CULTURE CLASH USES LAUGHTER TO DISCUSS CALIFORNIA POLITICS

BY JENNIFER LOPEZ
Staff Writer

“Condoleezza” by Shlomo Cohen and “Hurricane Katrina Sweeps the United States” by Dudi Shamai. COURTESY OF BERKELEY REPERTORY THEATRE

Culture Clash, a renowned writing and performance group, returns to Berkeley Repertory Theater with their creation Zorro in Hell.

“It seemed like a natural fit: the razor sharp wit of the Clash colliding head on with the monolithic myth of California’s most famous Latin hero,” wrote Director Tony Taccone in the Berkeley Rep Magazine.

Richard Montoya, Ric Salinas and Herbert Siguenza founded Culture Clash in 1984. The group first performed in San Francisco’s Mission District at the Galeria de la Raza and La Pena. More than 20 years later they are still tackling relevant social issues such as homeland security and racism through humor.

Zorro in Hell is part of a trilogy of plays on the current state of California.

“We are holding fast to the Diego Rivera mantra that art and politics are inextricably connected,” wrote Culture Clash in an article for the Berkeley Rep.

The setting is a hacienda style motel run by Don Ringo, the first Chicano, and a 200-year-old woman who has slept with everyone from Shakespeare to Joaquin Murrieta. Diego, our main character, is a bothered yet unmotivated writer who checks in to the motel so he can get some work done.

The state of California is bleak. Chicanos need a hero to inspire and create change. Don Ringo and the old woman spark a plan to inspire Diego using the legend of Zorro.

Pulp fiction writer Johnston McCulley created Zorro in 1919. Zorro was the first masked avenger with a secret identity. Nearly 90 years later, Zorro is still captivating audiences and inspiring writers. McCulley’s influence is apparent in the Lone Ranger, Superman, the Phantom and the Green Hornet.

Diego travels through time examining the need for a freedom fighter. Along this journey he encounters two bandits: a sleepy Mexican and a bear named Kyle. In the end he must decide whether or not he has the strength to become a freedom fighter himself.

Culture Clash is a great introduction to theater and continues to attract theater enthusiasts.

The dialogue is savvy and clever. Choreographed by Dave Maier, the fighting sequences varied in style incorporating the various versions of Zorro created in film over the decades.

The sets seamlessly transitioned from present to past and from reality to fiction. A combination of lighting effects made for a hilarious drug-induced dream sequence.

The show is filled with laughter but the Culture Clash makes sure every word counts.

e-mail: jlopez@theguardsman.com

TEENAGE MISERY: A LAUGHING MATTER

BY DAN VEREL
Editor

Scott Lifton shares journal entries of stalking his teenage crush. JACK KARP / GUARDSMAN

When Steve Scaia was 12, he found an odd refuge to help him cope with the angst that accompanies all adolescents: He wrote detailed letters about his frustrations and shared his excitement about pizza and ice cream to none other than Mr. Belvadere, the portly British butler from 1980s television.

The letters started off as a school assignment, meant to last two weeks — it lasted two years. But those letters, some 17 years later, are the source of a fledgling show traveling across the country from San Francisco to Boston, called “Get Mortified: Angst Written,” a show in which average amateurs reveal their most awkward, private or disgusting details from the tumultuous adolescent years in front of a live audience.

Self-deprecation is taken to new heights in Get Mortified, which takes place once a month at San Francisco’s The Make Out Room. On March 25, about 120 people packed the dimly lit and cozy bar to witness the show’s fifth performance in the city.

Scott Lifton, who helped organize San Francisco’s version of the show that started in Los Angeles about three years ago, led off the night with what he promised would be “a little dirty — it’s inside the mind of a 15-year-old adolescent.”

As such, he was the “sacrificial lamb” that night, regaling the crowd with tales of perverted sexual frustration, which he channeled through the best possible way an inexperienced teen could.

“I was 15, and I was really behind the times, my friends were starting to have sex. And so, I had a lot of unused sexual energy that I focused on the most popular girl at school. Instead of asking her out, I ending up … stalking her,” Lifton told the crowd during his performance.

One absurd but innocent entry read: “Heidi is so beautiful; I want pictures of her so bad. How bad you ask? Well today, I purchased this little mini camera phone thing for ten dollars. It holds 24 pictures, and is small, and silent. I am so excited. I can’t wait to get her, her ass and her tits on film. YES!”

The entry that followed: “I got two pictures back today. She’s looking at me kind of pissed. She’s not stupid… I think I should be more careful.”
So why would anyone want to share such moments?

“Well, it’s simple,” said Scaia, now 29 and a TV writer. “There’s a big part of me that was hoping it would be entertaining, thus justifying somehow the awfulness…But also, because friends of mine had already been doing it, and they promised Dave (the creator) was not interested in making a fool out of the person,” he said. “He really works hard to make everyone laugh with you,” not at you.

The intent of the show seems to be working, based on the sympathetic laughter from the crowd. David Nadelburg, a Los Angeles based writer, came up with the idea for Mortified when he stumbled upon an old love letter he had written as a teenager. He figured other people had similar stories to share, and he was right. The show has since expanded to New York, Boston, San Francisco, and Chicago. Nadelburg was not at the San Francisco show.

Scaia and Lifton were just two of those people with painfully hilarious stories to tell. The shows typically feature about five performers.

Performers generally agree that, while the moments may be embarrassing, reading about their past shortcomings is, in some form, a cathartic, coming-to-terms experience. But it’s still funny.

“Mortified is hilarious,” Scaia, a self-described “fat kid with no friends,” said. “That’s what I love about it, and it’s not a mean kind of funny. It’s more of a ‘can you believe how ridiculous I used to be?’ kind of funny. I hope what people get out of it is the message that no matter how boy crazy, creepy or strange you were… you can grow up and be anything. Being young isn’t a terminal disease. You recover.”

The next show in San Francisco is April 21-22 at The Make Out Room. More information about performing can be found at www.getmortified.com.

e-mail: associatemanagingeditor@theguardsman.com