four main-stage productions each academic year and several additional smaller productions, often student-directed. September: Waiting for the Parade; October: Scapin; November: Arms & the Man; February 2007: TBA; March: Oedipus; April: Hair. In the summer, the department's Heritage Repertory Theatre Company traditionally produces a mix of musicals, comedies, and dramas employing professional actors and technicians from all over the U.S. UVA's theaters include the 600-seat Culbreth, with its proscenium stage, and the flexible Helms Theatre with 160-200 seats. HRT performs in June, July, and August. $5-25. 109 Culbreth Road. 924-3376

Bent Theater--The Bent Theater presents live improv comedy shows at R2 behind Rapture restaurant on the Downtown Mall every Thursday night at 8pm. The group is made up of Jim Zarling, Ray Smith, Stephanie McCormack, Tania Grasso, Frank Cardella, Liz Levin and Lara Sprung, led by Bent Theater co-founder Jennifer Horne.

Dinner theater?
Charlottesville doesn't have a permanent one. The closest one, seating 450 people, is the Riverside, about an hour away in Fredericksburg. $44-52 includes dinner and the show, which typically runs 2-2.5 hours.This year's lineup includes Cats (August 4-November 26), Nunsense (December 1-January 28, 2007), and Bye, Bye, Birdie (February 2-April 29). Reservations required. 540-370-4300

Outdoor theater
Besides Shakespeare in Barboursville and Ash Lawn's summer opera, there is outdoor theater over in Lexington. It's a 60-minute drive to the Theater at Lime Kiln, a place that, while it has fallen on hard times laterly,  its owners and supporters are struggling to revive.  Currently the only event scheduled is a Seldom Scene concert on August 20. 540-463-7088

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Movies
Anticipa…ten: Reasons to jump on Oprah's couch
BY STEVE WARREN FILM@READTHEHOOK.COM
When you review an average of six to eight movies a week, as I do, you don't spend a lot of time looking beyond next week's schedule. On the other hand, with trailers and posters for some of next year's releases already in theaters, it's hard to ignore everything that's coming up.

1. King Kong (12/14) - Let's get the 800-pound (okay, maybe 8,000-pound) gorilla of the holiday season out of the way first. It has a list of pros and cons as long as Kong's arm. There's no way it can replicate the innocent charm of the 1933 original, even though that's reportedly what Peter Jackson's aiming for; but Naomi Watts, Jack Black, and Adrien Brody are usually watchable. Jackson is coming off The Lord of the Rings and had to get this out of his system before (maybe) making The Hobbit, so we'll cut him some slack. Even the 1976 version wasn't a total loss: it gave us Jessica Lange.

2. Tim Burton's Corpse Bride (9/23) - The trailer looks promising for this animated feature in the style of The Nightmare before Christmas. Dead Helena Bonham Carter steals Johnny Depp away from his intended wife, live Emily Watson. Mike Johnson co-directed and reportedly did most of the heavy lifting, but this could still give Burton two big hits in the same year, like Spielberg and Soderbergh. He may have to change his name to Burtonburg. You'll also hear Bonham Carter in Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit (10/7). I'm not a huge W&G fan from their shorts, but I like the trailer and I loved Chicken Run, the first feature from Aardvark Animation.

3. Biographical Films: Walk the Line (11/18) - Joaquin Phoenix and Reese Witherspoon play Johnny Cash and June Carter in this tale of the country legend's rise to fame in the 1950s. It's not clear at this writing whether they'll use original recordings; if not, my interest wanes considerably (although Kevin Spacey did a great Bobby Darin impression in Beyond the Sea). Capote (9/30) is even more focused, dealing with the relationship between writer Truman Capote (Phillip Seymour Hoffman) and murderer Perry Smith (Clifton Collins Jr.) that developed while Capote was researching In Cold Blood.

4. Untitled 1972 Munich Olympics Project (12/23) - Sure, the title needs work, but after War of the Worlds this could make another bifecta for Hollywood's most successful director, Steven Spielberg. When Palestinian terrorists assassinate Israeli athletes in Munich, a Mossad agent (Eric Bana) goes after them. Daniel Craig and Marie-Josée Croze co-star. It has to come together quickly, because it just started shooting last month.

5. George Clooney Films: The actor has an interesting pair due during award season. Good Night. And, Good Luck (10/14), which he also directed, is about the battle between broadcaster Edward R. Murrow (David Strathairn) and Sen. Joseph McCarthy (playing himself in archival footage). Patricia Clarkson co-stars, which is always good news. Syriana (12/9) was directed by Stephen Gaghan, best known for writing Traffic. It's said to be loosely based on the memoirs of the CIA's Robert Baer (played by Clooney), whose intelligence gathering and terrorist tracking are complicated by politics and oil business. Matt Damon and Jeffrey Wright co-star.

6. The Producers (12/21) - After all that real-life seriousness, we need a laugh, and if this doesn't provide it, nothing will. Who can afford to see a Broadway musical these days, either in New York or on tour? (People on expense accounts, that's who.) The rest of us have to wait for the movie, and fortunately this one has the Broadway stars, Nathan Lane and Matthew Broderick, backed up by Uma Thurman and Will Ferrell. You should know it's based on Mel Brooks' first movie, a wacky comedy about a producer and an accountant who plot to make a fortune by mounting the worst show in history. Broadway choreographer Susan Stroman makes her film directing debut, following the trail blazed by Rob Marshall with Chicago. Speaking of whom...

7. Memoirs of a Geisha (12/9) - Marshall finally follows Chicago with this adaptation of Arthur Golden's best-seller about a nine-year-old Japanese girl from a poor village who's sold into geishadom and comes out on top. Ziyi Zhang stars, with Ken Watanabe, Michelle Yeoh, and Gong Li. Spielberg, who has a hand in everything, was once set to direct it but got distracted by 12 other projects. Ziyi Zhang and Gong Li also appear in 2046 (8/5), which stars Tony Leung as a writer in 1960s Hong Kong who's working on a futuristic romance novel that parallels his own love(less) life. Director by Wong Kar-wai, it's called an "unofficial sequel" to his In the Mood for Love, one of the best romances of the last decade.

8. Match Point (12/23) - One of these days I'll stop falling for it when they say Woody Allen has returned to form, but my hopes are high that festival reports on this one are accurate. And Scarlett Johansson, who's also in Woody's next film, is his new muse. In this drama she comes between former tennis pro Jonathan Rhys-Meyers and Matthew Goode, his nemesis and soon-to-be brother-in-law. Emily Mortimer co-stars.

9. Me and You and Everyone We Know (in current release) - I know this is good because I've seen it, and I hope you'll get a chance to. Writer-producer-director-star Miranda July is a performance artist making her first feature-- and don't think that didn't scare the hell out of me too. But this is a weird and wonderful, fiercely independent comedy about a man (Deadwood's John Hawkes) and a woman (July) trying to connect; and about sexually precocious youngsters and the art world and a goldfish... Well, I don't want to build it up too much.

10. The Gospel (10/7) - This is the one I got paid for, working as an extra. It's got some talented actors and/or singers, but if I weren't personally involved I wouldn't be excited about an inspirational tale of a young African American who goes astray but comes home in more ways than one. Chances are I'll be in my usual place on the cutting room floor, but I may be blurry in the background while Tamyra Gray sings a beautiful song at a funeral; and I may stand out as one of the few white people in the congregation in what I think is the final scene: I'm on the aisle Boris Kodjoe walks down when he has his epiphany. (At least I was when it was filmed, but they could easily cut me out, as they did Kevin Costner in The Big Chill.)

11. Five that didn't fit in the Top Ten, but at least The Hook doesn't cut me: All the King's Men (12/16) - Yes, it's a remake, but the fictionalized story of Louisiana Governor Huey Long, here called Willie Stark and played by Sean Penn, may have gained from more than half a century of additional hindsight. Jude Law and Patricia Clarkson co-star under director Steven Zaillian.

Elizabethtown (10/14) - Orlando Bloom and Kirsten Dunst meet as strangers on a plane on the way to his father's Kentucky funeral in a dramedy written and directed by Cameron Crowe. It's said to be as autobiographical for Crowe as Almost Famous. The cast includes Susan Sarandon and Alec Baldwin.

Stay (10/21) - I'm playing a hunch, even though I was one of the few who didn't care for director Marc Forster's Finding Neverland (but I did like his Monster's Ball). This is a supernatural drama set in an Ivy League school, where Ewan McGregor is a therapist and Ryan Gosling a suicidal student. Naomi Watts also stars and the screenplay is by David Benioff, whose 25th Hour deserved to be more widely seen.

A History of Violence (9/30) - Viggo Mortensen stars in David Cronenberg's drama about a small-town diner owner who commits a murder in self-defense. Expect strong support from Maria Bello and Ed Harris.

Transporter 2 (9/2) - I like a good action movie now and then, and The Transporter was a good one. In the sequel a simple favor turns into a complex kidnapping with Jason Statham caught in the middle. Europe gets a rest as he tears up Miami instead. I hope The Legend of Zorro (10/28) is great, but this sounds like the more promising sequel, if only because the original left more room for improvement.

I went over the limit and contradicted myself a few times, and parents won't trust me because I didn't mention Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (11/18) or The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (12/9). If I were being paid by the word, they would have been high on my list.

Steve Warren is the Hook's weekly movie reviewer.

Movie theaters

REGAL DOWNTOWN - On the Downtown Mall across from the Hook (titles usually visible in our webcam). Presents artier fare on its six screens. Movieline: 979-7669 Office: 979-7857

CARMIKE - By Albemarle Square. Six screens and another option for first-run fare. Movieline: 973-4294 Office: 973-5972

REGAL SEMINOLE 4 - Behind K-Mart. This is where the blockbusters come. Four stalls in the ladies' room, so expect a wait. Movieline: 980-3333 Office: 978-1607

JEFFERSON - On the Downtown Mall. Second-run movie house for the flicks you missed the first time around at a bargain $3. Movieline: 980-1331 Office: 295-3321

VINEGAR HILL - 220 W. Market St. Downtown. Charlottesville's original art-house theater, still the best venue for independent and foreign films. Movieline: 977-4911 Office: 977-8458

UVA is blessed with two film-showing groups, both based in Newcomb Hall:

Cinemateque has the frenchie name but shows the closer-to-mainstream films. 924-7314

OffScreen, with the blander name, is actually the group that shows independent, foreign, and classic film. 243-8741

If you wanna neck to celluloid, ya gotta drive pretty far, as Charlottesville lost its drive-in (where the Hydraulic Kroger now stands) in the '70s:

Fork Union Drive-In Go retro on Route 612 South about 40 minutes south of here. 842-3624

Hull's Drive In Old fashioned fun an hour west in Lexington. 540-463-2621

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