


Ryan had just looked back blankly, hiding his cowardice beneath the haze of the joint Brendon had rolled and lit moments before. Spencer had suggested he return them, in that neutral voice that meant Spencer actually had a Very Specific Opinion about his suggestion but wouldn't spell it out. They had a habit of sliding down, especially when he broke out in a light sweat and didn't catch them. He crossed his sandaled feet and pushed the vintage Chanel sunglasses he'd stolen from his (ex-)girlfriend up his nose. It felt young, doing that, younger than Ryan had felt in-a long time. He was staying with Brendon, and with Shane, crashing on the pulled-out sofa next to Spencer. Ryan liked LA, liked that he didn't quite fit in there and yet his particular sense of style was never more unusual than anyone else's. He used them on purpose, sitting in the shade of the cafe's umbrellas and sipping his iced gingerbread latte absently in the sunlight of early spring. In Los Angeles, using old-fashioned materials like a fountain pen and leather-bound notebook felt anachronistic and out of place. His last three sentences were buried beneath expensive blue ink. The nib of the fountain pen Spencer's dad had given him for his birthday last year dug into the paper too deeply to write anything legible the nib had broken on a thoughtlessly crossed "t" and Ryan had been too deep in thought to register the leak until it was too late. Ryan looked at the slowly spreading ink splotch on the finely made page in front of him. You'd think I'd have written it in response to this, but no. Three thousand words about Ryan being a twat. at the UCSF Mission Bay Community Center, 1675 Owens (at Sixth Street), S.F.Smoke stupid cigarettes and drink stupid wine Gay Men's Chorus perform, and the dough goes to the Breakthrough Foundation, at 7 p.m. Jazz smoothie Spencer Day and the much-adored S.F. The idea of the World AIDS Day Benefit, "An Evening of Remembrance and Hope," might give you a lump in your throat, but the entertainment ought to cheer you up. Admission is $10-15 call 826-5750 or visit - Hiya Swanhuyser

30) at the Marsh, 1062 Valencia (at 21st Street), S.F. In other words, fear not the words "family holiday show," because this year's production, Nutcracker Nutz & Boltz, is a good bet to leave you looking at mousetraps, rusted hammers, and possibly your own sweater a little differently, no matter how old you are. The found-object puppet company's director, Liebe Wetzel, is brilliant: Everything she touches turns to funny, and she's quite grabby. Admission is $10-20 call 759-1047 or visit pullover.Īfter Lunatique Fantastique's family holiday show last year, seven of us - all adults - lurched out of the theater weak from having laughed so much. 17) at the Off-Market Theater, 965 Mission (at Fifth Street), S.F. President Augie Victor Douglas leads the nation to doom while a bankrupt Catholic Church sells all of its relics on eBay - except one very small piece of holy skin, which contains the DNA of the savior.Įxamining religion, biotechnology, corruption, and downright absurdity, Foreskin opens at 8 p.m. A fabulously blasphemous production, the satiric piece catapults us into the year 2044, during which power-hungry U.S. We're talking about his foreskin, the star of a new musical aptly titled The Foreskin of Christ. Or at least it deals with the little bit of him reportedly removed in a religious ritual held on the eighth day of his life. It's not Jesus Christ Superstar, but it does deal with the son of God. Admission is $17-20 call 503-0437 or visit - Karen Macklin 18) at the Shelton Theater, 533 Sutter (at Powell), S.F. From Steve Martin's The Zig-Zag Woman (about a waitress who takes drastic measures in search of a cure for loneliness) to Tennessee Williams' The Case of the Crushed Petunias (which finds a socially secluded woman forced to confront the man who destroyed her treasured flower garden), the dramas and the movies all touch on the natural urge humans have to communicate, despite the worldly forces that attempt to stop us. If you feel the same, prepare your ears and eyes for something a little different, as the innovative theater company La Vache Enragée presents three short plays interspersed with silent films, in turn accompanied by live - and lively - original orchestrations, for the production "Safe Words - Loud Silences: The Shorts Project." Though the genres are triply pleasing, the show floats on one common theme: people coming together in the face of a world coming apart. I get tired of the arts scene in our hard-to-categorize city always being divvied up into neat slots.
