The San Diego Union-Tribune: Arts & Culture - Spring Arts Preview special section

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As we enter the third year of the pandemic, we visit six artists who talk about how perseverance and resilience are helping them come back to life DEVIN BLASKOVICH PHOTOS FOR THE U-T

CHAMBER MASTERPIECES BY MENDELSSOHN AND DVORAK

At the La Jolla Woman’s Club

Sunday, April 10, 2022 | 4p.m.-7p.m.

Join us for a unique musical experience.

Serving High Tea Buffet & French Champagne once again!

- A. Dvorak: Piano Quartet No.2 in E Flat Major Op 87 - A. Dvorak: “Romance” for Violin & Piano in F Minor Op 11 - F. Mendelssohn: Piano Quartet No.3 in B Minor Op 3

Schedule and tickets available online

Concert | Conversation | French Champagne | Cuisine LeSalondeMusiques.com | (310) 498-0257

BO O K S Actor-comedian Bob Odenkirk looks back on his ups and downs. E26

T R AV E L A springtime guide to waterfalls in California and across the country. E30

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DEVIN BLASKOVICH PHOTOS FOR THE U-T

“In the early days of my writing, I very much limited what I would engage with as far as topics, tones and ideas.

As I’ve become more self-assured in myself and in my writing, I’ve expanded the number of things I’m willing to engage with on the page and in the storytelling.”

Author Kiersten White

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DEVIN BLASKOVICH FOR THE U-T

Kiersten White, pictured at her home in Carlsbad, is the author of the “Star Wars” novel “Padawan,” which will be released this summer.

K I E R S T E N W H I T E Author poised to break out of the young adult genre with new books

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BY SETH COMBS

t’s difficult not to geek out with Kiersten White. For hardcore “Star Wars” fans, there are any number of questions they’d be dying to ask since Disney and Lucasfilm Ltd. tapped White to pen “Padawan.” The young adult novel, set to be released in July, will center on Obi-Wan Kenobi’s formative years. To hear her tell it, the Carlsbad-based writer says it wasn’t too long ago that she had little hope of writing a “Star Wars” book.

“I had given up,” says White, who had initially met with the “Star Wars” storyboard team over four years ago to pitch ideas. “I just thought they’d moved on and that they didn’t feel like I was a good fit. Then they asked me to contribute a story to this anthology, but even after that I thought that was it.”

The anthology she references was “From a Certain Point of View: The Empire Strikes Back,” a collection of short stories from various writers centering on monumental events from the 1980 movie, but told from the perspective of a supporting or unknown character. Then, early last year, she got an email asking her if she’d be interested in writing about one of the franchise’s most iconic characters.

“I was like, ‘Obi-Wan Kenobi, are you kidding me?’ It was like the one thing I couldn’t say no to,” White says.

Until she was approached to write “Padawan,” however, White says she was attempting to move away from YA despite being one the most successful writers in the genre. Over the years, she’s penned dozens of YA novels and series, including the bestselling “Camelot Rising” and “And I Darken” trilogies. She loved penning these stories but had long hoped to break out of the YA box to start other projects, including a novel for adults.

“I feel like I’ve become a lot braver,” White says. “In the early days of my writing, I very much limited what I would engage with as far as topics, tones and ideas. As I’ve become more self-assured in myself and in my writing, I’ve expanded the number of things I’m willing to engage with on the page and in the storytelling.”

Those things include suspense, horror and decidedly adult themes in “Hide,” her first adult novel, which is set to be released May 24. She’d been toying with the premise of the book for over a decade after reading about a real-life adult hideand-seek competition in Italy and how “murdery” it sounded.

“You invite a bunch of people to come to an abandoned resort town in the middle of nowhere and you tell them they’re going to play a game of hide-and-seek,” says White. “I’m sorry, but that sounds like the beginning of a horror movie to me.”

There are a number of reasons White cites as to why she was reluctant to tackle “Hide” over the years. Some are practical, everyday things such as raising a family (she has three children), but some are more nuanced. First, there’s the element that it’s sometimes difficult to break out

of a genre once an author is known for that.

“For years, I would approach ‘Hide’ and back off, approach it and back off, until I was finally in the right space to fully commit,” White says. “I’ve had success in young adult, and that’s a genre that is very much dominated by women.

It’s an area where women writers can do well, but take the ‘And I Darken” books — if I were a man and I hadn’t been previously published in YA, those would have been published as adult novels.”

“It’s an interesting industry in the way that there’s this assumption that if you’re a woman writer, you’re going to be writing for children,” White continues.

“There’s the idea that if you’re doing well in this, why take a risk on something else?”

The other reason for White’s reluctance to tackle adult themes is a bit more personal. During our interview, she mentions the more conservative side of her family, many of whom still live in Utah, where White grew up until moving to San Diego in the early 2000s. Raised in the Mormon faith, White says her family was very supportive of her early dreams of becoming a writer, but adds that the Mormon community at large has “very rigid gender roles.”

“Me saying I wanted to be a writer was acceptable, but for most women it was like, ‘You have to be a nurse or a teacher,’ ” White says. “It was that perspective of, ‘You have to have some sort of nurturing job if you have a job at all, which you probably shouldn’t.’ That was the general consensus when I was growing up.”

White doesn’t practice Mormonism anymore and says it’s likely most of her family won’t like “all the swearing” and subject matter in “Hide.” Still, she thinks some of them will find something to like in her “Sinister Summer” books, a new series of middle-grade novels about a set of twins solving mysteries at various theme and resort parks. The first two books in the series, “Wretched Waterpark” and “Vampiric Vacation,” are being released in June and September, respectively. She says writing for even younger audiences presented just as much of a challenge as writing for adults.

“Middle-grade novels are much more difficult to write than YA or adult books,” White says. “It’s a lot harder to find the right tone and the right pacing. That was another one where I felt that I needed to get better as a writer before I started it.”

So while she’d been putting these books on the back burner for a while, White says the pandemic gave her a lot more free time to tackle these projects.

And even with the internal and external voices telling her that she should, perhaps, simply stick with the YA genre, she says she’s pleased that she finally fulfilled a lifelong dream — that she “found the courage to take that leap into something new.”

“There’s part of it that has to do with the way I was raised, but I also felt that I just wasn’t capable of engaging with certain ideas,” White says. “As I’ve grown and matured, I finally feel like I can.”

Combs is a freelance writer.

Mysterious Galaxy presents Kiersten White When: 7 p.m. May 24 Where: Mysterious Galaxy, 3555 Rosecrans St., No. 107, Midway District Tickets: Free Online: mystgalaxy.com

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PEARL JAM TO KICK OFF RESCHEDULED TOUR IN S.D.

BY SARA BUTLER

Diego show, originally scheduled for April 13, 2020, at the same venue.

The rescheduled tour promotes Pearl Jam’s 11th studio album, “Gigaton” — released during the pandemic in late March 2020 —and marks more than 30 years onstage for the group.

Touring member Josh Klinghoffer serves as the opening act for the shows with his solo project, Pluralone.

After its San Diego show,

Good news: Pearl Jam announced that its 2020 tour dates have been rescheduled for this year.

Even better news: That tour kicks off in San Diego with a May 3 concert at San Diego State University’s Viejas Arena.

Due to COVID-19 concerns, the Seattle-based rock band canceled its 2020 tour a month shy of its San

Pearl Jam will perform concerts in 16 additional cities across the United States and Canada. Six of those tour stops are in California, with Los Angeles and Oakland hosting two concerts each.

The first half of the North American tour will start on the West Coast during the month of May, then resume in September.

(In June, Pearl Jam will cross the pond and perform rescheduled European tour

Kansas

ZZ Top – Raw Whiskey Tour

Tuesday, May 3

Jason Mraz

Saturday/Sunday July 2/3

dates for two months.)

Three members of the five-piece band are former San Diegans, including lead singer Eddie Vedder. Though Pearl Jam hasn’t performed in San Diego since 2013, Vedder just paid El Cajon a visit last month with a show at The Magnolia alongside his new band The Earthlings.

Additionally, Vedder and Pearl Jam were both headlining acts at the 2021 Ohana Festival in nearby Dana

Friday, May 27

Smokey Robinson Thursday, August 11

MARCH

Sunday, May 29 • 7:30

with special guest Adam Doleac

Sarah McLachlan

Tuesday, June 7

Jackson Browne

Wednesday/Thursday August 31/September 1

GREG ALLEN AP

Eddie Vedder and Pearl Jam will be in San Diego for a show on May 3.

sara.butler@sduniontribune.com

Boz Scaggs – Out of The Blues Tour 2022

Jessie James Decker*

Thursday, March 31 • 8:00 The Go-Go’s* | SOLD OUT

Point last September.

Tickets for the Viejas Arena show go on sale at 10 a.m. March 29. However, all interested buyers must register as Verified Fans through Ticketmaster at verifiedfan.ticketmaster.com/pearljam before March 27 to be eligible for tickets.

For tour updates and additional details, visit pearljam.com.

Saturday, June 18

Chicago

Tuesday/Wednesday, September 13/14 Sunday, August 14 • 7:00

Little Feat – Waiting for Columbus Tour with special guest Hot Tuna (acoustic) Thursday, August 18 • 7:30

JUNE

APRIL

Wednesday, June 1 • 7:30

Monday, April 11 • 7:30

Culture Club

King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard*

Shakey Graves*

with special guest Jade Bird (GA/Standing Only) Friday, August 19 • 7:30

with special guest Mildlife (GA/Standing Only)

Thursday, June 2 • 8:00

Herb Alpert & Lani Hall

Anjelah Johnson-Reyes – Who Do I Think I Am? Tour*

Wednesday, April 13 • 7:30

Friday, June 3 • 7:30

Monday/Tuesday, August 22/23 • 7:00

(GA/Standing Only)

with special guest Neal Francis

Saturday, April 16 • 7:30

Tuesday, June 7 • 7:30

with special guest The Haunt (GA/Standing Only)

Wednesday, June 8 • 7:30

Thursday, April 21 • 7:30 Wallows* | SOLD OUT with special guest The Regrettes (GA/Standing Only)

Saturday, June 11 • 7:30

Amos Lee* | SOLD OUT

Cuco*

Boz Scaggs – Out of the Blues Tour 2022

The HU – Black Thunder Tour*

Neko Case*

Stephen Marley

(GA/Standing Only)

Tuesday, June 14 • 7:30

Friday, April 22 • 7:30

Gov’t Mule

Hot Chip*

(GA/Standing Only)

(GA/Standing Only)

Wednesday, June 15 • 7:30

Sunday, April 24 • 7:30

#IMOMSOHARD – The Getaway Tour – 18+*

Monday, April 25 • 7:30

Chris Isaak

Saturday, June 18 • 8:00

An Intimate Evening with Sarah McLachlan

Orville Peck – Bronco Tour*

Wednesday, June 22 • 7:30

with special guest Teddy & The Rough Riders (GA/Standing Only)

Indigo Girls

The Head and The Heart – Every Shade of Blue Tour* | 8/22 SOLD OUT

with special guest Dawes

Thursday, August 25 • 8:00

Jesse Cook

Saturday, August 27 • 6:00 Lost 80’s Live featuring A Flock of Seagulls, Wang Chung, The English Beat, Men Without Hats, Missing Persons, Stacey Q, Musical Youth, Naked Eyes, Animotion, and Kon Kan Tuesday, August 30 • 7:30

Colbie Caillat*

with special guest Nick Davisson Wednesday/Thursday, August 31/September 1 • 7:30

Jackson Browne

SEPTEMBER

Saturday, September 3 • 7:30 Thursday, June 23 • 7:00 Hanson – Red Green Blue 2022 Tour* The Dialogue Tour featuring Howard Jones* Tuesday, September 6 • 7:30 with special guest Midge Ure An Evening with Peter Hook & The Light –

Tuesday, April 26 • 7:00

beabadoobee*

with special guest Luna Li (GA/Standing Only)

Saturday, June 25 • 8:00

The Fab Four – The Ultimate Tribute

Wednesday, April 27 • 7:00

Marcus King – Live in 2022* | SOLD OUT with special guest Hannah Wicklund (GA/Standing Only)

JULY

Friday, July 1 • 7:30

Tom Papa & Ryan Hamilton

MAY

Saturday/Sunday, July 2/3 • 7:30

Tuesday, May 3 • 7:30

Kansas*

Jason Mraz & Raining Jane – lalalalivesongs

Saturday, May 7 • 7:30

Tueday, July 5 • 7:30

CAAMP – Lavender Days Tour*

St. Paul & The Broken Bones – The Alien Coast Tour*

with special guest Heartless Bastards (GA/Standing Only)

with special guest Danielle Ponder (GA/Standing Only)

Friday, July 8 • 7:30

Tuesday/Wednesday, May 10/11 • 7:30

America

Friday, May 13 • 7:30

The Temptations/The Four Tops

The Cult*

Sunday, July 17 • 7:30

Carla Morrison*

Saturday, July 23 • 7:30

Tig Notaro – Hello Again Tour

Monday, May 16 • 7:30

UB40 featuring Ali Campbell*

Tuesday, July 26 • 8:00

One Night of Queen performed

by Gary Mullen & The Works

Wednesday, May 18 • 7:30 Blondie* | SOLD OUT with special guest The Damned

Sunday, July 31 • 7:30

Michael Franti & Spearhead –

Thursday, May 19 • 7:30

Joy Division: A Celebration* with special guest El Ten Eleven Friday, September 9 • 8:00

Little River Band

Sunday, September 11 • 7:30

George Thorogood and The Destroyers – Good to Be Bad Tour – 45 Years of Rock Tuesday/Wednesday, September 13/14 • 8:00

Chicago

Thursday, September 15 • 8:00

Il Divo – Greatest Hits Tour Saturday, September 17 • 8:00

RuPaul’s Drag Race – Werq the World Tour 2022*

OCTOBER

Tuesday/Wednesday, October 4/5 • 7:30

Lake Street Dive

with special guest Devon Gilfillian Saturday, October 8 • 7:30

The Righteous Brothers – Bill Medley & Bucky Heard Sunday, October 9 • 7:30

Animal Collective*

with special guest Tropidelic

Air Supply

Friday, May 20 • 7:30

AUGUST

Graham Nash – An Intimate Evening of Songs and Stories

with special guest The National Parks

The Australian Pink Floyd Show*

Sunday/Monday, May 22/23 • 7:30 Rainbow Kitten Surprise* | SOLD OUT with special guest 99 Neighbors (GA/Standing Only)

Sunday, August 7 • 7:30

with special guest Spirit of the Beehive (GA/Standing Only)

Mat Kearney – The January Flower Tour*

Friday, May 27 • 7:30

ZZ Top – Raw Whiskey Tour*

Friday, August 5 • 7:30

Saturday, October 15 • 7:30

Saturday, October 29 • 7:30

Oingo Boingo Former Members, Missing Persons, Dramarama

Teo Gonzalez – Los Tres Tristes Tigres

Thursday, August 11 • 8:00

Smokey Robinson

Friday, August 12 • 8:00

Yacht Rock Revue 2022 Tour*

NOVEMBER

Friday, November 4 • 7:30

Felipe Esparza

Thursday, November 17 • 7:30

Postmodern Jukebox

HEALTH CHECK – At the artist’s

HC

request, vaccination requirements are in place for the identified shows.

See humphreysconcerts.com for more information.

TIG Premium and Dinner packages offer the best seating.

Visit humphreysconcerts.com for more information.

BOX OFFICE HOURS MARCH 19–20 10:00am–6:30pm AFTER MARCH 20 Wednesday / Friday / Saturday 11:30am–3:00pm / 3:30pm–6:30pm

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humphreysconcerts.com | Stay tuned…more shows to be announced! | 2241 Shelter Island Drive, San Diego

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BY SETH COMBS

Pandemic-related delays pushed back a lot of big-name books, so this season is filled with new releases. And with restrictions lifted, that means a lot of authors are coming to town to give readings and sign books for local readers.

Kim Dower

Just in time for Mother’s Day, the L.A.-based writer is set to release “I Wore This Dress for You, Mom,” a collection of poetry that celebrates all things maternal. She will be reading a few of the poems, discussing the process and signing copies. 7:30 p.m. May 5.

Warwick’s, 7812 Girard Ave., La Jolla. Free.

(858) 454-0347, warwicks.com

Marco E. López Quezada

The Sacramento-based writer and activist will read and discuss his poignant memoir “My March With César,” which follows the author through his time fighting alongside freedom fighter César Chávez in the 1960s and ’70s. 6 p.m. March 31. Turrentine Room at the Escondido Library, 239 S. Kalmia St., Escondido.

Free. (760) 839-4683, escondidolibrary.org

MARK BOSTER FOR THE LOS ANGELES TIMES

Crime thriller novelist Don Winslow, who lives in Julian, will release his latest book, “City on Fire.” best known for her roles in films such as “Samson and Delilah” and “Algiers.” 7 p.m. March 31.

D.G. Wills Books, 7461 Girard Ave., La Jolla.

Free. (858) 456-1800, dgwillsbooks.com

around, he sets his sights on the criminal underworld of New England and a man who’s desperate to escape it. Priced tickets include an autographed copy of the book. 7 p.m. April 26.

Brown Chapel at Point Loma Nazarene University, 3900 Lomaland Drive, Point Loma. Free$38.99. (619) 236-5802, libraryshopsd.org

Susan Meissner Stephen Michael Shearer

Shearer is an actor, film historian and author who specializes in film biographies. He’ll be making an appearance at the quaint D.G. Wills Books in La Jolla to promote and talk about his latest, “Glamour and Style: The Beauty of Hedy Lamarr,” a photographic tribute to the late actress

The bestselling author, who grew up in San Diego, will be on hand to sign and read from her latest novel, “The Nature of Fragile Things,” which centers on three women whose lives intersect after the devastating 1906 San Francisco earthquake. Priced reserve seats are available.

7 30 p.m. April il 18.

8 7:30 Warwick’s, 7812 Girard Ave., La Jolla. Free-$17.

(858) 454-0347, warwicks.com

Madhushree Ghosh

The local biologist, political activist, food writer and self-described “daughter of immigrants” will sign and discuss her hybrid food memoir/family history, “Khabaar: An Immigrant Journey of Food, Memory, and Family.” She will discuss the book with fellow food writer Nina Mukerjee Furstenau.

6 p.m. April 21. The Book Catapult, 3010-B Juniper St., South Park. Free.

(619) 795-3780, thebookcatapult.com

Independent Bookstore Day

Dozens of indie bookstores all over the county will participate in this annual event that features author appearances, popup events, exclusive giveaways and other promotions. See website for full details and participating stores. Various times, April 30. Free. indie bound.org/independentbookstore-day

Katie Cotugno

The bestselling author known for her witty romcom-style novels will discuss her new book, “Birds of California,” about a former child actress who is asked to reprise her role on a oncepopular TV show. 7 p.m.

May 24. Virtual event through Barnes & Noble.

Free. barnesand noble.com

Rupi Kaur

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Don Winslow

The Julian-based crime thriller novelist, best known for his cartel-focused “Power of the Dog” series of books, is back with “City on Fire.” This time

The writer-artist team behind the highly acclaimed and award-winning “Drawn Together” and “Lift” are back with a new children’s book, “The Blur,” about a young girl with superpowers. 2:30 p.m.

May 1. La Jolla/Riford Library, 7555 Draper Ave., La Jolla. Free. (858) 5521657, sandiego. librarymarket.com

The poet, best known for her inspirational posts on Instagram and her bestselling collection “Milk and Honey,” makesa rare in-person appearance to read some of her work and talk about her journey. 8 p.m.

June 7. Balboa Theatre, 868 Fourth Ave., downtown. $39-$99. ticketmaster.com Combs is a freelance writer.

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NOW PLAYING!

BOOK BY

MUSIC & LYRICS BY

MIKE LEW AND REHANA LEW MIRZA

SAM WILLMOTT

ADDITIONAL MUSIC BY

DEEP SINGH MUSICAL STAGING BY

LISA SHRIVER CHOREOGRAPHY BY

RUJUTA VAIDYA DIRECTED BY

STAFFORD ARIMA

FIND YOUR BEAT. FIND YOUR TEAM.

FIND YOURSELF YOURSELF.

Bursting with vibrant dance and electrifying music, Bhangin’ It: A Bangin’ New Musical is an exhilarating and joyous new musical comedy for America today.

The cast of Bhangin' It: A Bangin' New Musical; photo by Rich Soublet.

Get Tickets Today LaJollaPlayhouse.org

Sponsored by

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DEVIN BLASKOVICH PHOTOS FOR THE U-T

“I think I thrive on disasters!

That was confirmed when everything shut down.

I felt more activated than ever.”

Pianist and Project [Blank] co-founder Brendan Nguyen

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BY BETH WOOD

This spring, the many stellar classical music offerings in San Diego demonstrate the resilience of the local music scene.

For aficionados hungry for aural treats, here are some of the season’s most promising concerts. (Check websites for updated audience health protocols.)

ArtPower: Ariel Quartet

The dynamic Ariel Quartet returns to conclude its complete Beethoven Cycle with the immortal composer’s late-period quartets. Formed in Israel nearly 20 years ago when its members were teenagers, the string quartet is now based at the University of Cincinnati. 8 p.m. April 1.

Conrad Prebys Concert Hall, University of California San Diego, 9500 Gilman Drive, La Jolla. $22.50-$59. (858) 534-8497, artpower.ucsd.edu

viewers to use words like vigorous, dazzling and joyous. Musical director John Butt leads the 15member group, including four singers, in Bach cantatas and concertos. 7:30 p.m.

April 23. St. James-by-theSea, 743 Prospect St., La Jolla. $35-$45. (619) 2918246, sdems.org

Ariel Quartet

San Diego Symphony: Jacobs Masterworks series

La Jolla Music Society: Silk Road Ensemble

Syrian composerclarinetist Kinan Azmeh and Syrian Armenian visual artist Kevork Mourad present “Home Within,” an emotional audio-visual exploration of the concept of home. This Silk Road Ensemble performance will include five musicians on percussion, oud, bass, violin and cello.

7 p.m. April 3. Conrad Prebys Performing Arts Center’s Baker-Baum Concert Hall, 7600 Fay Ave., La Jolla. $36-$70.

(858) 459-3728, ljms.org

Musician Kinan Azmeh

MARCO BORGGREVE

Art of Elan: AMOC (American Opera Company)

The ever-adventurous Art of Elan hosts “With Care” by the interdisciplinary collective AMOC. The four-person performance was created by former Batsheva dancer Bobbi Jene Smith with violinist (and UC San Diego alum) Keir GoGwilt. AMOC co-founder Matthew Aucoin, curator of

BEN GABBE

San Diego Symphony’s 2019 “Hearing the Future” festival, composed the music.

7 p.m. April 13. Lyceum Stage Theatre, 79 Horton Plaza, downtown. $15-$25. artofelan.org

2 p.m. April 23, PHAME Performing Arts Center, Patrick Henry High School, 6702 Wandermere Drive, Del Cerro, $25-$55, (619) 235-0804, sandiegosymphony.org

San Diego Symphony: Mendelssohn’s ‘Italian’

La Jolla Music Society: Sheku Kanneh-Mason & Isata Kanneh-Mason

The symphony will take a country-hopping musical journey, starting in Algiers.

Then, principal bassist Jeremy Kurtz-Harris will perform “Double Bass Concerto No. 1” by Tijuanabased/Argentina-born composer Andrés Martín.

The orchestra will also visit Italy, where Felix Mendelssohn wrote “Italian,” inspired by his trip there in 1830. 7:30 p.m. April 20, California Center for the Arts, Escondido, 340 N. Escondido Blvd., Escondido, $25-$70, (619) 2350804, sandiegosymphony.org. 7:30 p.m. April 21, Joan B. Kroc Theater, 6611 University Ave., Rolando, $25-$55, (619) 235-0804, sandiegosymphony.org.

The final month of the San Diego Symphony’s 2021/2022 Jacobs Masterworks series begins with up-and-coming Venezuelaborn, New York-based pianist Gabriela Martinez and conductor Ruth Reinhardt.

They’ll be followed May 14 and 15 by acclaimed pianist Yefim Bronfman and symphony conductor laureate Jahja Ling, whose May 2020 concert with the orchestra was postponed due to COVID restrictions. Gabriela Martinez: 7 p.m. May 6 and 5 p.m. May 7. Bronfman: 5 p.m. May 14 and 15.

Rady Shell at Jacobs Park,

Sheku Kanneh-Mason, who famously played cello at the 2018 British royal wedding of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle, is touring with his older sister Isata, an accomplished pianist. The siblings, both in their 20s, have earned acclaim separately and as a chamber music duo. 8 p.m.

April 23. Conrad Prebys Performing Arts Center’s Baker-Baum Concert Hall, 7600 Fay Ave., La Jolla. $47-$87. (858) 459-3728, ljms.org

San Diego Early Music Society: DunedIn Consort

An in-demand baroque ensemble from Scotland, DunedIn has inspired re-

200 Marina Park Way, downtown. $25-$108.

(619) 235-0804, theshell.org

Camarada: ‘Hope’

In the second of its “Music of the Americas” series, the versatile chamber music ensemble Camarada honors music from our region of the world. Curated by Andrés Martin, the program will include tango, contemporary classical and jazz.

7:30 p.m. May 14. UC San Diego @ Park & Market, 1100 Park Blvd., East Village. $40-$50. (619) 231-3702, camarada.org

Mainly Mozart: All-Star Orchestra Festival

Music Director Michael Francis will conduct concertmasters and principal players from all over the U.S. This year, Mainly Mozart’s June festival closes with Mozart’s “Requiem,” featuring the San Diego Master Chorale. 7:30 p.m.

June 10-18. Del Mar Surf Cup Sports Park, 14989 Via de la Valle, Del Mar. $49$100 for pod tickets that accommodate up to four people. VIP tables are also available. (619) 239-0100, mainlymozart.org

Le Salon de Musiques: Season Finale

JAKE TURNEY

Cellist Sheku Kanneh-Mason (right) and his sister, pianist Isata Kanneh-Mason

This stage-free chamber music series — recently transplanted from Los Angeles to La Jolla — is unique. Each concert includes a buffet with Champagne, plus a chance to talk with the musicians. Closing night will feature works by Mendelssohn, Brahms and the German-Dutch composer Julius Röntgen. 4 p.m.

June 12. La Jolla Woman’s Club, 7791 Draper Ave., La Jolla. $45-$95. 310-498-0257, lesalondemusiques.com Wood is a freelance writer.

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Brendan Nguyen, with his mini schnauzer at his home studio in downtown San Diego, started playing the piano at age 4.

B R E N D A N N G U Y E N Pianist and Project [Blank] co-founder saw the pandemic as ‘a signal to push harder’

B

BY BETH WOOD

rendan Nguyen has lived a lot of life for a 39-yearold.

The son of Vietnamese immigrants, he has lived in Europe and New York. For decades, he was a serious student of music and classical piano performance. While studying in Amsterdam after graduating from the Oberlin College Conservatory of Music, he had a burnout-related breakdown and returned to his hometown of Seattle.

Although he waited tables there for a living, Nguyen always found time to practice piano. For four consecutive summers in Skagway, Alaska, he worked as a server, and during his off-hours he performed with a musical theater troupe.

An overachiever at a young age, Nguyen started playing piano at 4.

His teenage half-sisters taught him.

“For lots of immigrant families, music lessons are a sign that your kids are developing well,” said Nguyen, the only American-born member of his Vietnamese family. “My parents aren’t artistic but thought that’s what they should do.

“My sisters didn’t like piano, but they liked teaching their baby brother what they were learning. After they dropped out, I kept practicing on my own and my parents noticed that. I started lessons at 6.”

In 2008, Nguyen stopped his travels and began his eight years in the University of California San Diego’s graduate music program.

Fast-forward to March 2020. He had built a successful piano studio here. The local arts nonprofit Nguyen co-founded with fellow UC San Diego alum Leslie Ann Leytham in 2018, Project [Blank], was in its second season.

The organization — which aims to produce unique musical experiences that involve artists from a variety of genres — was preparing its first opera.

When pandemic restrictions were declared, Nguyen quickly changed to virtual piano instruction and Project [Blank] sprang into action. It launched the “sofa series,” a virtual gallery of interviews (conducted by Leytham) and performances by artists of many mediums from all over the country.

Later that fall, Project [Blank] gathered local artists to create a multi-genre video for a national competition, organized by Catapult Opera, that encouraged socially distanced operatic performances. Featuring mezzo-soprano Leytham and pianist-arranger Nguyen, the video won Catapult’s Innovation Prize.

How did Nguyen immediately change gears without getting flustered?

“I think I thrive on disasters!” he said with a laugh. “That was confirmed when everything shut down. I felt more activated than ever.

“These changes affected literally everybody. I took it as a signal to push harder.”

Project [Blank] co-founder Leytham agreed.

“Because we’re small and scrappy, it was a no-brainer,” she said. “People were out of work, so we immediately started ways to give people a stage.

“Our process is playful. Particularly in the last year, things might have felt unattainable at first. But it still feels like playtime. Brendan always thinks: ‘What can I do to make this better, one little piece at a time?’ ” While at UC San Diego, Nguyen and Leytham discovered they “were on the same page aesthetically,” as he put it.

When they established their nonprofit in 2018, they named it Project [Blank], inspired by the already taken “Tabula Rasa” (clean slate).

“We start with an idea and plan every detail,” said Nguyen, speaking from East Village, where he lives with Klaus, his mini schnauzer.

“The name is appropriately obtuse so that we wouldn’t be pinned down as far as the genre or style. It represents a promise to create some form of unique.”

The group planned two productions for this spring to help fulfill that promise. “Working Title,” a three-day multimedia event at La Jolla’s St. James by-the-Sea, has been postponed from spring because of construction delays at the church. It is now set for September.

On the last weekend of May, the organization will present “Paradise TBD” at Bread & Salt. The worldpremiere chamber music opera features electronics and five singers, including Leytham. Nguyen will perform and serve as producer and music director. Written and composed by Baltimore-based Clint McCallum, “Paradise TBD” explores the emotional aftermath of natural disasters.

Outside of Project [Blank], Nguyen has worked closely since his grad school days with another local arts organization, Bodhi Tree Concerts.

He has had countless “ideas sessions” with Bodhi Tree founders Diana and Walter DuMelle.

“They are amazing people. They’re like family to me,” Nguyen said.

Diana DuMelle said the feeling is mutual.

“Brendan’s such a technical wizard, he redefined what a music director is,” she said. “He’s a fabulous pianist, trained in both classical and the most current cutting-edge music.

And he is technically savvy. He’s an amazing combination.”

Bodhi Tree will present the ancient opera “Dido & Aeneas” Sept.

23-25 at Bread & Salt. Nguyen will serve as music director.

“We are respectful of every note,”

DuMelle said. “But we present it through a modern lens. Brendan will bring his own special something to it.”

In January, Nguyen presented the first in-person Project [Blank] performance since the pandemic. The solo concert, highlighting female composers, was dedicated to his immigrant mother, Thao Phuong Nguyen, and sisters Linda (who died of cancer three years ago) and Julie.

“At school I was in America, and at home I was in some strange hybrid Vietnam/America,” he recalled. “The food was different. No pizza and lots of fish sauce!”

It wasn’t until he was in his 20s that Nguyen heard his parents’ backstories. His father, Khanh Phuc Nguyen, a South Vietnamese naval officer, first came to California and picked strawberries, but eventually became a manager with Boeing in Seattle.

Brendan’s mother worked with the American Attaché Office in Vietnam.

She lost her first husband, a South Vietnamese pilot, in the war. Collecting his remains in the north, Thao Phuong, Linda and Julie missed the scheduled helicopter to take them to the U.S. Instead, they became boat people, spending six months on an Indonesian island, waiting to immigrate.

They eventually moved to Seattle, where they met Khanh Phuc. Thao Phuong worked as a pharmacy technician until her retirement at the University of Washington.

“When my mom told me the details, it was very impactful,” Brendan recalled. “I realized I was different from the rest of my family. I didn’t see the horrors they witnessed.

“My parents were always busy making life better for us. My family didn’t act like people who had been traumatized. They must have tried to shield me from that.”

Phone calls with his now-retired parents are in “Vietlish” — Vietnamese (them) and English (him).

Although a career in music is something they didn’t understand, his parents support his choice.

Decades ago, Nguyen strove to be a touring solo pianist, but he disliked the intense pressure and mega-hours practicing alone.

“That’s still a conundrum,” Nguyen said. “When I’m onstage, I feel so at peace. But when I perform a program, I want to leave it and do something else. I have projects in the works that, if opportunity presents itself, I’d tour. These would definitely involve another performer or two.”

In the meantime, Nguyen has a characteristically hectic schedule.

Last month, he took his first vacation since 2017. Arriving home from his trip to Hawaii with his boyfriend, Nguyen said he learned a key lesson from the last two years.

“For sure,” he said, “I need to take more breaks.”

Wood is a freelance writer.

Project [Blank] presents ‘Paradise TBD,’ a world premiere opera When: 7:30 p.m. May 27 and May 28; 2 p.m. May 29 Where: Bread & Salt, 1955 Julian Ave., Logan Heights Tickets: $25 general admission; $15 seniors and students Online: projectblanksd.org

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WINNER OF 8 TONY AWARDS TM

A CCAE THEATRICALS PRODUCTION

His music only needed one thing.

APRIL 22–MAY 7

Her.

An Evening of Stories and Music

ITZAK PERLMAN Rohan De Silva, piano

APRIL 18

OS B O L A V I LL S MAY 18 R E H T BRO

APRIL 25

MEOW MEOW MAY 19

WYNONA WANG Piano MAY 22 SCRIABIN: CHEN YI: SCHUMANN:

Valse, Op. 38 “Ba Ban” Sonata No. 1 in F-sharp minor, Op. 11 RACHMANINOFF: Sonata No. 1 in D minor, Op. 28

A CCAE THEATRICALS PRODUCTION

A CCAE THEATRICALS PRODUCTION

JUNE 17–25

JUNE 10

5 Teenagers. 5 Diaries.

Voices that must be heard.

Voices we must never forget.

JULY 15–31 YC Kim, Coral Formation (detail), 2020, Porcelain and light, 9x13.5x7 in.

MARCH 25–MAY 15

Tickets: artcenter.org | Box Office: 800.988.4253 Parking: Free for All Events | Address: 340 N. Escondido Blvd., Escondido, CA

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“I’ve been told by people in my dance career that I would never have a full-time job, that I would never be a professional dancer.

I don’t like being told that.

There is a rebel inside of me that says, ‘Oh, yeah? Watch this.’ ” Artistic director Terry Wilson

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BY MARCIA LUTTRELL

San Diego’s movement artists are more than ready to celebrate spring with new performances that express the stirrings of the soul through dance. Classics such as “Swan Lake,” “Giselle” and “Coppélia” are in the lineup, along with creative contemporary dance concerts. (Check websites for updated audience health protocols.)

San Diego Dance Theater: ‘Belonging: A Place for Everyone’

can and Chicano choreographers — Angel Arambula, María José Castillo and Alex Escalante — to present work along with the renowned Tijuana-based company Lux Boreal. The dances are accompanied with music by Mariachi Champaña Nevin. April 9.

Torrey Pines High School Performing Arts Center, 3710 Del Mar Heights Road, San Diego. litvakdance.org

Past and present company dancers celebrate SDDT’s 50th anniversary with “Rhapsody in Blue,” originally staged by former artistic director Jean Isaacs.

There also will be works by current artistic director Terry Wilson, guest artist Katie Stevinson-Nollet and last year’s Young Choreographer’s Showcase winner, Odessa Uno. 7:30 p.m. Today. Light Box Theater, 2590 Truxton Road, Liberty Station. (619) 225-1803, sandiegodancetheater.org

City Ballet of San Diego: ‘Don Quixote’

RBT: ‘Swan Lake’

The independent touring company RBT honors the traditional Russian ballet at two venues, with a new production showcasing hand-painted sets, bejeweled costumes and dancers from nine different countries, including Ukraine, Japan, Italy, Russia and Poland. March 30 at the California Center for the Arts, Escondido, 340 N. Escondido Blvd., Escondido, (800) 988-4253, artcenter.org; and April 9, Civic Theatre, 1100 Third Ave., San Diego, sandiegotheatres.org

ANNA SCIPIONE

City Ballet of San Diego will present “Rhapsody in Blue” March 25-26.

María José Castillo in LITVAKdance’s spring show “Border Stories.”

San Diego Civic Youth Ballet: ‘Coppélia’

Danika Pramik-Holdaway directs the classic ballet of jealousy, friendship and love starring an enchanting world of characters, including doll-maker Dr. Coppéllius; his lifelike creation Coppélia; the clever village girl Swanilda; and her suitor, Franz.

April 8-10. Casa del Prado Theater, 1650 El Prado, Balboa Park.

(619) 233-3060, sdcyb.org

City Ballet of San Diego: ‘Rhapsody in Blue’

Choreographer Geoffrey Gonzalez created “Rhapsody in Blue” last year for the company’s virtual season, and now the riveting production can be seen live along with the jazzy, fast-paced “Danses Concertantes” and the ballet masterpiece “La Bayadere – Kingdom of the Shades.” March 25-26.

Balboa Theatre, 868 Fourth Ave., San Diego.

(858) 272-8663, cityballet.org

Disco Riot: ‘Spectra’

DOUG MCMINIMY

The modern dance company’s spring show features works inspired by personal histories and cultures, magic and dreams by company artists Marty Dorado, Zaquia Mahler Salinas and Chelsea Zeffiro, as well as

guest artist Anna Brown Massey. Tickets are only available online, and masks are required for all audience members. April 21-23. City Heights Performance Annex, 3795 Fairmount Ave., San Diego. discoriot.org

City Ballet closes its season with the lavish, fulllength ballet, complete with opulent costumes and moving windmills. The production is choreographed by Elizabeth Wistrich and based on Miguel de Cervantes’ epic novel that tells of the adventures of the errant knight Don Quixote and his squire, Sancho Panza, who journey to find the dreamy Dulcinea. May 7-8. California Center for the Arts, Escondido, 340 N. Escondido Blvd., Escondido. (800) 988-4253, artcenter.org

La Jolla Music Society: Joffrey Ballet

The Chicago-based Joffrey Ballet offers a program that includes Liam Scarlett’s abstract “Vespertine” and Joffrey ballet master Nicolas Blanc’s poignant “Under the Trees’ Voices.” The company also integrates a variety of dance styles in choreographer Justin Peck’s lively “The Times Are Racing.”

May 14. San Diego Civic Theatre, 1100 Third Ave., San Diego. (858) 459-3728, ljms.org

San Diego Ballet: ‘Giselle’

The setting of this classic production gets a new twist. It takes place in the pueblos and ranchos of Spanish Colonial California, where a simple peasant girl falls in love with the nobleman who betrays her. May 21-22.

Balboa Theatre, 868 Fourth Ave., downtown.

(619) 294-7378, sandiegoballet.org Luttrell is a freelance writer.

Mojalet Dance Collective: ‘Mixed Sundry III’

The company celebrates its 30th-anniversary season with a collection of choreographic works by Faith Jensen-Ismay and Patricia Sandback. The sweeping, athletic dances tell stories inspired by emotional connections in the community.

April 30-May 1. Vine Theater, Mojalet’s Place for the Arts, 12540 Oaks North Drive, San Diego. (858) 243-1402, mojalet.com

LITVAKdance: ‘Border Stories’

The modern dance company has commissioned Mexican, Mexican Ameri-

CANELA

Jessica Conniff of San Diego Ballet’s “Giselle.”

The Conrad Prebys Foundation, Spring Season Sponsor

2022 SPRING SEASON EXPERIENCE THE EXPRESSIVE POWER OF THE HUMAN VOICE GOUNOD’S

Roméo et Juliette Darlene Marcos Shiley, Lead Production Sponsor

March 26 - April 3, 2022 San Diego Civic Theatre The operatic retelling of Shakespeare’s classic love story.

Aging Magician Co-created by Paola Prestini, Rinde Eckert & Julian Crouch Co-Produced by Beth Morrison Projects & National Sawdust Featuring Brooklyn Youth Chorus & the ATTACCA QUARTET Conducted by Dianne Berkun Menaker Directed by Julian Crouch

May 13 and 14, 2022 | Balboa Theatre A hauntingly beautiful hybrid of opera and theatre that celebrates youth, imagination, and the peculiar magic of ordinary life. West Coast Premiere.

FOR TICKETS, VISIT SDOPERA.ORG OR CALL (619) 533-7000

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Terry Wilson at San Diego Dance Theater in Liberty Station. Wilson took over as the company’s artistic director last year.

T E R R Y W I L S O N San Diego Dance Theater’s new artistic leader shepherds the company into tomorrow

E

BY MARCIA LUTTRELL ver optimistic, Terry Wilson’s positive playlist track is “Don’t Worry, Be Happy.”

And those who tell her what she can’t overcome are confronted with her

can-do attitude.

“I like a challenge,” says Wilson, who became artistic director of San Diego Dance Theater a year ago.

“I’ve been told by people in my dance career that I would never have a full-time job, that I would never be a professional dancer. I don’t like being told that. There is a rebel inside of me that says, ‘Oh, yeah?

Watch this.’ ” San Diego Dance Theater is a mainstay of the local contemporary dance community, known for Trolley Dances, an annual production created by former artistic director Jean Isaacs.

The nonprofit celebrates its 50th anniversary with a concert today at its Liberty Station headquarters — but it nearly missed that half-century milestone.

Before Wilson became artistic director, she was a former company dancer and then served as a board member from 2016 to 2020.

“I became an associate director to Jean because of some unfortunate things happening with her health,” Wilson explains. “I wanted to support the legacy of San Diego Dance Theater, and my dedication to Jean led me to a natural transition to artistic director.”

But when Wilson accepted the leadership role, the company was in jeopardy. The pandemic’s extended impact nearly crushed dance schools and performance companies, along with any sports or fitness organization that engaged in physical contact.

“There was a lot of panic,” Wilson recalls. “There was no money coming in, and the only way to pay the rent was through grant writing.”

Wilson investigated COVID-relief funding, but aid such as the U.S. Small Business Administration’s Shuttered Venue Operators Grant (SVOG) program was designed to support large, indoor concert halls.

“They are very different from artistic grants. We had to have a

financial person send the documents that showed the dramatic changes in our budget.”

While waiting on grant acceptance, which eventually came through, operating expenses remained the same for months.

“It was a state of desperation,” Wilson recalls.

“We lost our executive director.

We couldn’t meet the needs of her salary or our rent. Our board turned over. Jean retired. It was a revolving door, and the people who had to move on was one of the biggest challenges. We had a conversation daily because we didn’t know who would do what.”

Wilson assumed duties that typically went to others, including cleaning the floors and windows of the Light Box Theater.

“I’m cut from the cloth that you do what you need to do to make something happen, versus thinking, ‘I’m the artistic director and I want to make art,’ ” she says.

“No job is too small for me, and I think that works for now.”

Wilson was a little girl who couldn’t sit still when her family moved from Canada to Michigan.

Saturday dance classes in the basement of a church directed her energies and exposed her to tap, jazz ballet and tumbling.

When Wilson moved to California, she attended Palomar College and took every dance class available.

Isaacs offered her a scholarship, and in the 1980s Wilson began dancing professionally for Isaacs, McCaleb & Dancers, which Isaacs co-directed, while earning a degree in psychology from San Diego State University.

In the 1990s, Wilson returned to Michigan to pursue a master’s in dance from the University of Michigan on full scholarship. While in graduate school, she attended a modern dance lecture by choreographer Twyla Tharp, who asked, “Do we really care if people get it? If you want to run a dance company, you’ll have to figure that out.”

“That bumped right into me,” Wilson says.

“As an artistic director, you get to choreograph, but you also have to think about the experience of the audience. We care deeply about what we do and we are hoping our art touches the heart of our patrons.

What lingers with my audience is important to me.”

In addition to directing San Diego Dance Theater, Wilson is a professor of dance and co-chair of the Visual and Performing Arts Department at San Diego City College. She says her experience at City College shaped her to become a leader, and she is especially proud that a number of her students went from classroom to a career in dance.

She also teaches Introduction to Dance at the University of California San Diego, which she describes as a history class.

History is important to Wilson — she has devoted years to researching the beginnings of modern dance in San Diego.

Learning about those who contributed to the success of San Diego Dance Theater inspired the theme of SDDT’s 50th-anniversary concert, titled “Belonging: A Place for Everyone.”

The production pays tribute to the programming of the past along with new works.

It’s a show that reflects Wilson’s many considerations.

“Things can’t be too long. There should be a hint of comedy somewhere, and it needs depth, a moment that takes you deep into your own experience with whatever is being presented onstage. You have to think about how things flow, one dance into the next. You want to take your audience on a journey of emotion and joy and passion about dance.”

The repertory includes “Rhapsody in Blue,” originally staged by Isaacs and performed by past and present company dancers. There also will be works by Wilson, cofounder George Willis, Katie Stevinson-Nollet and last year’s Young Choreographer’s Showcase winner, Odessa Uno. “The early artistic directors wanted the same thing in San Diego that I want now in 2022,” Wilson says.

“I want people to know there is a place to dance here and there is a place for everyone.

“The community itself is rich and valuable, and that’s something I feel strongly about. It’s just so simple. I love dance. And that takes me to where I am now.”

Luttrell is a freelance writer.

San Diego Dance Theater presents ‘Belonging: A Place for Everyone’ When: 2:30 p.m. today Where: Light Box Theater, 2590 Truxton Road, Liberty Station Tickets: $15-$30, plus fees Online: sandiegodancetheater.org A VIP reception from 1 to 2 p.m. at the Hideaway Terrace of the Monsaraz Hotel includes one specialty drink, appetizers, valet parking and reserved seating. $125 per person.

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THEATER NOTEBOOK

BROADWAY SAN DIEGO BRINGS MUSICALS NEW AND OLD

BY PAM KRAGEN Five new Broadway musicals — including “Beetlejuice,” “Disney’s Frozen,” “Six,” “Ain’t Too Proud” and “Tina: The Tina Turner Musical” — will be coming to town over the next 18 months as part of Broadway San Diego’s 45th season.

The new lineup, announced Tuesday, will include seven regular season shows and three added events. All shows will be presented at the San Diego Civic Theatre.

The 45th season will be interlaced with eight already-announced shows from previous seasons that have been delayed by the pandemic. Those shows are “Tootsie” (April 12-17), “Rent” (April 22-24), “Come From Away” (May 17-22), “Hadestown” (May 31-June 5), “Pretty Woman” (July 26-31), “To Kill a Mockingbird” (Nov. 29-Dec. 4), “Mean Girls” (Feb. 28March 5, 2023) and “1776” (May 9-14, 2023).

“We are thrilled to get back to doing what we love,” said Vanessa Davis, general manager of Broadway San Diego, in an email. “The much anticipated 45th Season includes current Broadway hits, shows that are fresh on the road, and returning San Diego favorites. This season has something for everyone, and we are excited to share it with San Diego audiences.”

Here’s the lineup for the 45th season, beginning with the seven regularseason shows followed by added season events. The regular seven-show subscriptions are now on sale beginning at $318 at broadwaysd.com.

“Hamilton”: Lin-Manuel Miranda’s 2015 Tony-, Grammy- and Pulitzer Prize-winning hip-hop Broadway musical about revolutionary leader Alexander Hamilton makes its second trip to San Diego.

Nov. 8-20, 2022.

JOAN MARCUS

“Six,” the comic pop musical about the six wives of Henry VIII, will play in San Diego June 27-July 9, 2023.

nominated family musical brings to life the popular Disney animated film about two orphaned sisters torn apart by one sibling’s magical ability to freeze anything she touches.

Jan. 18-29, 2023.

“Six”: This high-energy, comic musical, now a soldout smash on Broadway, resurrects the six wives of English King Henry VIII as members of a competitive all-girl Spice Girls-style vocal pop group. June 27July 9, 2023.

“Tina: The Tina Turner Musical”: This 2019 jukebox musical, which recently relaunched its pandemicshuttered Broadway production, hits the road in its first national tour. It tells the story of the struggle, liberation and rise to superstardom of the famed R&Bsoul-rock singer and features 24 of her songs.

July 25-30, 2023.

“Beetlejuice”: This Tony-nominated 2018 musical was inspired by the 1988 Tim Burton film about a comically demonic ghost who haunts the home of a New England family. It features an all-original score

by Eddie Perfect. Aug. 15-20, 2023.

Added season events

DEEN VAN MEER

MATTHEW MURPHY

The national tour of “Disney’s Frozen” plays Jan. 17-29, 2023, at the San Diego Civic Theatre.

The first national tour of the musical “Beetlejuice” will come to the Civic Theatre Aug. 15-20, 2023.

“Annie”: An all-new holiday season tour is being mounted for this this classic Tony-winning 1977 all-ages musical based on the comic strip about an optimistic

Temptations”: Nominated for 12 Tony Awards, this 2018 jukebox musical tells the inside story of this rags-toriches Detroit-born R&Bsoul vocal group and fea-

Depression-era orphan hoping to get a family for Christmas. Dec. 27, 2022Jan. 1, 2023.

“Ain’t Too Proud: The Life and Times of the

tures more than 25 songs.

Jan. 3-8, 2023.

“Disney’s Frozen”: Postponed from 2020 due to the pandemic, this touring production of the 2018 Tony-

“Disney’s The Lion King”: This big-cast, puppetry-enhanced Disney musical about an African lion cub coming of age returns to the Civic for an extended run. Aug. 24Sept. 11, 2022.

“Cats”: Now in its 41st year, this evergreen Andrew Lloyd Webber song-anddance musical tells the stories of a group of London junkyard cats. Sept. 27Oct. 2, 2022.

Riverdance’s 25th Anniversary Show: The Irish step dance and music show has been reinvented in a new tour with updated music, sound and lights.

April 11-13, 2023. pam.kragen@sduniontribune.com

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“When the pandemic started, I worried about how I would be able to pay my rent.

Everyone was thinking the same thing. But I didn’t want to dwell on that. I thought, ‘Well, I have all these (technological) resources, thankfully, so why don’t we try livestreaming and see if it helps?’ ” Guitarist Louis Valenzuela

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BY GEORGE VARGA

Barring another pandemic resurgence, expect a record number of concerts this spring — here and nationwide.

Artists and venues are eager to make up for all the tours that were postponed or canceled outright over the past two years. For music fans, though, the biggest challenge may simply be narrowing down their choices from the increasingly dizzying number of options. Here are 10 especially promising spring concerts coming up in San Diego.

Sarah Jarosz, with Taylor Ashton

This Texas-bred troubadour is equally rewarding whether performing on her own or in the trio I’m With Her with Aoife O’Donovan and San Diego’s Sara Watkins. A New England Conservatory graduate and mandolin and banjo prodigy, Jarosz’s lovingly crafted Americana music is earthy, elegant and free of fuss. 8 p.m. March 28. Belly Up, 143 S. Cedros Ave., Solana Beach. $28-$30 (must be 21 or older to attend). (858) 841-8140, bellyup.com

sings in Spanish, English, Mixtec and Zapotec. Her music freely jumps borders and genres, as befits a University of Minnesota graduate who majored in both classical voice and cultural anthropology. 8 p.m. May 4.

Balboa Theatre, 868 Fourth Ave., downtown. $38-$83.

(858) 459-3728, ljms.org/ events

Sean Jones ‘Dizzy Spellz,’ featuring Brinae Ali

From tap dancing and hip-hop, to jazz and AfroCuban music, to the American South and New York City. These are just some of the elements that trumpeter Sean Jones and dancer and singer Brinae Ali draw from for “Dizzy Spellz.” Their multimedia collaboration examines various facets of the African American cultural experience through the lens of the late jazz giant Dizzy Gillespie. 8 p.m. April 14. The Loft at UC San Diego. 9500 Gilman Drive, La Jolla. $9-$40. (858) 5348497, artpower.ucsd.edu

MC5, featuring Wayne Kramer

Sons of Kemet

AMY HARRIS AP

Sarah Jarosz

Eubanks Evans Experience

Although it’s been 24 years since former “The Tonight Show With Jay Leno” band leader Kevin Eubanks appeared at the La Jolla Athenaeum, guitar fans still marvel at the nuance and daring that marked his 1998 concert here. Expect no less when Eubanks returns — finally!

— for a duo concert with the sublime pianist Orrin Evans. 7:30 p.m. April 2. Joan & Irwin Jacobs Music Room, Athenaeum Music & Arts Library, 1008 Wall St., La Jolla. $40-$45. (858) 454-5872, ljathenaeum.org

English saxophone sensation Shabaka Hutchings and his tuba-anchored band, Sons of Kemet, fuse calypso, jazz, funk, hip-hop, dub-reggae, trap and more into an invigorating whole.

On tour to promote their socially conscious 2021 album “Black to the Future,” they perform with equal fire and finesse on songs that bristle with invention and improvisational fire. 9 p.m.

April 16. Belly Up, 143 S. Cedros Ave., Solana Beach. $20-22. (858) 841-8140, bellyup.com

Googoosh

Long hailed as the “Voice of Iran,” Tehran-born vocal legend Faegheh Atashin — who performs as Googoosh — is a vibrant force for resiliency. Starting in 1979, she was forbidden from performing in her homeland (and from leaving it) for 21 years.

Since going into exile in Los Angeles in 2000, Googoosh has made eight albums and toured the world. At 71, she remains a symbol of perseverance and defiance. 8 p.m. April 17. Balboa Thea-

CONRAD LOUIS-CHARLES

Trumpeter Sean Jones and vocalist/dancer Brinae Ali perform as part of ArtPower’s 2021-2022 season. tre, 868 Fourth Ave., downtown. $92.50-$189.

(619) 615-4000, ticketmaster.com

The House of Music presents ‘Cuba Llego, A Celebration of Cuban Music’

Formed in 1969 in Havana, Los Van Van helped expand Cuban son and charanga music by adding elements of salsa, rock and more. It’s a synthesis that is no less notable now, 53 years later. The 16-piece Los Van Van will be joined here by Havana D’Primera, a 15-year-old Cuban ensemble led by trumpet and vocal sensation Alexander Abreu. Both bands are adept at inspiring audiences to rise from their seats and dance with abandon. 5 p.m. May 1. Rady Shell at Jacobs Park, 200 Marina Park Way, downtown. $95-$135. (619) 235-0804, theshell.org

Lila Downs

Logistics will sadly prevent Lila Downs from bringing the 176-piece Banda Misteriosa de Oaxaca — which is featured on her most recent album, “Al Chile” — here for her Balboa Theatre concert. But that won’t hinder this proudly eclectic artist, who expertly

If you want to catch the only 2022 Rock & Roll Hall of Fame nominee that will be performing in a 230-capacity San Diego club this spring, head straight to the Soda Bar. Ditto if you want to catch the latest iteration of this short-lived but hugely influential Detroit-bred band, which helped create a template for punk rock and for such politically charged artists as Rage Against the Machine. Led by guitarist and MC5 co-founder Wayne Kramer, the 2022 edition of MC5 includes ace San Diego guitarist Stevie Salas, bassist Vicki Randle, singer Brad Brooks and Jane’s Addiction drummer Stephen Perkins.

7:30 p.m. May 15. Soda Bar, 3615 El Cajon Blvd., City Heights. $40.38 (must be 21

Christone “Kingfish” Ingram

SEASON 46 |

JON NAUGLE

or older to attend).

(619) 255-7224, sodabarmusic.com

Christone ‘Kingfish’ Ingram

The highlight of last year’s 11th annual AimLoan.com San Diego Blues Festival, this 23-year-old Mississippi dynamo is injecting welcome new vigor into one of America’s most foundational music genres.

An electrifying guitarist and a soulful singer, he and his band salute and extend the blues with sufficient verve to appeal to veteran fans of the music and neophyte listeners alike. 7:30 p.m.

May 16. Balboa Theatre, 868 Fourth Ave., downtown. $21.50-$41.50. (619) 615-4000, ticketmaster.com

Chris Stapleton’s All-American Road Show, featuring Dwight Yoakam and Mike Campbell & The Dirty Knobs

Chris Stapleton’s nononsense blend of country, blues and rock is so heartfelt and free of artifice and commercial compromise that he almost seems to be from a different planet than most of his Nashville-based contemporaries. He also has exemplary taste in opening acts, as the lineup for his June San Diego concert attests. It includes Dwight Yoakam, a champion of the Bakersfield school of country music pioneered

by Buck Owens, and former Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers guitar ace Mike Campbell, now a member of Fleetwood Mac. 7 p.m.

June 9. North Island Credit Union Amphitheatre, 2050 Entertainment Circle, Chula Vista. $44-$119.75.

(619) 494-5600, livenation.com george.varga@sduniontribune.com

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Louis Valenzuela, sitting at his home studio in North Park, provided a vital lifeline to local artists by freely sharing his livestreaming skills.

L O U I S VA L E N Z U E L A Local music mainstay’s pandemic-fueled pivot to livestreaming helped many San Diego artists

L

BY GEORGE VARGA

ouis Valenzuela became one of San Diego’s busiest guitarists between 2010 and 2020, leading weekly jam sessions and playing jazz, gospel and R&B gigs.

He got even busier soon after the COVID-19 pandemic shutdown brought the performing arts to an abrupt halt two years ago this week.

His increase in activity helped many of his fellow musicians reconnect with listeners — and earn some money — at a time when virtually all live music gigs evaporated.

But rather than rely on his guitar skills, this 33-year-old Lakeside native utilized video cameras, microphones and computers to create a concert livestreaming service.

Using the name ElectricLouieLand — in honor of his favorite album by Jimi Hendrix, 1968’s landmark “Electric Ladyland” — Valenzuela provided a vital lifeline by freely sharing his livestreaming skills.

“His service to our music community during the peak of the pandemic with ElectricLouieLand really saved most of our souls here,” said top trumpeter Gilbert Castellanos, the jazz curator for the San Diego Symphony and founder of Young Lions Jazz Conservatory.

“Louis gave us hope and the ability to perform for an audience, online, when we weren’t able to in person. He played such an important role with his livestreaming. It helped bring us all together, and I know a lot of other musicians feel that way.”

Daniel Atkinson, the veteran jazz program coordinator for the Athenaeum Music & Arts Library in La Jolla, is equally effusive.

“Like Gilbert, I have known and admired Louis for years now as one of the top guitarists on the jazz scene here,” said Atkinson, who is also the founder of San Diego Jazz Ventures.

“During the past two years, when the entire music world had to pivot to online performances, Louis dove into acquiring mastery of new software and hardware for both video and audio.

“He swiftly became the go-to person for our entire region, creating hundreds of online concerts with high production values and providing an essential lifeline for San Diego’s musical artists through the depths of the pandemic. His work has been truly heroic.”

Castellanos, flutist Holly Hofmann, pianist Joshua White and saxophonist Christopher Hollyday are among the beneficiaries of Valenzuela’s livestreaming expertise.

But the list isn’t limited to San Di-

ego’s jazz community.

Other ElectricLouieLand artists have ranged from blues-soul vocal dynamo Whitney Shay and rockfunk band Psydecar to singer-songwriter Israel Maldonado and the experimental dance band Fresh Veggies Micro Brass.

Of course, Valenzuela had no way of foreseeing the COVID-fueled shutdown of live events. But when it happened, he was better prepared than most musicians to pivot to livestreaming.

Through trial and error, he had been honing his skills by livestreaming his own performances and jam sessions prior to the pandemic. He had also gradually upgraded his equipment, adding GoPro cameras, higher-quality routing systems, studio-caliber microphones and better software for his digital audio workstation.

“I’m a jazz musician — I research things!” said Valenzuela, the son of a Mexican American father and Iraqiborn mother. He is a member of the jazz faculty at both Mesa College and San Diego State University, where he earned his master’s degree in music.

When the pandemic struck, launching ElectricLouieLand was a case of business as unusual. “The new normal” had yet to be determined.

As a part-owner of Chula Vista’s Avant Garde Music Co., Valenzuela had access to a suddenly empty recording studio. It became ElectricLouieLand’s livestream concerts headquarters.

The studio’s three adjoining rooms, partitioned by plexiglass, enabled him to isolate older musicians who were at greater risk of getting COVID. Except for brass and wind players, masks were required.

So were negative test results.

“That made everyone doing the livestreams feel more comfortable,” Valenzuela said.

When Castellanos began performing socially distanced outdoor dinner shows each Wednesday night at Balboa Park’s Panama 66 in March 2021, Valenzuela was on hand to livestream them.

San Diego radio station KSDSFM Jazz 88 — which at the time had shuttered its studios and was broadcasting entirely remotely — began airing Valenzuela’s livestreams on Saturday evenings.

The station now devotes an hour each Saturday to airing a compilation of his recently streamed performances on “Jazz Night San Diego.”

“When the pandemic started, I worried about how I would be able to pay my rent. Everyone was thinking the same thing,” Valenzuela said.

“But I didn’t want to dwell on that. I thought, ‘Well, I have all these (technological) resources, thankfully, so why don’t we try livestreaming and see if it helps?’ I didn’t have a

choice, really. I felt compelled to do this.”

Now, two years later, he is happily back to doing live gigs six days a week, while continuing to do livestreams.

On Tuesdays, he plays from 7 to 9 p.m. with the John Reynolds Quartet at Madison On Park in University Heights. Then comes a gig from 10 p.m. to midnight that he co-leads with trombonist Matt Hall at Seven Grand in North Park.

Wednesdays find Valenzuela teaching online guitar and bass classes to Mesa College students by day and stopping in at Castellanos’ weekly jam sessions at Panama 66 by night.

Thursdays are devoted largely to video-editing work during the day, followed by Valenzuela’s weekly jam sessions — which showcase Great American Songbook classics — at Blind Lady Ale House in Normal Heights.

Fridays are usually open for whatever last-minute performance opportunities pop up, while Saturdays find the guitarist and Hall doing their weekly brunch gig at Pali Wine Co. in Little Italy. Once a month on Saturday nights, the two perform at the restaurant Hob Nob Hill in Bankers Hill.

On Sundays, Valenzuela plays gospel music as the guitarist in the house band at Total Deliverance Worship Service in San Diego’s Grant Hill neighborhood. Next Sunday, he’ll play guitar at the monthly “Soul Sunday” open-air concert at downtown’s Courtyard.

On Monday mornings, Valenzuela teaches one-on-one guitar classes at SDSU. On Monday nights, he leads all-ages jam sessions at Amplified Ale Works Kitchen & Beer Garden’s new downstairs bar, The Acid Vault. But his jams there have a twist.

Instead of using what musicians call a “fake book,” which contains sheet music for hundreds of decades-old jazz standards, Valenzuela has created what he calls the SDRealBook. It features contemporary compositions by such top area musicians as trumpeter Castellanos and pianist White.

“I’m putting it up on my website, electriclouieland.com, and I’ll constantly be updating it,” said Valenzuela, who plans to record his longoverdue first solo album. Creating and livestreaming music remains his dual focus.

“Honestly, when the pandemic began, it wasn’t like I thought, ‘Livestreaming concerts will be the answer to everyone’s problems,’ ” Valenzuela said.

“I made what I thought was the best choice in the moment. Looking back, it was the best thing. Because, from here on out, I’ll keep doing more of this.” george.varga@sduniontribune.com

‘Soul Sunday,’ featuring Louis Valenzuela When: 5 p.m. March 27 Where: Courtyard, 1301 Market St., downtown Tickets: $15-$55 (must be 21 or older to attend) Online: courtyard.com

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“I’ve been ashamed of who I am for a lot of my life and didn’t even know it.

I covered myself by going to college, competing in pageants and doing the whole reality show thing.

I still don’t quite have it figured out, but I sure am damn closer to feeling comfortable in my skin.”

Actor Ari Afsar

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Ari Afsar, pictured at La Jolla Playhouse, earned a degree in ethnomusicology with an emphasis in jazz from UCLA in 2013.

A R I A F S A R Star of ‘Bhangin’ It’ says her role in the musical is the closest she’s ever played to her own identity

F

BY PAM KRAGEN

our years ago, San Diego native Ari Afsar finished up a two-year run in the Chicago production of “Hamilton” playing Eliza Schuyler Hamilton, the musical’s surprise linchpin character, who dedicates her life to preserving and telling her late husband’s story.

Today, Afsar’s mission is to tell her own story as a second-generation Asian American, composer, singer, actor and political activist. She said it’s been a long journey toward rediscovering herself — and the loss of work during the pandemic made her question her career choices — but Afsar said she’s grateful for what she has learned about herself along the way.

On the biography page of her website, she explains her self re-evaluation in her opening words: “I’ve been ashamed of who I am for a lot of my life and didn’t even know it. I covered myself by going to college, competing in pageants and doing the whole reality show thing. I still don’t quite have it figured out, but I sure am damn closer to feeling comfortable in my skin.”

After playing only White and Latino characters for most of her professional career, Afsar is now playing the lead role of “Bhangin’ It: A Bangin’ New Musical,” which opens tonight in its world premiere at Jolla Playhouse. She stars as Mary, a second-generation Asian American woman struggling to find and embrace her own personal, racial and cultural identity through Indian Bhangra dance.

“This is the first time where I’ve been able to play closer to my identity,” she said. “With that comes difficulty. It’s amazing but it’s hard. How do we create, how do we interact when some things are so personal? I catch myself a lot. The challenge now is finding the dissimilarity with Mary.”

Afsar, 30, grew up an arts-loving only child in Rancho Peñasquitos. Her father, an immigrant from Bangladesh, is an engineer. Her mother, a German American, is an attorney. In grade school, she landed the coveted role of Cindy-Lou Who in the Old Globe’s “Grinch” musical. In her teens she was a pageant queen, winning the titles of Miss California, Miss America’s Outstanding Teen and Miss San Diego County. And in her senior year at Westview High School, she was among the top 36 contestants on TV’s “American Idol” singing competition.

But rather than pursue musical theater in college, she felt an internal pressure to honor her parents’ sacrifices by pursuing a career in the sciences. She enrolled at the University of California Berkeley as a biology major, then transferred to UCLA, where she studied biology for two more years before finally following her heart and earning a degree in ethnomusicology with an emphasis in jazz in 2013.

Since then, she has pursued a career as an actor, singer and composer. One of her greatest prides is writing the score for “We Won’t Sleep,” a musical she co-wrote with playwright and fellow feminist Lauren Gunderson about Jeannette Rankin, who

became the first woman elected to the U.S. Congress in 1916.

It was 100 years after Rankin’s election that Afsar had her own political awakening. “Hamilton” opened in Chicago just one month before the 2016 presidential election. A lifelong feminist, Afsar said she had a crisis of confidence in the career path she’d chosen and wondered whether the arts really mattered in such tumultuous times.

“I got really disheartened about my industry and had a period of self-reflection and doubt,” she said. “Then I started to think about what can I actually do to help. ... In that moment I needed to surround myself with badass women to feel better.”

She participated in the 2017 Women’s March, joined the board of the ACLU of Illinois, became an advocate for Planned Parenthood, and raised money for progressive women running for Congress. She also opened for Michelle Obama at the United States of Women Summit in 2018.

After leaving “Hamilton,” Afsar moved back to California. She and Gunderson were working toward the world premiere of “We Won’t Sleep” when the pandemic struck in 2020, capsizing the theater industry. Fortunately, Afsar had put away a small nest egg from her “Hamilton” earnings, so she bought a small, older house in the California desert that she renovated herself to earn some rental income.

She also threw herself into more activism. With three fellow women of color, she co-founded Until We Do It, a nonprofit that distributed more than 1 million face masks to underserved communities. She also raised money for Broadway for Racial Justice and spoke out against attacks on Asian Americans. Afsar said she found validation in the work but pushed herself so hard she became burned out.

“I do believe that’s how I cope with things. In all honesty, it’s me not dealing with my emotions, trying to be of support and help,” she said. “Saying ‘I’m so altruistic’ is a lie. There’s a sense of feeling needed and feeling belonging that needs balance.”

“Bhangin’ It” co-writer Rehana Lew Mirza said she pursued Afsar for the role of Mary for nearly five years ago because she felt Afsar was the perfect role model for the progressive mixed-race character.

And Afsar said returning home to San Diego — where her father attended many of the show’s rehearsals — has been a wonderful full-circle moment. After years of struggle, shame and self-reflection, she has come back to her hometown for a musical theater role that allows her to re-embrace her identity and celebrate multiculturalism.

“There’s the reality that when we start in the arts, it’s like something we love and are good at, but then we don’t see beyond the applause,” she said. “It’s common. We all have to go through it. I think what transformed it for me is where I truly, from the bottom of my soul, found that art changes culture and culture changes policy, and that’s the part of the arts that I want to be a part of.” pam.kragen@sduniontribune.com

‘Bhangin’ It: A Bangin’ New Musical’ When: 7:30 p.m. Tuesdays and Wednesdays; 8 p.m. Thursdays and Fridays; 2 and 8 p.m. Saturdays; 2 and 7 p.m. Sundays. Through April 17 Where: Mandell Weiss Theatre, La Jolla Playhouse campus, 2910 La Jolla Village Drive, La Jolla Tickets: $25 to $87 Phone: (858) 550-1010 Online: lajollaplayhouse.org

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From Stephen Sondheim’s “Into the Woods” to Broadway San Diego’s “Hadestown,” San Diego stages come back to life this spring with a bounty of productions. duction won eight 2019 Tony Awards, including best musical, and it makes its first visit to San Diego this spring. The musical is a mashup of the two mythical tales of Orpheus and Eurydice and of King Hades and his wife, Persephone, in a post-apocalyptic setting.

May 31 through June 5. San Diego Civic Theatre, 1100 Third Ave., San Diego.

(619) 564-3000, broadwaysd.com

New Village Arts & Oceanside Theatre Company: “Into the Woods”

Two North County theater companies are teaming up on this co-production of the 1986 musical by the late Stephen Sondheim and his frequent collaborator James Lapine. It’s a bittersweet story about family and parenting that examines what happens to famous fairy tale characters after their supposed “happily ever after.” The musical will be presented at Oceanside Theatre Company’s artistic home while New Village Arts’ headquarters is under renovation. March 18 through May 1. Sunshine Brooks Theatre, 217 N. Coast Highway, Oceanside. newvillagearts.org

La Jolla Playhouse: “Lempicka”

San Diego Opera: “Roméo et Juliette”

Last produced here in 2010, this new production of the 1867 opera will feature stunning scenery from Minnesota Opera that mixes traditional elements with modern touches. Samoan tenor Pene Pati of New Zealand has sung Roméo all over the world, including two seasons ago at San Francisco Opera under the baton of conductor Yves Abel, who will lead the San Diego Symphony for this production. American soprano Nicole Cabell, winner of the 2005 BBC Singer of the World Competition, makes her company debut as Juliette. Saturday through April 3. San Diego Civic Theatre, 1100 Third Ave., San Diego. (619) 232-7636, sdopera.org

The Old Globe: “Bob Fosse’s Dancin’ ”

This Broadway-bound revival of Fosse’s 1978 revue “Dancin’ ” features 18 short scenes that spotlight the famed director-choreographer’s unique theatrical

CHARLES SYKES AP

style. It will be directed and musically staged by Wayne Cilento, who starred in the show’s original Broadway company, with a revised and updated book by actress and playwright Kirsten Childs. April 19 through May 29. Old Globe Theatre, 1363 Old Globe Way, Balboa Park. (619) 234-5623, theoldglobe.org

Moxie Theatre: “Mother of the Maid”

This 2015 play by Jane Anderson retells the story of Joan of Arc from her mother’s perspective. As a mom herself, Moxie executive artistic director Jennifer Eve Thorn said she was touched

by Anderson’s description of

“Bob Fosse’s Dancin’ ” opens April 19.

Moonlight Stage Productions: “Memphis”

Moonlight kicks off its 2022 season with this La Jolla Playhouse-born musical, which won four Tony Awards in 2010, including best musical. Written by Joe DiPietro and David Bryan, “Memphis” was inspired by real-life White radio DJ Dewey Phillips, who introduces his White listeners to Black music from Memphis’ underground dance clubs in the 1950s and helps spawn the rock ’n’ roll revolution. May 11-25. Moonlight Amphitheatre, Brengle Terrace Park, 1200 Vale Terrace Drive, Vista. (760) 724-2110, moonlightstage.com

Diversionary Theatre: “Eighty-Sixed”

Based on the novel by David B. Feinberg, this world premiere musical by Jeremy J. King and Sam Salmond is the story of a gay man trying to keep the party going in 1986 New York City as AIDS deaths are soaring. When an exlover becomes ill, he is forced to redefine his life.

The show’s creative team includes director Kevin Newbury and Obie Awardwinning choreographer Raja Feather Kelly. May 12 through June 12. Diversionary Theatre, 4545 Park Blvd., San Diego. (619) 220-0097, diversionary.org

Cygnet Theatre: “Mud Row” RACHEL NEVILLE

Above: “Hadestown” begins a run in San Diego on May 31.

the play where she said: “When I was a gay girl growing up, I loved Joan of Arc. ...

But when I became a mother, I suddenly understood how hard it must have been for my own mother to raise a strange and gifted daughter. ... It’s hard to be a Joan, but loving a child like Joan is a whole other thing.”

April 24 through May 22.

Moxie Theatre, 6663 El Cajon Blvd., San Diego.

(858) 598-7620, moxietheatre.com

Delicia Turner Sonnenberg directs the Southern

Left: “Mud Row” writer Dominique Morriseau.

This acclaimed 2018 musical was inspired by the story of bisexual Polish painter Tamara de Lempicka, who fled the Russian Revolution in 1917 and flourished in bohemian Paris with her sensuous paintings. Then, when the Germans entered Paris in 1940, she fled again to Los Angeles. First produced at the Williamstown Theatre Festival, “Lempicka” features a book and lyrics by Carson Kreitzer and a score

by Matt Gould. It will be directed by Rachel Chavkin, who won a Tony in 2019 for directing “Hadestown.”

June 14 through July 24.

Mandell Weiss Theatre, La Jolla Playhouse, 2910 La Jolla Village Drive, La Jolla. (858) 550-1010, lajollaplayhouse.org pam.kragen@sduniontribune.com

-The San Diego Union-Tribune

JEMAL COUNTESS

California premiere of Dominique Morisseau’s 2019 family drama about two generations of Black sisters, the first pair living in the early 1960s and the other sisters in the present day.

Cygnet artistic director Sean Murray said it’s a powerful story about healing, generational challenges and lifelong conflict as the sisters find space to heal and move forward. May 18 through June 19. Cygnet Theatre, 4040 Twiggs St., Old Town San Diego. (619) 337-1525, cygnettheatre.com

San Diego Repertory Theatre: “In Every Generation”

On the eve of the 2022 Lipinsky Family San Diego Jewish Arts Festival, Rep Associate Artistic Director Todd Salovey will direct this new play by former San Diego playwright Ali Viterbi. It’s the story of one family’s Passover celebration; in this case, one family over many millennia, who share their sacred meal while grappling with questions of the past. May 26 through June 19. Lyceum Theatre, 79 Horton Plaza, San Diego. (619) 544-1000, sdrep.org

A co-production by New Village Arts and Oceanside Theatre Company

Music and Lyrics by STEPHEN SONDHEIM Directed by KRISTIANNE KURNER Music Director LEIGH ANNE SUTHERLIN

Book by JAMES LAPINE Choreographer ALYSSA JUNIOUS

FINAL DRAFT NEW PLAY FESTIVAL APRIL 1 - 3, 2022

10 ORIGINAL PLAYS & MORE!

New Village Arts | 2787 State Street, Carlsbad

Broadway San Diego: “Hadestown”

The first national touring production of this Anaïs Mitchell musical. The pro-

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“If you don’t have a bunch of money to lean on, to give you the time to figure out yourself and just paint, then you have to be creative in your work and practice.”

Painter Charlene Mosley

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With pandemic restrictions officially lifted, museums and galleries are gearing up for an exciting season of new exhibitions and shows. And whether readers live in Escondido or downtown San Diego, there’s plenty to see throughout the county.

California Center for the Arts, Escondido: ‘Campus Creatives: Featuring San Diego’s Fine Arts Faculty’

to 6 p.m. April 30; 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. May 1. Between Juniper Street and A Street, Little Italy. Free.

(619) 615-1090, artwalksandiego.org

Arts educators from local universities and colleges will be showcasing their own work at this unique showcase of work that varies in mediums and styles. Notable names include Terri HughesOelrich (installation work), Sasha Koozel Reibstein (sculpture) and Perry Vásquez (paintings).

March 26 through May 15.

California Center for the Arts, Escondido, 340 N. Escondido Blvd., Escondido. $5-$8. (760) 839-4138, artcenter.org

Athenaeum Music & Arts Library: ‘Timeless: Black & White Portraits of Joan Agajanian Quinn’

A showcase of photographs and art from the Los Angeles journalist and collector. Spanning five decades, the exhibition features works from Andy Warhol, Ed Ruscha, Helmut Newton and more. May 7 to June 11. Athenaeum Music & Arts Library, 1008 Wall St., La Jolla. Free. (858) 454-5872, ljathenaeum.org

Oceanside Museum of Art: ‘James E. Watts: Storyteller’ The local fabricator and sculptor, who works out of a Gaslamp Quarter studio known as The James Watts Institute of Artistic Behavior, will present new works based on classic literature and created from repurposed and salvage scrap metal. April 2 to July 9.

Oceanside Museum of Art, 704 Pier View Way, Oceanside. Free-$10. (760) 4353720, oma-online.org

Museum of Photographic Arts: ‘Nick Brandt: This Empty World’ and ‘Encounter: Photographs

by Jed Fielding’

PAUL NESTOR

The Mission Fed ArtWalk returns to Little Italy on April 30 and May 1.

Quint Gallery: Gary Lang and Adam Belt

Both of Quint’s Girard Avenue locations will be opening new exhibitions from two accomplished regional artists. First, Ojai-based painter Gary Lang will showcase some of his signature illusory works filled with vibrant light and color. Up the street, Carlsbad artist Adam Belt will present some of his highly evocative installation art.

Adam Belt April 2 to May 14. Gary Lang June 4 to July 30. Quint Gallery, 7655 and 7722 Girard Ave., La Jolla. Free. (858) 454-3409, quintgallery.com

Mingei International Museum: ‘Fold, Twist, Tie’ and ‘Niki and Mingei’

The local love for Niki de Saint Phalle is what April is all about (see MCASD listing below). “Niki and Mingei” focuses on the local sculptor’s designs for furniture and furnishings.

Speaking of sculpture, the concurrent “Fold, Twist, Tie” shows off Hawaiian artist Moses’ intricate objects made from paper bags. April 8 to Oct. 2.

Mingei International Museum, 1439 El Prado, Balboa Park. Free-$10.

(619) 239-0003, mingei.org

Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego: ‘Selections From the Collection’ and ‘Niki de Saint Phalle in the 1960s’

MCASD reopens its flagship La Jolla location after a multimillion-dollar renovation and expansion with two new exhibitions.

One showcases works from the museum’s permanent collection, many of which have never been displayed before. The other is a selection of paintings and sculptures from the iconic French American artist who once called La Jolla her home.

Opens April 9. Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego, 700 Prospect St., La Jolla. Free-$10. (858) 4543541, mcasd.org

“Serpent Lady Pink” vase by Niki de Saint Phalle (2000, polyester resin)

MOPA has two stellar photographic exhibitions opening in May. First is Nick Brandt, an English photographer best known for his stark pictures of wildlife dealing with the rapid disappearance and destruction of the natural world.

Then there’s the work of photojournalist Jed Fielding, who specializes in spontaneous street portraiture in places like Naples, Italy, and Mexico City. Nick Brandt: May 8 to Oct. 2. Jed Fielding: May 12 to Sept.

25. Museum of Photographic Arts, 1649 El Prado, Balboa Park. Pay what you wish. (619) 238-7559, mopa.org

San Diego Natural History Museum: ‘Expedition Baja’

MCASD

“Pool Party” by John Valadez (1986, oil on canvas) at the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego.

MINGEI INTERNATIONAL MUSEUM

related postponements and virtual editions, the annual visual arts event is back as an in-person event. The two-day

festival features dozens of local and regional artists selling their wares, as well as entertainment, food vendors and more. 11 a.m.

The Nat opens a brandnew gallery on the top floor with this new, ongoing exhibition that features immersive dioramas, rare specimens and researcher stories from the Baja Peninsula. Opens May 27. San Diego Natural History Museum, 1788 El Prado, Balboa Park. Free-$19.95.

(619) 232-3821, sdnhm.org Combs is a freelance writer.

NIKI DE SAINT PHALLE IN THE 1960s APRIL 9 — JULY 17, 2022

San Diego Museum of Art: ‘Terra: Fernando Casasempere’ and ‘Art Alive’

In addition to SDMA’s recently opened “Monet to Matisse: Impressionist Masterpieces From the Bemberg Foundation” exhibition, visitors should definitely take time to visit “TERRA,” a series of immersive installations from Chilean artist Fernando Casasempere that deal in themes of environmentalism and climate change.

The exhibition opens the same week as “Art Alive,” the annual four-day showcase of floral interpretations of the museum’s vast collection. “Terra” runs April 29 through Sept. 5.

“Art Alive” happens April 28 through May 1. San Diego Museum of Art, 1450 El Prado, Balboa Park. $8-$20. (619) 232-7931, sdmart.org

Mission Fed ArtWalk

After a few COVID-

Pirodactyl over New York 1962, Paint, plaster, and various objects on two wood panels, 98 3/8 × 122 × 11 3/8 in. (249.9 × 309.9 × 28.9 cm). Guggenheim Abu Dhabi. ©Niki Charitable Art Foundation / ADAGP, Paris, 2021.

mcasd.org

Niki de Saint Phalle in the 1960s is presented by the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego in partnership with the Menil Collection. Support for this exhibition at both the Menil Collection and the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego is provided by Christie’s. Institutional support of the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego is provided by the City of San Diego Commission for Arts and Culture.

Research for this exhibition was supported by the Terra Foundation for American Art. Lead support and major funding is made possible through the generous support of La Prairie.

E24

THE SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIBUNE

S P R I N G

A R T S

SUNDAY • MARCH 20, 2022

P R E V I E W

V I S U A L

A R T

DEVIN BLASKOVICH FOR THE U-T

Charlene Mosley, pictured at Art on 30th in North Park, was one of the artists who worked on the Oscar-nominated 2017 animated film “Loving Vincent.”

C H A R L E N E M O S L E Y Painter channels her unique American journey into a solo exhibition at Sparks Gallery

A

BY SETH COMBS

little over five years ago, Charlene Mosley tried to raise Monarch butterflies.

To hear her tell the story at her North Park studio, the process of maintaining the creatures throughout their life cycle proved to be too difficult. The experience, however, did end up inspiring the work she’s currently producing for her first-ever solo exhibition.

“It’s about pollinators both in the literal and symbolic sense,” Mosley says. “It’s about focusing more on the things that are so little and that we think are fragile, but that are so important to everything else.”

Still, it’s also easy to see the paintings Mosley is producing for her exhibition, aptly titled “Pollinators” and opening May 15 at Sparks Gallery in downtown San Diego, as something representative of the artist’s own journey — a multiyear metamorphosis that has taken her from a working-class girlhood in Germany to a hustling artist’s life in San Diego.

“If you don’t have a bunch of money to lean on, to give you the time to figure out yourself and just paint, then you have to be creative in your work and practice,” Mosley says.

Combining methods of portraiture and figurative art with elements of nature and the fantastical, Mosley’s work has been popping up all over the city, from group shows at galleries to murals on storefronts and at San Diego State University. A glance at her artistic résumé reveals someone who has rarely turned down a show or a job, a testament to her diligent work ethic since moving to San Diego when she was 17 and almost immediately having to get a job to help support her family.

“I’ve definitely gone through some of the hardest times, and this is not exactly the best career choice for a kid of a single mother when we could barely get rent together,” says Mosley, who was born and raised in Berlin before her mother moved her and her sister to the U.S. in 2008. “My mother has been very supportive throughout, but she has had her doubts.”

One of these doubts came about seven years ago when Mosley, who had just finished studying art and museum studies at Cuyamaca College and SDSU, saw a trailer on YouTube soliciting painters for an animated film about Vincent Van Gogh. She says she submitted her portfolio and three weeks later she received a late-night phone call from an unknown international number.

“They told me I looked to be a good fit and asked me if I could be there on Thursday,” Mosley recalls of the call, adding that while she quickly told them “yes,” she didn’t quite realize what she was committing to.

“They gave me the address and it was a Polish address.”

Mosley ended up asking the person on the call if she could have 24 hours to decide.

She ultimately decided to go, but struggled with how to tell her family.

“The next morning I had to be like, ‘Hey, Mom, I got this job possibly in Poland and I need to be there on Thursday.’ She thought

I was joking.”

Mosley barely got enough together for the plane ticket (one-way), but the project she ended up working on was “Loving Vincent,” a groundbreaking and ultimately Oscar-nominated animated film about the iconic painter. Along with more than 60 other artists, Mosley worked tirelessly for six months in a Polish warehouse.

Once she was back in San Diego, she immersed herself in the local arts community, showing work wherever possible, attending exhibitions, painting murals and, ultimately, making enough connections to where she made a name for herself.

“It’s hard. You definitely have to be active and go out and search for places; go out to gallery events and meet those people who are interested in art,” Mosley says. “You have to be on it all the time.”

Mosley considers herself to be German American, a fact that often confuses those who first meet her, but since moving to the U.S., she says she’s had to re-examine what it means to be biracial in a different culture.

For the last couple years, Mosley has been collaborating on “Kayla: A Modern Day Princess,” a series of children’s books written by Kentucky-based author Deedee Cummings. The books feature a Black girl navigating the world around her, and while the character isn’t based on Mosley, it’s easy to see parallels between the titular character and some of Mosley’s own experiences.

“Deedee is biracial too, but I have this thing where I grew up in this White, German culture and so I lack that father’s side of me, so sometimes I struggle with that,” says Mosley, whose father was not in the picture while she was growing up. “I’ve had to label myself since coming over here. You never have to do that over there. So in a lot of ways, this was like a catalyst for me learning more about Black culture and the history of Blacks in America. I’ve had to educate myself.”

So in many ways, Mosley’s work is reflective of a unique American experience — an artist of color who believed enough in her work to persevere through language barriers and financial hardships. She was recently contacted by the creators of “Loving Vincent” to potentially work on a new film, but she says she may be too busy with her own art and commitments. She sees “Pollinators” as not only the culmination of years of hard work and commitment, but as a unique opportunity to represent her fully formed identity.

“I can’t remember any time growing up and seeing Black or Brown people in the foreground of the exhibition,” Mosley says.

“So I feel like I want to put that into the storefront of Sparks Gallery.”

“When it comes to the symbolism of it, it’s the idea of we as people being pollinators of new concepts, new ideas that are evolving,” Mosley continues. “Especially women of color. Having dealt with people who are dealing with racial issues, I began looking at my own self and asking myself if I just overlooked things over the years that have happened to me and thinking it was normal to not get something. Just being more aware of things, looking forward, because we all know that historically Black women have not gotten the credit they deserved.”

Combs is a freelance writer.

‘Charlene Mosley: Pollinators’ When: May 15 through July 3 Where: Sparks Gallery, 530 Sixth Ave., downtown San Diego Phone: (619) 696-1416 Admission: Free Online: sparksgallery.com

THE SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIBUNE

E25

SUNDAY • MARCH 20, 2022

Honoring women every day

Felicia Shaw, director of the Women’s Museum of California, discusses the institution’s renewed focus on spreading the message Women’s Museum of California: 21st Annual Women’s Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony

BY KRISTY TOTTEN

M

arch is Women’s History Month, and there’s no better way to learn about it than with Felicia Shaw, executive director of the Women’s Museum of California, based here in San Diego.

Q: A:

Happy Women’s History Month!

Yes, here we are again.

One year later, we’re still standing.

Q: A:

How are you and the museum celebrating?

This is a big month for us. What’s bigger than Women’s History Month when you’re a women’s history museum? We’re doing a lot of our annual events, things that we’ve been doing for the past 20 years. The big one is the San Diego County Women’s Hall of Fame. And this is when we celebrate the accomplishments of women who are chosen by the community because of their lifetime achievements. We induct them at a ceremony on the 20th (today), and I think it’s a big deal. We’ve inducted over 125 women since the Hall of Fame began 21 years ago.

Q: A:

Can you tell me about some of the people who made the list?

Some of the past people who made the list are names you might know, like Sally Ride. These are women who spent time here in San Diego, but we make a point of celebrating those unsung heroes, women that you may not know about. These are women who don’t necessarily come from money, but they spend a great deal of their lives going beyond the norm to do extraordinary things.

And in terms of activism and being trailblazers, we have a lot of women who are the first in their field. We have women that have just been really good at building our community, connecting people so things can happen. Those things don’t make the news because they’re kind of under the radar, but the people whose lives are affected by what they do, they know, and they become household names in the community.

One that I’m really excited about because I happen to know her personally, her name is Josephine Talamantez. Josephine is being honored in the historian category. She’s an activist who has dedicated her life to defending the Logan Heights neighborhood where she grew up as a child, and continued to work

CA K EWATC H Today: Actor Hal Linden is 91. Country singer Don Edwards is 83. Country singer-guitarist Ranger Doug of Riders in the Sky is 76. Blues musician Marcia Ball is 73. Drummer Carl Palmer (Asia; Emerson, Lake and Palmer) is 72.

Guitarist Jimmie Vaughan (Fabulous Thunderbirds) is 71. Guitarist Jim Seales (Shenandoah) is 68. Actor Amy Aquino (“Bosch,” “Brooklyn Bridge”) is 65. Actor Vanessa Bell Calloway is 65. Director Spike Lee is 65. Actor Theresa Russell is 65. Actor Holly Hunter is 64.

Drummer Slim Jim Phantom (Stray Cats) is 61.

Model Kathy Ireland is 59. Actor David Thewlis (“Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban”) is 59. Guitarist Adrian Oxaal of James is 57. Actor Jessica Lundy (“Party of Five,” “Hope and Gloria”) is 56. Actor Liza Snyder (“Yes, Dear”) is 54. Actor Michael Rapaport (“Boston Public”) is 52. Actor Alexander Chaplin (“Spin City”) is 51. Actor Cedric Yarbrough (“Speechless,” “Reno 911!”) is 49. Actor Paula Garces (“Harold and Kumar” films) is 48. Michael Genadry (“Ed”) is 44. Actor Bianca Lawson (“Pretty Little Liars”) is 43. Comedian Mikey Day (“Saturday Night Live”) is 42.

Actor Nick Blood (“Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.”) is 40. Guitarist Nick Wheeler of All-American Rejects is 40.

Actor Michael Cassidy (“People of Earth,” “The O.C.”) is 39. Actor Christy Carlson Romano (“Even Stevens,” “Kim Possible”) is 38. Actor Ruby Rose (“Orange is the New Black”) is 36. Actor Barrett Doss (“Station 19”) is 33.

Monday: Actor Kathleen Widdoes (“As the World Turns”) is 83. Singer-guitarist Keith Potger of The Seekers is 81. Actor Marie-Christine Barrault is 78. Singerkeyboardist Rose Stone of Sly and the Family Stone is 77. Actor Timothy Dalton is 76. Singer-guitarist Ray Dorset of Mungo Jerry is 76. Singer-guitarist Rodger Hodgson (Supertramp) is 72.

Bassist Conrad Lozano of Los Lobos is 71. Singer Russell Thompkins Jr. of The Stylistics is 71. Comedian Brad Hall (“Saturday Night Live”) is 64. Actor Sabrina LeBeauf (“The Cosby Show”) is 64. Actor Gary Oldman is 64. Actor Kassie Depaiva (“Days of Our Lives”) is

there over the years. She was part of the group that helped to found Chicano Park. So what we know as Chicano Park today was not always a park. She and a group of activists were concerned about a freeway that was to be built right down the center of that neighborhood. And from the story that I have heard her tell me, things got tense down there and she and a group of people stood in the way of the bulldozers as they were coming to start building.

She went to UC Berkeley, and I later went on to work for the California Arts Council. But she kept returning back to Barrio Logan and doing the work of ensuring that the people in that community and the culture in that community could remain and that they would not be pushed out by anything and that neighborhood, eventually — and this is what she’s working on now — establishing a museum for Chicano Park. Isn’t that cool?

We also induct women who are no longer with us.

One woman, Marie Herney, actually passed away in 1984. She’s known as a legal authority on, and an advocate for, women’s rights. She was the first woman to practice in the Supreme Court.

Another woman, Dr. Francine Foster Williams, was an educator who used her classroom to teach about civil rights. And I love the story that she is responsible for inspiring the Martin Luther King parade that we hold in San Diego today, which is probably one of the biggest ones in the country.

So they come from all walks of life. Some celebrated, some not so much, but we put them on a pedestal. After they are inducted into the hall of fame, we keep their archive, materials about their lives, at the museum in our collection.

So that for generations to come, if anybody ever wondered, who were the women who made San Diego great?

They can find them in our collection.

Q:

Who: Activist: Rosalia Salinas.

Cultural Bridge Builder: Dr. Francine Foster Williams.

Empowerer: Marie M. Herney.

Historian: Josephine Talamantez. Trailblazer: Tamila Ipema When: 2:30 p.m. today Where: Virtual event Tickets: Start at $25 Online: sandiegowomens halloffame.com/event

WOMEN’S MUSEUM OF CALIFORNIA

“I think anyone who visits the museum when we open will have the best overview of what has been happening around women’s activism in United States history, and particularly here in San Diego,” said executive director Felicia Shaw.

A:

I love to talk about Kate Sessions. Kate Sessions is considered the mother of Balboa Park. She was a botanist, and she struck a deal with the city of San Diego to allow her to put her gardening company in Balboa Park. And they said, sure, but you’ll have to plant a hundred trees a year in exchange for this free rent. And that is what she did. Many of the trees that you see in Balboa park are because of Kate Sessions.

Now, one interesting thing about Kate Sessions is, she has a statue in the park. Out of all the statues that we have in San Diego of important people, and usually they’re men, she’s in a skirt with an apron and a basket. And I thought that was so typical, that even when we get heralded, the women who tend to make it are in some type of a service industry or in service to others. What an amazing visionary in Kate Sessions.

Q:

Talk to me about the Women’s Museum and what you have on exhibition.

The Women’s Museum has been in transition since COVID-19 hit in 2020.

We shut our doors, which a lot of museums did, and after

When you think back to the beginning of San Diego’s history, who are some of the big historic names?

A:

61. Actor Matthew Broderick is 60.

Actor-comedian Rosie O’Donnell is 60.

Actor Cynthia Geary (“Northern Exposure”) is 57. Musician DJ Premier of Gang Starr is 56. Musician Maxim of Prodigy is 55. Keyboardist Jonas “Joker” Berggren of Ace of Base is 55. Guitarist Andrew Copeland of Sister Hazel is 54.

Actor Laura Allen is 48. Actor Sonequa Martin-Green (“Star Trek: Discovery,” “The Walking Dead”) is 37. Actor Scott Eastwood (“The Longest Ride”) is 36.

Actor Jasmin Savoy Brown (“For the People”) is 28. Actor Forrest Wheeler (“Fresh Off the Boat”) is 18.

Actor Keri Russell is 46. Actor Brandon J. Dirden (“For Life”) is 44. Gossip blogger Perez Hilton is 44. Singer Paul Martin of Marshall Dyllon is 44. Actor Nicholle Tom (“The Nanny”) is 44.

Country singer Brett Young is 41.

Tuesday: Actor William Shatner is 91.

Actor M. Emmet Walsh is 87. Singer Jeremy Clyde of Chad and Jeremy is 81. Singer-guitarist George Benson is 79. News anchor Wolf Blitzer is 74.

Composer Andrew Lloyd Webber is 74.

Actor Fanny Ardant is 73. Sportscaster Bob Costas is 70. Country singer James House is 67. Actor Lena Olin is 67. Singer-actor Stephanie Mills is 65.

Actor Matthew Modine is 63. Comedian Keegan-Michael Key (Key and Peele) is 51. Actor Will Yun Lee (“Hawaii Five-0”) is 51. Actor Guillermo Diaz (“Scandal”) is 47. Actor Anne Dudek (“Mad Men”) is 47. Actor Cole Hauser (TV’s “Yellowstone”) is 47.

Actor Kellie Williams (“Family Matters”) is 46.

Actor Reese Witherspoon is 46. Drummer John Otto of Limp Bizkit is 45. Actor Tiffany Dupont (“Murder in the First”) is 41. Rapper Mims is 41. Actor Constance Wu (film’s “Crazy Rich Asians,” TV’s “Fresh Off The Boat”) is 40. Guitarist Lincoln Parish of Cage The Elephant is 32.

Wednesday: Singer Chaka Khan is 69.

Actor Amanda Plummer is 65. Actor Catherine Keener is 63. Actor Hope Davis (“The Matador,” “About Schmidt”) is 58. Actor Richard Grieco (“21 Jump Street”) is 57. Drummer Kevin Griffin of Yankee Grey is 57. Actor Marin Hinkle (“The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel,” “Two and a Half Men”) is 56.

Singer-keyboardist Damon Albarn of Blur and of Gorillaz is 54. Actor Kelly Perine (“Knight Squad,” “One on One”) is 53. Drummer John Humphrey of The Nixons is 52. Bandleader Reggie Watts (“The Late Late Show with James Corden”) is 50. Actor Randall Park (“The Interview,” “Fresh Off The Boat”) is 48. Actor Michelle Monaghan is 46.

Thursday: Harmonica player Lee Oskar of War is 74. Singer Nick Lowe is 73.

Bassist Dougie Thomson of Supertramp is 71. Actor Robert Carradine (“Revenge of the Nerds”) is 68. Actor Donna Pescow is 68. Actor Kelly LeBrock is 62. DJ Rodney “Kool Kollie” Terry of Ghostown DJs is 61. TV personality Star Jones is 60. Guitarist Patterson Hood of Drive-By Truckers is 58.

Actor Peter Jacobson (“House”) is 57.

Singer-violinist Sharon Corr of The Corrs is 52. Actor Lauren Bowles (“True Blood”) is 52. Actor Lara Flynn Boyle is 52. Rapper Maceo of De La Soul is 52.

Actor Megyn Price (“Rules of Engagement,” “Grounded For Life”) is 51. Actor Jim Parsons (“The Big Bang Theory”) is 49. Drummer Chad Butler of Switchfoot is 48. Actor Alyson Hannigan (“How I Met Your Mother,” “Buffy The Vampire Slayer”) is 48. Actor Amanda Brugel (“The Handmaid’s Tale”) is 45.

Actor Olivia Burnette (“Sons of Anarchy”) is 45. Actor Jessica Chastain (“Zero Dark Thirty,” “The Help”) is 45.

Actor Amir Arison (“The Blacklist”) is 44. Actor Lake Bell (“The Practice”) is 43. Bassist Benj Gershman of O.A.R. is 42. Bassist Jesse Phillips of St. Paul and the Broken Bones is 42. Actor Philip Winchester (“Chicago Justice,” “Chicago Med”) is 41. Dancer Val Chmerkovskiy (“Dancing with the Stars”) is 36. Actor Keisha CastleHughes (“The Nativity Story,” “Whale Rider”) is 32.

Friday: Film critic Gene Shalit is 96.

Singer Anita Bryant is 82. Actor Paul Michael Glaser (TV’s “Starsky and Hutch”) is 79. Musician Elton John is 75. Actor Bonnie Bedelia is 74. Actorcomedian Mary Gross is 69. Actor James McDaniel (“NYPD Blue”) is 64.

Saxophonist Steve Norman of Spandau Ballet is 62. Actor Brenda Strong (“Desperate Housewives”) is 62. Actor Marcia Cross (“Desperate Housewives”) is 60. Actor Lisa Gay Hamilton (“The Practice”) is 58.

Actor Sarah Jessica Parker is 57.

Turner Classics Movies host Ben Mankiewicz is 55. Actor Laz Alonso

nearly 40 years of being in existence, we took that time to think about our future. We had been at Liberty Station for nearly 10 years, but what we discovered is, as great as Liberty Station is — what a fun place to be — we really weren’t reaching the community as deeply as we wanted to. Our audiences weren’t as diverse, and particularly we weren’t serving women of color.

And we decided to move.

We moved a part of our operations to Balboa Park, where our collections are now stored in the business office at the San Diego History Center, and then our exhibits and our educational programs will be produced in southeastern San Diego at the Jacobs Center for Neighborhood Innovation.

Right now, we’re building a new exhibit in that space that will premiere in April. I am so excited about this facility. First of all, I’m excited about grounding our work in southeastern San Diego, which is an underserved community.

And then secondly, that this is a kind of a new model of a museum. It’s not the kind where you go and you just stand there in front of panel after panel of didactics, reading things. It’s

(“Avatar,” “Fast and Furious”) is 51.

Singer Melanie Blatt of All Saints is 47.

Actor Domenick Lombardozzi (“Boardwalk Empire”) is 46. Actor Lee Pace (film’s “The Hobbit,” TV’s “Pushing Daisies”) is 43. Comedian Alex Moffat (“Saturday Night Live”) is 40. Singeractor Katharine McPhee (“Smash,” “American Idol”) is 38. Comedian Chris Redd (“Saturday Night Live”) is 37.

Rapper Big Sean is 34. Music producer Ryan Lewis of Macklemore and Ryan Lewis is 34. Actor Matthew Beard (“The Imitation Game”) is 33. Singer-actor Aly Michalka of Aly and AJ (“Hellcats”) is 33. Actor Kiowa Gordon (“Twilight”) is 32.

Saturday: Actor Alan Arkin is 88. Actor James Caan is 82. Singer Diana Ross is

really intended to be a very interactive place for learning and engagement, lots and lots of programs for kids and their families to discover women’s history and also to find ways to be inspired, to activate around women’s issues.

The permanent exhibit that we’ll showcase there will focus on the waves of feminism from the early wave during the suffrage movement, through the second wave, and then into the third wave. And I think anyone who visits the museum when we open will have the best overview of what has been happening around women’s activism in United States history, and particularly here in San Diego.

Q: A: add?

Is there anything else you would like to

We were founded in 1983 by Mary Maschal. Mary was a selftaught historian and she was concerned about the absence of women in the annals of history books.

She was concerned that when you open a history book, who did you see? It was mostly what men did.

And she knew that women were breaking glass ceilings everywhere, every day,

78. Singer Steven Tyler of Aerosmith is 74. Singer-actor Vicki Lawrence is 73.

Actor Ernest Thomas (“Everybody Hates Chris,” “What’s Happening”) is 73. Actor Martin Short is 72. Country singer Ronnie McDowell is 72. Drummer Monte Yoho of The Outlaws is 70.

Country singer Dean Dillon is 67. Country singer Charly McClain is 66. Talk show host Leeza Gibbons is 65. Actor Ellia English (“The Jamie Foxx Show,” “Curb Your Enthusiasm”) is 63. Actor Jennifer Grey is 62.

Actor Billy Warlock (“Baywatch”) is 61.

MAY 6 - JUNE 5, 2022

throughout our history, but they just weren’t being talked about. And that hurts women, it hurts women because young girls need role models.

We need to see each other doing things other than being in service to others.

There’s nothing wrong with being in service to others, but also leading, creating, being involved in politics, being an artist, doing creative things, all kinds of things. So we need that.

Mary was really a woman who didn’t believe in obstacles. She started the archive in her house, and when that archive outgrew her house, the museum got its first place in Golden Hill, and then finally Liberty Station, where we were most recently. I will say that with every move, we have developed such a loyal following of people — and they’re not all women by the way — who just believe in the notion that women’s history is being made every day.

We don’t have to go back and look toward the suffrage era, Susan B. Anthony, or anything like that. Every day, women are breaking records in sports, they’re setting precedents in all kinds of legal fields, and it’s unfortunate — and it’s fortunate at the same time — that we have this one month where we’re going to get it all in, we’re going to learn everything we can about women, and then we’ll go back to normal.

I would just encourage everyone to consider women’s history a part of our culture, and think about the contributions of women in every aspect of our lives.

You will be amazed at what you can find.

Hear more about Felicia Shaw on the “San Diego News Fix” podcast. kristy.totten@sduniontribune.com

Actor Eric Allan Kramer (“The Hughleys”) is 60. Actor Michael Imperioli (“Life on Mars,” “The Sopranos”) is 56.

Guitarist James Iha of Smashing Pumpkins is 54. Country singer Kenny Chesney is 54. Actor Leslie Mann (“Knocked Up,” “This Is 40”) is 50.

Actor T.R. Knight (“Grey’s Anatomy”) is 49. Rapper Juvenile is 47. Actor Amy Smart (“Road Trip,” “Felicity”) is 46.

Actor Bianca Kajlich (“Rules of Engagement,” “Boston Public”) is 45. “Face the Nation” moderator Margaret Brennan is 42. Actor Keira Knightley is 37. Rapper J-Kwon is 36. Actor Carly Chaikin (“Mr. Robot,” “Suburgatory”) is 32.

ASSOCIATED PRESS

SEPTEMBER 30 - OCTOBER 30, 2022

THEATRE IS ALIVE AND WELL ON THE SDMT STAGE!

NOVEMBER 25 - DECEMBER 30, 2022

E26

WHAT’S NEW

THE SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIBUNE

SUNDAY • MARCH 20, 2022

How Bob Odenkirk found success in failure Comedian’s new memoir is an often funny look at the difficulty of being funny

BY MARK ATHITAKIS

“Things Past Telling” by Sheila Williams (Amistad): Inspired by the real-life census record of an 1870 Ohio woman, along with fictionalized stories of Williams’ ancestors, this novel chronicles a Black woman’s eventful journey of selfdetermination in the face of cruelty. Stolen from her African home in the late 18th century, an 11-year-old girl is brought to the Caribbean, initially avoiding enslavement because of her facility with languages. As a pirate’s translator and spy, she finds a community, eventually learning midwifery skills that provide a foundation for her identity, even when she is recaptured and enslaved.

“Drowning Practice” by Mike Meginnis (Ecco): In a literary landscape littered with post-apocalyptic novels, Meginnis has created something distinctive: a pre-apocalyptic novel set in a world of ransacked grocery stores and empty neighborhoods. This world has not yet ended, but everyone on Earth has simultaneously dreamed they will be led by a loved one to a watery death on Nov. 1. With the future uncertain, Lyd sets out to escape from a controlling husband with her daughter, Mott. On a road trip though a changed landscape, the mother and daughter gain insight into what really matters.

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLERS Fiction 1. “The Paris Apartment” by Lucy Foley (Morrow) 2. “One Italian Summer” by Rebecca Serle (Atria) 3. “The Atlas Six” by Olivie Blake (Tor) 4. “House of Sky and Breath”

by Sarah J. Maas (Bloomsbury) 5. “The Club” by Ellery Lloyd (Harper) 6. “The Midnight Library” by Matt Haig (Viking) 7. “The Maid” by Nita Prose (Ballantine) 8. “The Lincoln Highway” by Amor Towles (Viking) 9. “The Last Thing He Told Me”

by Laura Dave (Simon & Schuster) 10. “The Love of My Life”

by Rosie Walsh (Pamela Dorman)

Nonfiction 1. “Red-Handed” by Peter Schweizer (Harper) 2. “Comedy Comedy Comedy Drama”

by Bob Odenkirk (Random House) 3. “The 1619 Project” edited by Nikole Hannah-Jones, Caitlin Roper, Ilena Silverman and Jake Silverstein (One World) 4. “From Strength to Strength”

by Arthur C. Brooks (Portfolio) 5. “The Beauty of Dusk” by Frank Bruni (Avid Reader) 6. “The Invisible Kingdom”

by Meghan O’Rourke (Riverhead) 7. “Crying in H Mart” by Michelle Zauner (Knopf)

8. “Black Ops” by Ric Prado (St. Martin’s) 9. “Will”

by Will Smith with Mark Manson (Penguin Press) 10. “The Nineties”

by Chuck Klosterman (Penguin Press)

WARWICK’S TOP SELLERS 1. “Run, Rose, Run” by Dolly Parton & James Patterson

A

fter suffering a heart attack on the set of the hit TV show “Better Call Saul” in July, Bob Odenkirk surfaced on Twitter with an uncharacteristically gooey remark: “I feel the love and it means so much,” he wrote.

It was a rare moment of unvarnished candor from an actor whose career has been built on rigorously avoiding mushiness. As he explains in his new memoir “Comedy Comedy Comedy Drama,” Odenkirk was a product of an ’80s and ’90s Gen-X alternative comedy scene that guzzled irony like cheap beer. On “The Ben Stiller Show,” and especially his ’90s sketch program with David Cross, “Mr. Show,” Odenkirk specialized in skewering sentimentality and the mass culture that indulged it.

“We wanted only the ‘outcrowd,’ the few, the proud, the misanthropes,” he writes.

And he got them, in a series of now-classic sketches. If the oily, shallow, but somehow charming bus-stop-ad lawyer Saul Goodman is your sole exposure to Odenkirk, his Angry Young Man phase is worth hunting down. You might start with some classics from “Mr. Show”: “Lie Detector,” in which Odenkirk’s character is hooked up to a polygraph and confesses to an absurdly escalating series of transgressions. Or “Mafia Mathematicians,” in which he plays a mob capo shouting down goons debating whether 24 is the highest possible number. Or “Blow Up the Moon,” in which he plays a patriotic country singer in a lampoon of lunkheaded American populism. That last one lands even better now than it did in 1997.

Though Odenkirk, 59, has had plenty of successes, “Comedy” is largely a study in the sad-clown paradox, a story about moody tenacity in the face of either fear of failure or failure itself. Growing up in the Chicago suburbs, Odenkirk was enchanted by the city’s robust comedy scene, which in the ’70s and ’80s was masterminded by improv coach and impresario Del Close.

Odenkirk was caught off guard

by Close’s consumption of all manner of intoxicants, but he loved comedy’s culture. Kinda sorta: Odenkirk had little patience for the didja-evernotice stand-up scene, and he characterizes his mid-’80s stint as a “Saturday Night Live” writer as a kind of agony.

“As a writer I was a waste of bagels!” he writes. “I was trying too hard, but the more I failed, the more I tried.”

So “Comedy” isn’t exactly intended to be ha-ha funny, though it sometimes is. More often, it seems that Odenkirk wants to fire off some warning

GREG LEWIS AMC

Bob Odenkirk is the star of “Better Call Saul,” whose final season begins next month.

“Comedy Comedy Comedy Drama”

by Bob Odenkirk (Random House, 2022; 304 pages)

flares to comics who might want to follow in his footsteps.

Sometimes that involves making object lessons out of tragic cases like his “SNL” colleague Chris Farley, whose rapid decline Odenkirk observed firsthand. He recalls seeing Farley at the height of his fame but near death, partying in a limo and beyond help. “Should I have grabbed him by the lapels and shouted, ‘You’re throwing it away, man!’ ... I considered it. But I also knew that he’d heard all of it, so many times. ... I watched the limo pull away and a few weeks later we all had a funeral,” he writes. “What a dumb story.”

But mostly, his frustrations involve the more mundane limbo of what he calls “development heck.” “Mr. Show”

wrapped up in 1998, and Odenkirk didn’t land the role of Saul Goodman till 2009.

That means he spent more than a decade wandering the Hollywood wilderness, and “Comedy” suggests that he labored every second to navigate his way out. He directed movies that didn’t take off. He made pilot after pilot that wasn’t picked up. He auditioned for the role of Michael Scott on “The Office,” eventually losing out to Steve Carell.

There, and everywhere else, he’s stubborn and self-deprecating in defeat. “I had so many projects to drive into the dirt,” he writes. “One trick for surviving Hollywood’s beatdown is to keep making new things despite every ‘no.’ ” Perhaps inevitably, “Comedy” gets less interesting as Odenkirk becomes an actor who hears yes more often. His hunger and fear of failure are still palpable: He embraces advice he got from “Breaking Bad” lead Bryan Cranston, who told him that he simply needed to commit, put the effort in: “Work all the time.”

But the latter pages of the book are made of blander stuff.

Working with Steven Spielberg on “The Post” was great, having a cameo in “Little Women” was great, playing an unlikely action hero in “Nobody” was great.

Underneath that placid surface, some sad-clown stuff lurks, despite Odenkirk’s efforts to compartmentalize it.

In an early chapter, “My Funny, Angry Dad,” he sketches a portrait of his father as a hard-drinking, often-

absent, suburban bore. “A tale as old as time. Daddy issues.

The end,” he writes. Except not: The dad stuff keeps popping up in the memoir like a jump scare. Odenkirk imagined Saul Goodman as “a hollow man, like my dad and his pals.” One failed pilot was about “a dad making observations about Middle American midlife livin’.” Another was about a “crabby, alcoholic, and estranged father (my dad).”

“Nobody” is a revenge story in which he plays a “good dad” with a vengeful streak.

At the end of the dad chapter, he sighs, “Can I be done with ‘the darkness’ now?” You tell us, Bob. Of course, a deep dive into daddy issues isn’t what readers want out of a comedian’s memoir. The sad-clown paradox demands you tamp down the sad part, even when your job is to talk about your inner life. Late in the book, as Odenkirk describes landing more serious-acting gigs, he philosophizes about how actors work. Some are consciously “using their own particular version of Method acting,” he notes, while others “just have disastrous internal lives that they let leak onto the screen, turning their inner turmoil and frailty into sweet dollarinos. I’m a little of both.”

It would be nice to hear more about that turmoil, and how he successfully channeled it.

Happily, he’s around to tell it, should he ever want to.

Athitakis, who wrote this for The Washington Post, is a critic in Phoenix and author of “The New Midwest.”

2. “Be Nice. The End.” by Bryan Skavnak 3. “The Paris Bookseller” by Kerri Maher 4. “The Anomaly” by Hervé Le Tellier 5. “The Paris Apartment” by Lucy Foley 6. “One Italian Summer” by Rebecca Serle 7. “Violeta” by Isabel Allende 8. “The Lincoln Highway” by Amor Towles 9. “The Thursday Murder Club” by Richard Osman 10. “Still Life” by Sarah Winman

CALENDAR ADVENTURES BY THE BOOK, (619) 300-2532 adventuresbythebook.com In-person event: A Ballad of Love and Glory: a San Diego Brunch Adventure with award-winning Author Reyna Grande, 10:30 a.m. and 2 p.m. Saturday MYSTERIOUS GALAXY, (619) 539-7137 mystgalaxy.com Hybrid event: David Putnam in discussion with Matt Coyle, 6 p.m. Tuesday Virtual event: Alex Segura in conversation with Rob Hart, 7 p.m. Wednesday In-person event: Kelly Barnhill discussing “The Ogress and the Orphans,” 6 p.m. Thursday Virtual event: Sara A. Mueller in discussion with Marina J. Lostetter, 7 p.m. Thursday Virtual event: Gareth L. Powell in conversation with J. Dianne Dotson, noon Saturday In-person event: Imperial Beach Library Presents: “Ramón and Julieta” author talk and book signing with Alana Quintana Albertson, 2 p.m. Saturday WARWICK’S, (858) 454-0347, warwicks.com In-person event: Weekends With Locals: Taylor García, noon today In-person event: Weekends With Locals: Simon Benjamin, 2 p.m. today In-person event: Brian Gushue, “The Grass Is Always Greener,” 7:30 p.m. Tuesday In-person event: An Afternoon With Rebecca Serle (“One Italian Summer”), 1:30 p.m. Thursday

‘EUGENIA’ INSPIRED BY GRANDMOTHER’S STONES

Ask Jasmine Jimenez what inspired her to write “Eugenia Hunts for Gemstones,” and the answer is highly personal.

The children’s book “is based on true stories told by my grandmother and my family.

She would go into the California deserts and bring back gemstones, turquoise, garnet, obsidian and many others. She would tumble them in her backyard and then line her yard and fill jars full of stones.”

That, Jimenez says, “always seems magical to me — to take a rock and turn it into something beautiful.”

RECOMMENDED READS

Now Jimenez is hoping “Eugenia Hunts for Gemstones” will turn out to be magical, too.

“I have always loved to read,” she says. “I loved the library, the Dewey Decimal System. I loved checking out books. I loved the plastic covers in the ’80s that protected the covers and made crinkling noises when they were opened.”

She passed on this fascination to her son Justin, taking him to the library when he was little.

“We could spend hours there reading and finding the

perfect books to check out.

Being a young mom meant not having a lot of spending money for the bookstore, so we made ourselves regulars at the Pacific Beach Library.”

Jimenez says she’s written five stories based on Eugenia, and “Eugenia Hunts for Gemstones” is the first one she’s getting independently published — the beginning, she hopes, of the Euegnia’s Books Collection.

“Independent publishing is not for the faint to heart,” she admits.

MICHAEL JAMES ROCHA • U-T

“Eugenia Hunts for Gemstones” Pre-orders are open through March 28. Go to eugeniasbooks .com for more information.

Welcome to our literary circle, in which San Diegans pass the (printed) word on books

Liz Vagani

Laura Rinaldi

Job: Branch Manager, Santee Branch, San Diego County Library

Job: Bookseller, Warwick’s

She recommends: “The Wisteria Society of Lady Scoundrels” by India Holton (New York: Berkley, 2021; 336 pages) Why? The first time Ned Lightbourne lays eyes on Cecilia Bassingwaite, he finally understands the concept of “love at first sight.” This is unfortunate, as Ned is an assassin-pirate hired to kill the charming lady thief. Cecilia will not cotton to this sort of nonsense, either the love or the assassination attempts. Can Ned convince Cecilia that he’s worth taking a chance on, despite their rocky beginning? In this absolutely delightful romp through an alternate Victorian England, the reader will encounter unconventional ladies, dread pirates (both good and bad), flying houses, witches and a cameo from a take-nononsense Queen Victoria. This book is highly recommended for romance lovers, readers of historical or science fiction, or anyone looking for a unique and fast-paced read.

She recommends: “Joan Is Okay” by Weike Wang (Random House, 2022; 224 pages) Why? Joan is so much more than just okay!

This big-city ICU doc has a wry sense of humor and a unique perspective that fills this novel with incredible charm and appeal.

Because her job is where she feels most at home, Joan goes to great lengths to maximize her working hours. Unexpected mandatory leave plunks her into a situation she ordinarily avoids with vigor: time with family. Her audacious brother will insist on a lavish French meal together, when all Joan craves is home-cooked comfort food.

Musings of what it means to grow up as the child of Chinese immigrants or to be a woman who is not a mother leave an indelible impression. Ultimately, when enough boundaries have been crossed, the lobe in her brain that Joan has labeled “RAGE” bubbles over, and lessons are learned about how to be a better neighbor, in every sense of the word.

THE SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIBUNE

E27

SUNDAY • MARCH 20, 2022

HARVEY FIERSTEIN SINGS THE SONG OF HIMSELF

Actor and writer recounts his life and career in raw, fun and fabulous memoir

BY ALEXANDRA JACOBS

A

ctor, writer and consummate New Yawker Harvey Fierstein is assuredly a man of many talents. Who knew needlework was one of them?

In his new memoir “I Was Better Last Night” — the title refers to a theater performer’s perennial lament, but with aptly sexualized undertones — Fierstein writes of his “passion for crochet.” In the lean years before his play “Torch Song Trilogy” hit Manhattan like a ton of graffitied bricks in 1981, he embroidered clothes for chic boutiques and Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis. Detoxing from Southern Comfort, his “longest love affair,” Fierstein took up quilting, hoping eventually to contribute to the famous AIDS memorial project but also recognizing the hobby’s general practicality: “Quilts have two sides, doubling the chance you’ll find something you can live with.”

Intentionally or not, “I Was Better Last Night” is very quiltlike. Fierstein shares his life less in conventional chapters than in colorful patches: 59 of them, stitched together with photos and a plush index. The sum of this is warm and enveloping and indeed two-sided: One is a raw, cobwebby tale of anger, hurt, indignation and pain; flip it over and you get billowing ribbons of humor, gossip and fabulous, hot-pink success.

As with a treasured blankie, the frayed side is somehow more lovable. Fierstein writes of growing up with his older brother, Ronald, in the Bensonhurst neighborhood of Brooklyn, where “Jews cautiously befriended Italians, who guardedly befriended the Greeks.” He was one of several students named Harvey — the name’s trendiness being one of the “three greatest mistakes of the ’50s,” he jokes, along with Formica and thalidomide — but always stood out in a crowd. Enlarged tonsils made it hard to eat; removing them led to gorging and weight struggles. Overdeveloped secondary vocal cords were responsible for his distinctive growl. From a young age, he wanted to dress up and make up and make believe, including as a mermaid, and wondered if he was a girl. Now he recognizes that he was a “7-yearold gender warrior.”

MICHAEL GEORGE THE NEW YORK TIMES

Actor Harvey Fierstein’s memoir “I Was Better Last Night” was released March 1.

Blessed with a high IQ, Fierstein skipped two grades and attended the High School of Art and Design in east midtown, where there was a smoking terrace for students: “Hello, 1965!”

When author Anaïs Nin visited Fierstein’s English class, an elegant harbinger of what would be many encounters with the celebrated, he read her tarot cards.

Undiagnosed dyslexia drew him to play scripts: sparer texts, meant to be spoken aloud. Unsurprisingly, some of the snappiest parts of this book are bits of remembered dialogue. (“You’re Madeline Kahn!” a ticket seller protested when the comedian, nearing 40, brandished an NYU ID and demanded a student discount to “Torch Song.” “With so much more to learn,” Kahn replied.)

Andy Warhol also figures.

“I Was Better Last Night: A Memoir”

by Harvey Fierstein (Alfred A. Knopf, 2022; 383 pages)

Little Harvey had admired the illustrations of footwear the artist did for Bloomingdale’s newspaper ads; while a sophomore at Pratt, where he made ceramics with genitals called Bad Boy Jugs, Fierstein got the part of an asthmatic lesbian maid wearing a red wig in “Andy Warhol’s Pork” at La MaMa, the temple of off-off-

Broadway. He mingled with underground types at Max’s Kansas City (to pay the check, the Factory would send over a painting), though not without what became a trademark contrariness. “I could never catch what Candy Darling was talking about, and when I did, it wasn’t worth the effort,” he snipes about one member of Warhol’s entourage.

The author’s parents, despite their qualms about queerness, must have done something right, because throughout his life, Fierstein (he pronounces it FIREstein, although his brother pronounces it FEER-stein) has been both fiery and fierce. “Jeez, but it was fun to be a teenager dropped in the middle of a revolution!” he writes of his early activism. Plays such as “A Taste of Honey” and “The Boys in the Band” troubled

him as documents of loneliness and self-loathing, and spurred him to write of gay life more affirmatively, more assertively.

It’s sobering to be reminded that as late as 1973, a male culture writer for The Village Voice was arrested for holding another man’s hand as they crossed a street in Greenwich Village. Fierstein’s interview with Barbara Walters in 1983, during the first successful run of “La Cage aux Folles,” in which she “questioned me as if I were an interstellar alien” from Planet Homosexuality, was a thundering call for acceptance that still echoes today, on YouTube. “The norm,” he realized, “meant nothing but the majority.”

“I Was Better Last Night” gets to be more of an extended, eyerubbing Tony acceptance speech after Fierstein hits the big time with “La Cage aux Folles” and “Hairspray” and their various tours and revivals — or at least the medium time (Hollywood has never made proper use of him).

Still, this man seems to roll around, constitutionally, in velvety darkness. Medical matters, including a suicide attempt in the mid-1990s, are handled with matter-of-fact frankness. When living “Cheetosto-cheek,” he suffered terrible dental problems. Acting as Tevye in “Fiddler on the Roof,” he got a hernia and had to manipulate his intestines back into place to go on.

He had an aortic valve replacement, and when offered the choice between pig, cow or manufactured, he wondered: “How serious could this be if it involved shopping?”

(There are enough one-liners in “I Was Better Last Night” for a oneman show, and guess what, he’s available.)

The effect of AIDS on his community has left Fierstein — only spared, he surmises, because he grew bored with anonymous sex — burning with as much righteous rage as when he pointedly kissed a disease-phobic Ginger Rogers, a childhood idol, on the cheek backstage at “The Tonight Show.”

“They’ve turned us into drug addicts,” he writes of antiviral medication manufacturers, “and managing us is a very profitable business.”

With a dramaturge’s expert timing, Fierstein saves the most difficult anecdote of his upbringing for near the end, like the classic 11 o’clock number in musical theater. A story about his mother’s reaction to his accidental comingout, it’s a pin prick to the heart.

Actually it makes the heart a pin cushion.

Jacobs writes for The New York Times.

POEMS

I ROT.

By Clara Broderick The insects crawl under the sheer sheath of my skin.

I could keep them out, But I don’t bother.

It’s where I keep the shards of dishes that I smashed And the letters you wrote me That I actually wrote myself.

I crumple them to an almost molecular degree, In hopes that no one bothers to unwrap them And discover their sappy contents And that those insects mistake them for crumbs.

I hope that they disappear Because I can’t bring it upon me to do it myself.

I’m the only one who will ever have read them, Yet everyone knows what they say.

She never lit the flower’s petals for me again.

The insects have finally cleared away the mess.

I didn’t bother trying to reconcile.

I’m hoping they’ll take my silver chain as a thank you.

She must’ve given you her sympathy, is what I figure.

I no longer want it and

Another bridge burned.

Maybe the bridge was never really there.

She still does her job, Illuminating the crosswalks that I roam each night.

The junk never seems to be completely gone after they leave.

Damnit!

Figures.

How many times have I told them,

The sun must have heard me crying again.

All or nothing?

If I am going to rot,

Also figures.

I’d like to rot correctly.

I like to think that she cares,

Decomposition has become my composure.

But I think that she just takes pity on me.

She’s also just doing her job.

I wonder if you ever visit that flower.

I wonder if you lay your head in the pollen.

If you do,

Stop it.

Is it the crook of my arm?

You’re doing it again.

Maybe it’s just pollen to you.

You’re embarrassing yourself.

Does the moon still let you see?

You hate this stuff.

Tell me,

Do I really?

Does she hide from you, too?

As the insects eat at my unwanted innards,

I’ll be needing them again soon.

Even when I am frugal with my time, My inevitable fate as a compost pile Never seems to wane.

If you happen to find dried petals With honeysuckle dust And a chewed up spliff filter, It’s just me.

The insects were just doing their job.

As did the sun, And her less forgiving cousin,

All that I see is the flower that we waltzed upon,

The moon.

The moon doing me one final favor,

I was glued to that stupid silver chain and the shards of dishes that I smashed,

As she held her light amidst the pollen’s fog.

I must have rubbed her the wrong way.

I’m sorry I let myself rot.

And those crumpled letters From me to you to me again.

I am not rotten, But I rot away, anyway.

I rot.

I rot.

I rot.

Did you ever find me in the dust?

I’ve long withered

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But I hope you looked And I hope you recognized the crook of my arm And the petals we once danced upon For they say more than my crumpled letters ever could.

Clara Broderick is a recent graduate of Westview High School in Rancho Peñasquitos. She is currently on a gap year and plans to attend college next fall.

FLEETSCIENCE.ORG

E28

THE SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIBUNE

SUNDAY • MARCH 20, 2022

SummerFest 2022 schedule and ticket information Unless otherwise indicated below, all concerts are at 7:30 p.m. at the BakerBaum Concert Hall in the Conrad Prebys Performing Arts Center in La Jolla. Some events take place in The JAI, the center’s smaller, 144-seat space.

July 29: Opening Night: “Side by Side” — Featuring music by Rimsky-Korsakov, Chopin/Franchomme, Brahms, Bacewicz and Czerny July 30: “Point Counterpoint” — Featuring music by Valentini, Haydn, Reich, Mozart and Elgar

The Miró Quartet will perform Aug. 24 at the Baker-Baum Concert Hall as part of the La Jolla Music Society’s SummerFest.

NAOYA IKEGAMI

SummerFest expands to four weeks in 2022 La Jolla Music Society’s annual chamber music festival will include a record 21 concerts

BY GEORGE VARGA

S

More jazz and nonclassical concerts

Leah Rosenthal, the society’s artistic director, helped formulate the growth plan that led to SummerFest’s expansion this year. The plan was originally scheduled to run through 2025, but has been extended a year because of the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic-fueled shutdown of live events.

“Going from three weeks to four will not only give our patrons an opportunity to breathe a bit between performances, it will also give our artists more of a chance to enjoy their time here and to better integrate with the community,” Rosenthal said. “And we can better expand our musical offerings this way.”

Indeed, the Aug. 17 jazz concert by the classically trained Salvant and her quartet is a preview of things to come, noted Todd Schultz, the

Aug. 3: “Under the Influence: Shakespeare’s World” — Featuring music by Korngold and Beethoven, 7 p.m.

Aug. 5: “A Weekend in Paris: The Salon and the Masquerade” — Debussy, Chopin, Caplet, Ravel, and Sarasate Aug. 6: “A Weekend in Paris: Le Conservatoire” — Debussy, Boulanger, Franck, Messiaen, and Fauré Aug. 7: “A Weekend in Paris: Beg, Borrow and Steal” — Featuring music by Couperin, Milhaud, Saint-Saëns, Schumann, and Ravel, 3 p.m.

ummerFest, the La Jolla Music Society’s annual chamber music celebration, will be bigger than ever in 2022, literally.

For the first time in the event’s 36-year history, SummerFest will expand from three to four weeks. To be held July 29 to Aug. 26, it will feature 21 concerts, also a record. They will be presented thematically as “Under the Influence,” a name chosen to denote creations, people and events that influenced some of classical music’s most renowned composers.

The lineup includes such celebrated artists as pianist Joyce Yang, clarinetist Anthony McGill, the Miró Quartet and the 19-piece chamber orchestra The Knights. Also set to be showcased is 39-year-old violinist and singer Caroline Shaw, who at 30 became the youngest artist to ever win a Pulitzer Prize for music composition.

In addition, the lineup includes Grammy Award-winning singer Cécile McLorin Salvant. She will do the first stand-alone jazz concert in SummerFest history, and will team with countertenor Anthony Roth Costanzo for a performance of classic songs by German composer Kurt Weill.

SummerFest’s seven-day increase in duration will result in five more performances than at last year’s 16-concert edition. It will also see the introduction of intermissionless Wednesday-afternoon concerts, which will be followed by food and wine offerings — themed to that day’s concert — in the courtyard of the society’s Conrad Prebys Center for the Performing Arts.

“The idea is that you’re really joining us for a festival that is festive, a party,” said SummerFest music director Inon Barnatan.

The increase in size, duration and scope is by design, as part of the nonprofit society’s five-year growth plan. But the goal of the event’s expansion is to make it more leisurely, not more hectic, with the festival going dark on Monday and Tuesday nights.

“This way, there will be more space around the concerts,” Barnatan noted.

“Instead of having five main concerts per week, we now will have four main concerts on Wednesdays, Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays. This way, there will be less fatigue for everybody. It will be more relaxed.”

July 31: “Baroque by the Beach” — Featuring music by Falconieri, J.S. Bach, CPE Bach, Biber and Vivaldi, 3 p.m.

Aug. 10: “Under the Influence: Vivaldi’s ‘ Four Seasons,’ ” 7 p.m.

Aug. 12: “The New Romantics” — Hamelin and Dvor ák LA JOLLA MUSIC SOCIETY

Grammy-winning singer Cécile McLorin Salvant will perform a stand-alone jazz concert.

Aug. 13: SummerFest Gala Aug. 14: “The Wagner Effect” — Strauss, Berg, Wagner, Liszt and Dohnányi, 3 p.m.

Aug. 17: “Under the Influence” — Cécile McLorin Salvant Quintet, 7 p.m.

Aug. 18: Synergy Event: Kurt Weill tribute, featuring Cécile McLorin Salvant and Anthony Roth Costanzo Aug. 20: “The Planets,” featuring The Knights and Dance Heginbotham, 6 and 8 p.m., The JAI

HAYNE PALMOUR IV U-T FILE KT KIM

Pianist Joyce Yang will be one of the featured artists at the 2022 edition of the La Jolla Music Society’s annual SummerFest. society’s CEO and president.

“Part of our growth plan is to have one or two jazz or nonclassical concerts at each future edition of SummerFest,” Schultz said.

“The event’s core will solidly remain chamber music, with a focus on Brahms, Haydn, Mozart, Vivaldi, Beethoven, Elgar and other bedrock composers. But we’ll also feature composers whose work you wouldn’t expect to find in a chamber music festival, programming that really reflects Inon’s interest in being more adventurous and creative.”

The theme of this year’s SummerFest, “Under the Influence,” explores events, places and individuals that inspired the storied composers whose music will be performed.

Those places will be reflected in such concerts as “Shakespeare’s World” on Aug. 3 and “A Weekend in Paris” Aug. 5-7.

For the record, the “Under the Influence” theme has nothing to do with the drinking habits of any composers, even if Beethoven’s welldocumented propensity for alcohol consumption ravaged his liver.

“There’s obviously a kinky sense to the name ‘Under the Influence,’ ” Rosenthal said, laughing.

“As tongue-in-cheek as the title is, there is another element,” stressed Barnatan, who is an internationally acclaimed concert pianist.

“As a consumer of music, I want the concert experience to be — as much as possible — a complete one. I think about: ‘What experience does the audience have before, during and after the concert?’

“That is why we are introducing the intermissionless Wednesday afternoon concerts, followed by food and drink in the courtyard, so that you can have a whole experience that is both musical and nonmusical.

That said, the contents are more important than the theme.”

Barnatan chuckled.

“I don’t think that we’ll be having Elizabethan foods for the ‘Shake-

speare’s World’ concert!”

I love Paris

Last year, while planning the 2022 edition of SummerFest, Barnatan had contemplated including a concert or two that would salute France’s Nadia Boulanger. Based in Paris, the famed music composition teacher counted Aaron Copland, Elliott Carter, Philip Glass, Quincy Jones and Brazil’s Egberto Gismonti among her most notable students.

While the Boulanger tribute did not coalesce for this year’s SummerFest, it inspired Barnatan to create the three-part “A Weekend in Paris” series, which will run Aug. 5-7. It will feature music by composers who were based in the French capital, or spent pivotal times in their careers there, including Debussy, Chopin, Ravel, Messiaen, Schumann and Lili Boulanger, Nadia’s younger sister.

“I am so excited about the ‘A Weekend in Paris’ series,” Barnatan said, speaking by phone from his New York apartment in Manhattan’s SoHo district.

“I started off with it being a single concert, but I could do a whole festival with this theme! So, I had to at least do a weekend devoted to Paris.

There are so many fantastic stories surrounding the city, whether it’s the conservatory — where so many great musicians studied and were nurtured — or the salons that held concerts and commissioned great works.”

Barnatan is equally enthused when discussing SummerFest’s Aug. 14 “The Wagner Effect” concert. It will examine the formidable impact of the 19th-century German composer Richard Wagner in a program that also features his music and works by Strauss, Berg, Liszt and Dohnányi.

“That concert is a product of my fascination, which is shared by others, with the effect Wagner’s music and personality had on other com-

Inon Barnatan, music director of SummerFest, will also perform during the festival. posers,” Barnatan said. “Wagner’s (1865 opera) ‘Tristan und Isolde’ changed music and changed harmony, and steered it to different directions. The concert will be a deep dive into the world of harmonic possibilities.”

The 2022 edition of SummerFest is the fourth since Barnatan came on board as music director in 2019. That was the same year the society’s $82 million Conrad Prebys Performing Arts Center opened in La Jolla.

The 2020 edition was held, in truncated form, entirely online because of the pandemic shutdown.

Happily, 2021 saw a return to all-live performances in front of audiences, although masking and proof of vaccinations were required.

“We were largely back to normal last year,” society honcho Schultz said.

“Other than the health protocols, it looked like a normal, pre-pandemic SummerFest, with 16 public concerts, plus dozens of master classes, free concerts during the daytime, artist roundtables, lectures and seminars. It was a huge success coming off a very difficult period.

And it gave our audiences confidence we could bounce back quickly.”

If all goes according to the society’s five-year plan, SummerFest could expand again by 2026, this time from four weeks to five. The number of nonclassical concert offerings would rise as well, with the addition of more jazz, cabaret and world music artists.

“It’s a great way to engage with new audiences and with a slightly different demographic than SummerFest usually attracts,” Rosenthal said.

“And, by drawing them in during a chamber music festival, maybe we can help them explore music they aren’t as familiar with. It’s really important for us to continue to grow and create new content.” george.varga@sduniontribune.com

Aug. 21: “The Planets,” featuring The Knights and Dance Heginbotham, 3 and 5 p.m., The JAI. Aug. 24: “Under the Influence” — Miró Quartet performs Shaw and Mendelssohn, 7 p.m.

Aug. 24: “Takeover @ The JAI,” featuring Caroline Shaw, 8:30 p.m.

Aug. 25: “New Wine, Old Bottles” — Featuring music by Françaix, Chris Rogerson and Brahms Aug. 26: SummerFest Finale, “Metamorphosis” — Featuring music

by Strauss and Schubert Subscription packages: SummerFest subscriptions are available now.

The Windansea Series — which includes all 15 concerts in the Baker-Baum Concert Hall — is priced at $1,120 or $1,289, depending on seat location. Any concert at the adjacent JAI can be added on to Windansea for 8 percent off the price of a single ticket.

Partial subscription series and composeyour-own packages will be made available later in the spring.

Single tickets: On sale April 29, $45 to $110 Phone: (858) 459-3728 Box office: 7600 Fay Ave., La Jolla Online: ljms.org

THE SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIBUNE

ley) as her partner in the new episode “Jesus Take the Wheel.”

BEST B E TS Sunday

“Don’t Hang Up”: Bounce, 8 p.m. A thriller premise based on a true story: In one phone call, a dad (Wendell Pierce, Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan) learns his daughter has been taken hostage and is ordered to fulfill a series of missions to get her back — while staying on the line and ignoring his increasingly frantic wife (Lauren Holly).

“The Equalizer”: CBS, 8 p.m.

In the new episode “D.W.B.,” two deputies fear reprisal after using excessive force on Dante (Tory Kittles) before realizing he’s a fellow cop.

“Riverdale”: The CW, 8 p.m.

New episodes. As news begins to spread about the bombing at the Andrews’ home, Archie (KJ Apa), Betty (Lili Reinhart) and Jughead (Cole Sprouse) begin to deal with mysterious side effects from the explosion. Elsewhere, Veronica (Camila Mendes) spirals after learning that Hiram (Mark Consuelos) may have been involved, and Cheryl (Madelaine Petsch) is consumed with guilt when she believes she may have had a hand in the explosion.

“The Simpsons”: Fox, 8 p.m.

When Bart (voice of Nancy Cartwright) befriends a famous kid influencer, Homer (voice of Dan Castellaneta) leads a rebellion of loser dads against them in the new episode “Bart the Cool Kid.” “The Great North”: Fox, 8:30 p.m. In the new episode “You’ve Got Math Adventure,” Honeybee (voice of Dulce Sloan) agrees to help Moon (voice of Aparna Nancherla) with his school problems, only to learn that something else is on his mind.

Monday “American Idol”: ABC, 8 p.m.

Season 5 continues on ABC as superstar judges Luke Bryan, Katy Perry and Lionel Richie journey to find America’s next singing sensation. As the final auditions across Los Angeles; Austin, Texas; and Nashville, Tenn., come to an end, the show’s iconic judge auditions will surprise audiences and hopefuls alike with neverbefore-seen twists, and the final Platinum Ticket winner is revealed. Emmy Award-winning producer Ryan Seacrest hosts.

Smith) becomes worried about JR (Sylvester Powell), who is dealing with issues in the wrong way. Meanwhile, Coach Marcus (Cory Hardrict) and Amara’s (Kelly Jenrette) relationship comes to a head, leaving them questioning how to move forward.

Tuesday “FBI”: CBS, 8 p.m. When murder victims are discovered bound by the same sophisticated knot, the team realizes they have a cross-country serial killer on their hands in the new episode “Scar Tissue.”

“Superman & Lois”: The CW, 8 p.m. Lois (Elizabeth Tulloch), Clark (Tyler Hoechlin) and Natalie (Tayler Buck) notice a difference in John Henry’s (Wolé Parks) behavior and fear something might be very wrong. Meanwhile, Kyle (Erik Valdez) encounters an awkward moment with Lana (Emmanuelle Chriqui) while stopping by the house to pick Sarah (Inde Navarrette) up for school. Lastly, Jonathan (Jordan Elsass) and Jordan (Alex Garfin) brace themselves when they realize a talking-to from their parents is headed their way.

“Mr. Mayor”: NBC, 8:30 p.m.

Mikaela (Vella Lovell) learns that her award for flattening the homelessness curve is based on a lie, and, with James (Yedoye Travis) and Arpi’s (Holly Hunter) help, grows determined to make a change for real. Meanwhile, Neil (Ted Danson) realizes that his excitement about the I-Team has caused his original staff to act out like children, so he attempts to appease them.

“Abbott Elementary”: ABC, 9 p.m. It’s Open House night at Abbott Elementary, and while Janine prepares to meet her struggling student’s mother, the rest of the faculty uses the time to relax. Gregory is taken aback when he learns how Ava got the principal job, and later, Barbara’s daughter’s visit creates a commotion in more ways than one.

“Bob (Hearts) Abishola”: CBS, 8:30 p.m. Bob (Billy Gardell) is under pressure when the successful MaxDot television commercial generates more business than the company can handle in the new episode “I’ll Sleep When I’m Dead.”

“The Goldbergs”: ABC, 8 p.m. When Murray goes out of town, Jane Bales (Leslie Grossman) attempts to make a power grab at the Ottoman Empire, forcing Beverly to retaliate. Meanwhile, Adam is thrilled to learn that Dave Kim (Kenny Ridwan) also plans to attend NYU. The excitement is short-lived when Adam weighs the cost of his popularity after the two agree to be college roommates.

Wednesday

“The Flash”: The CW, 8 p.m.

Barry (Grant Gustin) trusts his instincts during a murder investigation, believing the suspect, despite the overwhelming evidence against him. Meanwhile, Iris (Candice Patton) gives Allegra (Kayla Compton) an opportunity to be a mentor.

“The Wonder Years”: ABC, 8:30 p.m. As the reboot, set in 1960s Alabama, continues its stellar first season, 17-yearold Kim (Laura Kariuki) starts

a job at a Montgomery diner.

She contends with a racist co-worker and her former boyfriend Kwame (Myron Parker Wright), who pops in with a new girl. Tip well, please.

“Domino Masters”: Fox, 9 p.m. Four new teams of domino enthusiasts face off in a toppling tournament with a time-travel theme in the new episode “Qualifiers: Time Travel.” The two best teams move on to the next round.

“Home Inspector Joe”: HGTV, 9 p.m. Antonio and Sam LaValva are ready to settle down near family in their hometown of Rye, N.Y. Sam’s sister recently put her home on the market, but they know it comes with a lot of problems. They tour it and another property with Joe Mazza and Noel Gatts to see if a more turnkey home is the better option.

Thursday “Station 19”: ABC, 8 p.m. The past of Lt. Sullivan (Boris

SU

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Kodjoe) and fire chief Ross (Merle Dandridge) is revealed.

Ben (Jason George) and his wife, Grey’s doc Bailey (Chandra Wilson), press their case to raise orphaned Pru. “MasterChef Junior Edition”: Fox, 8 p.m. Fifteen chefs remain and must join together in groups to create showstopping pizzas in the new episode “Taste It, Make It.” “Call Me Kat”: Fox, 9 p.m.

Sheila (Swoosie Kurtz) convinces Kat and Oscar (Mayim Bialik and Christopher Rivas) to join her on a double date with a man who owns a local chain restaurant in the new episode “Call Me a McCluckhead.”

“Growing Up Hip Hop”: WE tv, 9 p.m. Season finale. The series that follows the lives of the children of hip-hop legends airs its Season 6 finale tonight.

“Welcome to Flatch”: Fox, 9:30 p.m. Kelly (Holmes) starts a ride-sharing business and enlists Shrub (Sam Stra-

8:00

8:30

“Built It Forward”: HGTV, 6 p.m. Matt Blashaw and Taniya Nayak fly to Albuquerque, N.M., to meet a first-time homeowner and her colleagues at Crossroads for Women. With some help from Lowe’s, they’ll transform her home into a Hollywood oasis and give the Center’s exterior a creative refresh.

“Murdoch Mysteries”: Ovation, 7 p.m. When Murdoch (Yannick Bisson) investigates the murder of a ladies’ man, Crabtree’s (Jonny Harris) aunt is the prime suspect.

“Gold Rush”: Discovery Channel, 8 p.m. Season finale. Season 12 of Discovery’s No. 1 series concludes, followed by the new spinoff series “Hoffman Family Gold.”

Season premiere. The fan-favorite drama inspired by Jane Austen’s final, unfinished novel is back. After the first season’s finale left viewers hanging in suspense, the story continues with its high-spirited heroine, Charlotte Heywood (Rose Williams), returning to the picturesque coastal resort of Sanditon and the companionship of her friend Georgiana Lambe (Crystal Clarke). What adventures, scandals, intrigue and — above all else — romance await Miss Heywood this season?

“FBI: International”: CBS, 9 p.m. In the new episode “The Kill List,” the Fly Team must figure out how to keep the U.S. attorney general (guest star Rebecca Blair) safe amid a possible security breach while she’s in Hungary for an important meeting.

“All American: Homecoming”: The CW, 9 p.m. When the power goes out at Bringston, everyone takes the time to reveal some surprising truths to each other. Simone (Geffri Maya) grapples with telling her friends about her son when she learns he will be in town for a visit, and Thea (Camille Hyde) unexpectedly turns to Simone for dating advice. Damon (Peyton Alex

“Charmed”: The CW, 8 p.m.

Mel (Melonie Diaz) suddenly finds herself haunted by memories of her mysterious breakup with Ruby (guest star Bethany Brown), while Maggie’s (Sarah Jeffery) demonhunting habit puts strain on her relationship with Jordan (Jordan Donica). Harry (Rupert Evans) tries to train the newest Charmed One (Lucy Barrett) but gets derailed when they all must focus on a formidable new nemesis who starts wreaking havoc throughout the magical world.

“Sanditon”: KPBS, 9 p.m. Sunday

“The Neighborhood”: CBS, 8 p.m. Relationships are tested when Calvin’s (Cedric the Entertainer) longtime pal (guest star Bill Bellamy) harbors a secret, and a suspicious Dave (Max Greenfield) wonders what’s going on between his principal wife Gemma (Beth Behrs) and a coach at her school.

“NCIS”: CBS, 9 p.m. In the new episode “The Wake,” a gruesome mishap at a gender-reveal party leads NCIS to the case of a missing teacher that was popularized on a true-crime podcast.

hourlong extended cut on discovery+ and a companion podcast. Episode 1 features the series’ first guest, actress Julianna Margulies.

Friday

“America’s Got Talent: Extreme”: NBC, 7 p.m. Enjoy an edited-down version of last week’s first season finale of this competition series, in which the first grand-prize winner was determined.

“The Wedding Fix”: UPtv, 7 p.m. Original film. Reeling from a breakup, professional over-planner Gwen (Andrea Brooks) pitches in to help put the finishing touches on her best friend’s wedding. But when she’s teamed up with best man Josh (Patch May), a free-spirited nature guide, she finds that pulling together this wedding might not be as easy as she thought.

E29

SUNDAY • MARCH 20, 2022

“A Second Chance at Love”: Hallmark Channel, 8 p.m.

Original film. On the surface, Alicia (Alvina August) and Arnold’s (Jarod Joseph) marriage is picture perfect; however, there is something amiss. Arnold is ready to grow their family, but subconsciously Alicia is hesitant to the idea. Rather than face the problem head on, Alicia, the self-proclaimed “love doctor,” immerses herself in her divorced parents Jack (Eriq La Salle) and Brenda’s (Gloria Reuben) dating affairs by setting them each up on a blind date dating app.

“Selling the Big Easy”: HGTV, 9 p.m. Two newlyweds are looking for their first home together, and they’re searching both sides of the causeway to find that perfect new construction. Meanwhile, Brittany Picolo-Ramos must uncover why a home with incredible custom features has been sitting on the market.

“American Justice”: A&E, 10 p.m. Aaron Hernandez had it all. The New England Patriots star tight end was revered for his true gridiron grit. But he also had a temper to match his reputation for toughness, and on June 17, 2013, he murdered close friend Odin Lloyd. This episode plays out the shocking investigation.

Saturday “Be My Guest With Ina Garten”: Food Network, noon. New series. This new series starring the Barefoot Contessa herself, Ina Garten, is a fresh take on Ina’s signature style of welcoming viewers into her home. In addition to this half-hour version on Food Network, there will be an

9:00

9:30

10:00

“Dune”: HBO, 8 p.m. Director Denis Villeneuve’s take on the first half of Frank Herbert’s classic novel is a dazzling sci-fi epic nominated for 10 awards at Sunday’s Oscars. In the year 10191, the galaxyruling Emperor hands control of the barren desert planet Arrakis to Duke Leto (Oscar Isaac), who also governs a nearby ocean world. The good news for the Duke: The “spice,” a valuable, mysterious substance that is the source of heightened consciousness and interstellar flight throughout the universe, is available in abundance on Arrakis. The bad news: Everybody else wants control, too.

Can all-out war be avoided?

10:30

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COM

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SUNDAY • MARCH 20, 2022

TRAVEL

Season’s spectacular shows draw visitors to waterfalls across the country — while they last

IN THE SPLASH ZONE

BY ELAINE GLUSAC

A

s fall is to leafpeeping, spring is to waterfall-watching, a seasonal pursuit now under way in the northern and higher regions of the United States.

Waterfalls can range from thunderous plunges to delicate mossy trickles. They can be backcountry pop-ups or the centerpieces of parks, like Great Falls Park in McLean, Va., and Silver Falls State Park, near Salem, Ore. There’s no agreed-upon definition of a waterfall, according to Joel Scheingross, an assistant professor of geology at the University of Nevada, Reno, who studies those that detach from the bed of a river, creating an air pocket between the face and the water jet. Waterfalls, he explained, can be the result of glacial carving (as at Niagara Falls), or through faults in tectonic plates. Places where hard and soft rock mix often produce waterfalls pouring over a harder rock cap that carve away soft rock below.

“Any area where the water flow is dominated by snowmelt will get bigger waterfalls now, not just in the northern U.S., but at high elevations too,” Scheingross said.

“If not snowmelt, you just need big storms.”

Especially now, perhaps, as pandemic-weary travelers continue to seek the safety and solace of the outdoors, waterfalls are “metaphors for how life carries on and nature goes about doing its thing,” says Johnny Cheng, who writes about waterfalls on his website World of Waterfalls.

The following is a selective springtime guide to waterfalls across the United States.

California

Dropping an impressive 2,425 feet, Yosemite Falls in Yosemite National Park is the icon of the Eastern Sierra Nevada range, peaking in May and June and dwindling to a trickle or drying out by August. But there are many more in the region where waterfall chasing is a spring pursuit.

“There are a lot of hiking trails in canyons outside of Yosemite where waterfalls are delights to discover,” said Allan Pietrasanta, a backcountry sportsman and a board member of the Eastern Sierra Avalanche Center.

Still, many of the high-elevation areas remain closed until snowplows dig out the roads in spring. When that happens, Devils Postpile National Monument near Mammoth Lakes will open, usually by mid-June, offering opportunities to see the namesake basalt columns as well as 101-foot-tall Rainbow Falls, the highest waterfall on the Middle Fork of the San Joaquin River, and named for the rainbows that tend to form in the mist. It is reached via a roughly 3-mile, round-trip hike.

Nearby falls include Twin Falls, tumbling out of Lake Mamie, and 270-foot Horsetail Falls on the 16-mile June Lake Loop road.

New York

GETTY IMAGES

Yosemite Falls is the highest waterfall in the park, dropping 2,425 feet from the top of the upper fall to the base of the lower fall.

Roughly 6 million acres of the Adirondack Mountains offer waterfall-watching, from the well-known Rainbow Falls at Ausable Chasm, a tourist site since 1870, to the more secluded Gleasmans Falls near Lowville.

OK Slip Falls near Indian Lake lies between them on the spectrum, impressively high at around 250 feet — one of the tallest in the Adirondacks — reached via a roughly 3-mile trail through SEE SPLASH • E31

TAKE A ROAD TRIP WITH KEVIN COSTNER, OTHERS IN TOW Actor’s storytelling app narrates drive across the U.S.

BY NATALIE B. COMPTON Kevin Costner says the best way to see America is on the back of a horse. But what if you’re not an Academy Award-winning actor and filmmaker who regularly saddles up to shoot Westerns?

“You see it by car,” the “Yellowstone” star said.

Despite his preference to travel like a cowboy, Costner reveres the humble road trip. That sentiment led him

to partner with HearHere, an audio app designed to entertain drivers and their passengers with stories about the U.S. landscapes around them. Whether you’re driving down a freeway or backcountry road, the app promises to illuminate the trip with short bursts of information about the local history, culture, nature and mythology.

HearHere uses geolocation technology to queue up 8,800 stories narrated by voice actors, including celebrities such as Costner, former Los Angeles Lakers coach Phil Jackson, actor John Lithgow and Rolling Stones keyboardist Chuck

Leavell. The stories automatically start playing when travelers pass featured locations. If Kevin the app is Costner closed, it sends you a notification when you have activated a story.

Throughout his life, Costner said, he has been compelled to pull over at landmarks to read about a place, no matter how interested his traveling companions were in an impromptu history lesson.

“There’s something

terribly satisfying in the learning process when it’s not really shoved down your throat and to understand where you’re walking or you’re driving through,” Costner said. “Our intention is to go deeper and deeper into those stories.”

I told Costner about the short road trip I was taking with my dad near Sierra National Forest, a place not too far from the parts of California where the actor and I both grew up. He immediately regaled me with stories full of geological and cultural facts about the region full of geological and cultural facts.

I decided to try the app

myself to see how storytelling could inform my own road trips. Here’s what I learned from the test drive.

For the full experience, you’ll have to subscribe

You can listen to five stories with a free account, but the stories aren’t very long — usually just a couple of minutes. You could easily run through those freebies before your road trip has really started.

In California, I downloaded the app for my iPhone and paid $35.99 for a one-year membership.

There are weekly subscriptions, too, for $29.99. If paying for a “road trip app”

seems like too much of a niche purchase, note that you don’t have to be in a car to use it. You can fire it up on trains or buses, open it up at home to learn more about your neighborhood or listen to stories while you’re visiting a new place on foot.

My dad and I hopped into the van to drive into the mountains, and the first story we listened to was about my hometown, Fresno. Apparently the city’s name is the Spanish word for ash tree because the county is full of them.

Somehow, in 18 years of living there and 13 years of visits, I had never learned SEE COSTNER • E31

THE SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIBUNE

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CALEB KENNA THE NEW YORK TIMES

In New Hampshire’s White Mountains, visitors can find Arethusa Falls, the highest waterfall in the state, which drops over a cliff nearly 200 feet tall.

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The three waterfalls that make up the famous Niagara Falls in New York state near the Canadian border are the result of glacial carving.

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At Silver Falls State Park near Salem, Ore., the 177-foot South Falls is part of the Trail of Ten Falls that meanders through the forested park.

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When Devils Postpile National Monument near Mammoth Lakes opens, usually by mid-June, visitors can view Rainbow Falls with about a 3-mile hike.

SPLASH • Intensity of the waterfalls can increase with snowmelt FROM E30 rolling woodlands that ends at a pair of overlooks (a short, very steep trail leads to the river below).

“What’s nice about OK Slip Falls is you travel a distance to get there, building anticipation,” said Stacy Pagoda, owner of Another Paradise Cove, a canoe and kayak rental shop in Long Lake, who offers regional sightseeing advice to visitors.

Hamilton County, home to OK Slip Falls, has a waterfall challenge: identifying 19 waterfalls in the area reached via hikes that range from five minutes to several hours, each assigned a point value ranging from 1 (easy) to 4 (difficult, which is OK Slip’s rating). Hikers who score 12 or more points may receive a souvenir patch.

New Hampshire

More than 10 waterfalls seasonally gush with highcountry snowmelt and spring rain in and around Crawford Notch State Park in the White Mountains. The highest in the state, Arethusa Falls, drops over a nearly 200-foot cliff face.

Two of the park’s falls, the ribbonlike Silver Cascade and Flume Cascade, can be viewed from roadside stops. Others require a hike on trails that may be muddy or snowy this time of year.

“You can do a lot of hik-

ing if you want to,” said Clare Arentzen, a senior outdoor guide with the Appalachian Mountain Club in New Hampshire, noting that the moderate 3-mile, round-trip trail to Arethusa Falls can be looped to the Bemis Brook Trail to reach the tiered Bemis Brook Falls for “more bang for your buck.”

Throughout the White Mountain region, Chris Whiton, a nature photographer who regularly shoots waterfalls, estimates that there are more than 100 named falls in shapes from flumes to drops to steps. He uses 19th-century guides published by railroads and hotels to find often unnamed waterfalls that have fallen off the map.

“Waterfalls are fun because they have such personality, and each is a little different,” he said.

At nearly 100 feet, Moxie Falls, in the central Kennebec Valley, where the Dead and Kennebec rivers meet in a region known as The Forks, is among Maine’s highest falls, with the added attraction of easy accessibility. A well-maintained trail of about half a mile reaches the water, a popular swimming hole in summer.

Gulf Hagas, near Brownville in central Maine, has often been called the “Grand Canyon of Maine” for its series of slate gorges, rock walls, and falling and rippling water along 4 miles of the West Branch of the Pleasant River in the Appalachian Trail corridor.

From the same trailhead, ditch the crowds by hiking just over a mile to Hay Brook Falls, “prettier than Gulf Hagas and easy to get to,” Westrich said.

Maine

The United States and Canada technically share 120-foot High Falls in Grand Portage State Park, where the Pigeon River forms the international border in northern Minnesota on Ojibwe tribal lands.

“High Falls is the biggest of the plunges, the last big one the river takes before it lazily makes its way to Lake Superior, not quite 2 miles to the lake,” said Travis Novitsky, the park manager.

“It’s pretty common to

Many of the cascades and falls in Maine are ephemeral and dependent on snowy winters, according to Greg Westrich, the author of “Hiking Waterfalls Maine,” which identifies about 100 falls in the course of 67 hikes.

“In Acadia National Park, there are half a dozen falls that will be dry by midJune or just a trickle unless there’s a heavy rainstorm,” he said.

Minnesota

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get a rainbow when the water is high,” he added, noting the angle of the viewing platform to the falls, an effect also visible by moonlight.

In addition to seeing Minnesota’s highest falls, accessible by a paved trail, explorers can take a challenging 4.5-mile round-trip hike over rugged, rocky hills, crossing a ridge with panoramas of the river and Lake Superior, to reach more remote Middle Falls.

Grand Portage is on the north end of the 145-mile drive from Duluth along Lake Superior, stringing together eight state parks, most with their own waterfalls, including Tettegouche State Park, home to another High Falls, the second tallest in the state.

Idaho

Many waterfalls are regulated by dams or siphoned for irrigation. But Mesa Falls on the Snake River in the CaribouTarghee National Forest in eastern Idaho, about 50 miles southwest of Yellowstone National Park, flows freely, the last of the uncontrolled falls in the state.

When snowmelt swells the Snake River, May through June, it rushes in a white water curtain over the 10-story, roughly 200-footwide Upper Mesa Falls. A mile downstream via the

Mesa Falls Scenic Byway, the water then tumbles through a smaller chasm known as Lower Mesa Falls.

“In spring, the falls are thundering,” said Susan McKenna, who manages the falls site.

Though located at a 6,500-foot elevation, Mesa has the advantage of being accessible, especially for families, many of whom are on their way to Yellowstone when they stop by the falls.

The round-trip hike to the viewing platforms is around half a mile, and a walk on a nature trail will add 2 miles.

The byway has been plowed, but the road may be icy and the visitors center will not open until around Memorial Day. “People have been calling already to find out if we’re open,” McKenna said.

“We’re not Old Faithful, but we’re getting there.”

Washington

There are at least 150 waterfalls in Mount Rainier National Park, about 85 miles south of Seattle. But the unofficial count is much higher.

“There are times of year that if you counted every place where water is running and dropping, you probably have thousands in the park,” said Kevin Bacher, the park’s volunteer program manager. “There’s a good reason we’re in a

region called the Cascades.”

It might take until July for the snow, which averages 53 feet annually in the 5,400-foot Paradise area, to melt. Snowmelt and water from 25 glaciers on the 14,410-foot namesake peak produce a prolonged torrent that starts in April and works its way to higher ground in summer.

“The park is best known for its mountains and grand scenic vistas, so a lot of times people miss the forest trails where you see the waterfalls,” Bacher said.

For a mix of seasonal and year-round falls, he recommended the lowerelevation Eastside Trail, introducing “a waterfall every quarter-mile or so” along the roughly 13-mile, one-way trail. The trail, which has several access points for shorter treks, follows the Chinook Creek and Ohanapecosh River through dense forests past a series of falls, including two-tiered-plunge Ohanapecosh Falls and “a bunch that aren’t named.”

From a roadside lot, visitors can easily visit Narada Falls, where the icy waters of the Paradise River sail nearly 180 feet over ancient andesite volcanic rock.

Glusac is a freelance writer.

This article appeared in The New York Times.

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Narada Falls, which is easily accessible from a roadside lot, is one of at least 150 waterfalls in Mount Rainier National Park, north of Seattle.

The High Falls in Grand Portage State Park in Minnesota are technically shared between the U.S. and Canada; the Pigeon River forms the international border.

COSTNER Download the stories before trip

app needed to offer a robust account of American history, including the negative parts.

“It’s horrible in so many ways, but I’m not embarrassed to learn about it,” Costner said. “It allows for more empathy to understand how people were shoved out of here. ... The depth of displacing people is not something we will ever overcome, but if we choose to forget it, then we’re really in a lot of trouble.”

One story got me and my father talking about the incarceration of Americans of Japanese ancestry during World War II. My dad told me that he worked in a building that was once part of a detention camp for

FROM E30 that. About nine short stories later, I felt much more in touch with my home state.

To get the best use of the app, download stories offline before you start driving, or at least while you have cell service. I didn’t, and I regretted it once my dad and I began twisting up mountain roads. Not only

did I get carsick, we couldn’t listen to many stories for the rest of the trip.

App is part icebreaker, part entertainment

Beyond providing educational entertainment, Costner sees the app as a conversation starter for families.

“I’m having a hard time with my own kids getting their nose out of their computers and I don’t think I’m the only one,” said Costner, a father of seven. “I know it’s biblical that your kids don’t listen to you, but I find that they’ll listen to this a little bit.”

“Sometimes when you hear a story together, it kind of bonds you,” he added.

On my trip, the app did

inspire conversations beyond the usual small talk catching up on family news.

After listening to a story about Fresno’s Forestiere Underground Gardens — a national treasure built by a Sicilian immigrant in the 1900s — we reminisced over our own family visit to the site when I was a kid, as well as the loose connection that my parents now love traveling to Sicily.

Segments don’t shy away from America’s ugly history

Before he agreed to get involved, Costner had one stipulation: HearHere had to tell stories about Native Americans, “because there is no HearHere without who was here first,” he says. The

Japanese Americans in the 1940s. During my dad’s career, a Japanese firm purchased the company. I never would have learned this without HearHere sparking the conversation.

Listening will make you want to plan a road trip

My main takeaway from testing the app was that I’m not taking enough road trips.

Instead of seeing long drives as a painful form of transportation, I should be seeing them as a way to slow down, learn more and connect with my travel partners. Plus, Kevin Costner loves them, and apparently I am easily influenced by Kevin Costner.

“We’re used to taking everything for granted.

Everything is at our fingertips now; there’s not anywhere you can’t go,” Costner said. “But to go across the country, you have to make an effort. Make the effort.

Get a part of doing something that isn’t easy, and you’ll never forget it.”

Once he started dispensing advice, Costner got on a roll: “Get in the car. Take your kids. Take your friends.

Stop. Find a campground.

Find a museum and ask how the name of the town came to be. ... Just try it. You’ll never — almost never — regret it.”

Compton writes about travel for The Washington Post.

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