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NIGHTS

A S U M M E R F U L L O F C O N C E RT S, M OV I E S & E N T E RTA I N M E N T !

outdoor Music & Dancing, Movies & More, All under beautiful Marin skies

O U T D O O R C O N C E R T S : Music

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Wine

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Dancing

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Picnic

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Playground

Sat 6/19 STEVE LUCKY & THE RhUMBA BUMS Cool, hip, playful jump swing. Pre-concert Swing lesson

Sat 7/10 Nigerian brothers & west african highlife band Great African beats! Pre-concert African dance lesson

Sat 7/17 sambaguru featuring katia moraes High-energy, dynamic Brazilian rhythms. Pre-concert Samba lesson 43 B<8C7

F4;; 20BC Sam Misner and Matt Mueller are two of five equally important cast members in ‘American Song.’

Sat 7/31 los pinguos HOT rhythms, horns & vocals of Buenos Aires. Pre-concert Salsa dance lesson

Sat 8/7 geno delafose & french rockin’ boogie Hot & spicy Louisiana Zydeco. Pre-concert Line Dancing lesson.

Unified cast brings Woody Guthrie’s song to vivid life By David Templeton

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‘Woody Guthrie’s American Song’ runs Tuesday– Sunday through June 27 at the Marin Theatre Company, 397 Miller Ave., Mill Valley. Tuesday and Thursday–Saturday at 8pm; Wednesday at 7:30pm; Sunday at 7pm; matinees, Saturday– Sunday at 2pm. $20–$54; Tuesday, pay what you can. 415.388.5208.

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Popcorn

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Picnic

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Playground

Sat 6/26 ‘Til dawn EYjaf k l]]f Y [Yhh]ddY k]fkYlagf

Xjmmz!Xpolb!'!uif!Dipdpmbuf!Gbdupsz Sat 7/24 unique derique Body percussion & juggling comedy.

Tisfl!JJ Sat 8/14 tim cain music & songs.

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Tickets: $5 / Ages 5 and Under FREE

B U Y A F E S T I VA L PA S S ! A L L C O N C E R T S & M O V I E S $ 1 0 0 EARLY ENTRY c NO LINES c ADDITIONAL TICKETS

WWW.MARINJCC.ORG OSHER MARIN JCC

Come Home to Sonoma County

David Peoples Residential Real Estate

707-486-5037 PeoplesHomes.net

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415.444.8000

200 N. SAN PEDRO IN SAN RAFAEL • FURNITURE • FRUIT LABELS • GARDEN ANTIQUES •

Dude! We’re 5 times the fun & bull-free!

Antique Society 100 dealers! Our 21st year!

2661 Gravenstein Hwy So. (Hwy 116) on Sebastopol’s Antique Row Open daily! 707 829.1733

TOYS & DOLLS • ARTS & CRAFTS • POST MODERN • COUNTRY • CALIFORNIA

s the summer begins, appreciative North Bay theater audiences have been talking up a handful of truly extraordinary local musical performances. Many of these are stand-out turns in larger ensembles. At Petaluma’s Cinnabar Theater, Sacramento-based soprano Carrie Hennessey is nothing short of sensational in Tobias Picker’s heart-rending opera Emmeline, a smart, devastating work in which Hennessey proves to be as gripping an actress as she is a singer. In Sixth Street Playhouse’s Rent, actress Stephanie St. James brings so much raw passion and dynamic focus to the part of Mimi that she almost eclipses the other fine performers she shares the stage with. Something quite different is happening at the Marin Theatre Company, where Woody Guthrie’s American Song just opened. Under the direction of Peter Glazer, who also created the show, the entire ensemble works as a finely tuned unit, with all five featured performers equally good. In fact, when looking back on the show, it’s nearly impossible to think of the cast in terms of individual actors and singers. Backed up by a first-rate onstage band, Lisa Asher, Berwick Haynes, Sam Misner, Matt Mueller and Megan Pearl Smith all work as one, each taking up the autobiographical thread of Woody Guthrie’s life, tossing it back and forth like a football team moving the ball toward the end zone. The show, a revival of the show Glazer originally presented in New Hampshire 25 years ago, is a musical-theatrical collage, an artful overlapping of Guthrie’s songs and writings, brought to life in a series of vignettes

showing how Guthrie’s songwriting skill grew during the tumultuous 1930s and ’40s. This is not a simple biographical drama. Instead of listing the basic facts of Guthrie’s life, Glazer gives us only the details that support his goal: to illustrate the ways that Guthrie’s earliest encounters and experiences shaped the way he saw himself as a songwriter. From Depression-era railroad cars and tentcity jungles to wartime California and New York City, American Song presents an evolution of America right along with Guthrie’s emergence as America’s original folk troubadour. The songs, many of which work as little “scenes� unto themselves, are loaded with emotion and sadness, frequently crossing into chills-up-the-spine territory. On opening night, a conspicuous low-energy vibe among the cast, ironically, only added an additional sense of melancholy to songs like “The Grand Coulee Dam,� “Pastures of Plenty,� “Ludlow Massacre� and “Deportee.� What comes into view by the final, stirring performance of “This Land Is Your Land� is a man who did much more than write songs. As Woody says himself in the various voices of the cast, these songs are taken from the voice of real Americans. Once put to music, the people need to take them back, and sing them with all their hearts. In Woody Guthrie’s American Song, you’ll want to sing along from beginning to end.

SO MUCH MORE THAN A MOVIE: Movies

PRIMITIVES • JEWELRY • LIGHTING • KITCHEN TOOLS • ARCHITECTURAL • GLASS

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Tickets: $25 / $5 Ages 6-17 / 5 and Under FREE

www. AntiqueSociety .com THE BOHEMIAN

06.09.10-06.15.10

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