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About Just out. (Portland, OR) 1983-2013 | View Entire Issue (Feb. 2, 2007)
on stage ì Artists Repertory Theatre presents a world premiere adaptation of Anton Chekhov's Vanya starring Academy Award winner William Hurt that transplants the setting from 19th century Russia to Depression-era America, through Feb. 25. (Call for times. 1516 SW Alder St. $24-$64 from 503-241-1278.) Arts Equity presents Hot 'n' Throbbing, a button-pusher that boldly asks, "Which is more obscene, pornography or domestic violence?" through Feb. 25. (7:30 pm Thursday-Saturday, 2 pm Feb. 4 and 25. 606 Mam St $8-$24 from 360-695-3770.) Blue Monkey Theater Company presents a rock 'n' roll take on Shakespeare's classic love story Romeo 8 Juliet Feb. 9-25 at West End Theater. (7 pm Friday and Saturday, 2 pm Saturday and Sunday. 1220 SW Taylor St $10-$20 from 503-777-4506.) Miracle Theatre Group presents Sonia Flew through Feb. 24 BodyVox presents First Impressions V. 5, another evening of entirely new works, Feb. 2 and 3 at Columbia Dance Center in Vancouver, Wash (7:30 pm. 1700 Broadway. $24-$30 from 503-229-0627.)' CoHo Productions presents gay playwright William S. Gregory's Chateau Joyeaux, a tale of a family divided during post-war France, through Feb. 24. (8 pm Thursday- Saturday, 2 pm Sunday. 2257 NW Raleigh St. $20-$23 from 503-220-2646.) Defunkt Theatre presents the Portland premiere of The Trestle at Pope Lick Creek, a haunting drama in which a pair of young friends race against death, through Feb. 10 at Back Door Theater. Trestle is a slow, dolorous tale of teenage yearning set amid the Great Depression. Despite wonderfully weird moments with two kids under a bridge, the play is overall vaguely incoherent and off-key, with visual compositions and physicality dwarfing its bland language. (8 pm Thursday-Sunday. 4319 SE Hawthorne Blvd. $10 $ 15 from 503-481-2960; Thursdays and Sundays are "pay what you will.") Discovery Theatre Lab presents Phaedra, a Greek tragedy about a princess who falls for her stepson, through Feb. 4 at Gresham Little Theater. (8 pm Friday and Saturday, 4 pm Sunday. 30639 SE Bluff Road. $10.) Insight Out Theatre Collective presents The Yellow Boat, based on the true story of a young boy who contracts HIV through a blood transfusion and creates inspired art that transforms his pain, through Feb. 11 at Echo Theatre. (8pm Friday and Saturday, 2 and 7 pm Sunday. 1515 SE 37th Ave. $15 from 503-493-8070; Sunday evenings are $5 $ 15 sliding scale. All shows are two for one!) Interstate Firehouse Cultural Center presents No Strangers Here Today, a compelling new work by acclaimed performer Susan Banyas based on Underground Railroad diary entries, Feb. 16-18. (8 pm Friday and Saturday, 4 and 7 pm Sunday. 5340 N Interstate Ave. $10- $20 sliding scale from 503-239-7107.) Interstate Firehouse Cultural Center presents Facets of Africa, featuring some of Portland's most vibrant storytellers sharing tales from several African cultures followed by an open conversation about the diversity within African cultures, through March 15. (10 am Thursday, 2pm Saturday. 5340 N Interstate Ave. $5 $ 10 from 503-823-9455, ext. 1.) Lakewood Theatre Company presents Where's Charley?— a Tony-winning musical packed with Frank Loesser hits—through Feb. 18. (Call for times. 368 S State St., Lake Oswego. $23-$25 from 503-635-3901.) Madison's Grill presents the dinner theater musical Who Stole My Dead Husband through March 31. (7 pm Saturday. 1109 SE Madison St. $57-$67 from 800-966-8865.) Miracle Theatre Group presents Sonia Flew, a moving account of a Cuban-American woman whose half-Jewish son enlists in the war against terror in Afghanistan in the weeks following 9/11, through Feb. 24. (7:30pm Thursday, 8 pm Friday and Saturday, 2 pm Sunday. 525 SE Stark St. $17-$20 from 503-236-7253.) Northwest Children's Theater presents the Portland premiere of Junie B. Jones and a Little Monkey Business, a musical based on the popular book about a kindergartner who is delighted to learn that her new baby brother is a "real, alive monkey!" through Feb. 26 at Northwest Neighborhood Cultural Center. (Call for times. 1819 NW Everett St. $16-$20 from 503-222-4480.) Portland Center for the Performing Arts presents Menopause: The Musical— four women at a lingerie sale with nothing in common but a black lace bra, memory loss, hot flashes and night sweats—extended through March 18 at Winningstad Theatre. (Call for times. 1111 SW Broadway. $44.50 from box office or Ticketmaster.) Portland Center Stage presents Misalliance, George Bernard Shaw's biting satire that unmasks aristocratic courtship, cavorting and matrimony and decries Edwardian class stratification, through Feb. 4 in Gerding Theater at the Armory. Broad orations are drawn out in what seems a noticeably American hand gripped around a thick Sharpie. A few laughs, a few nods, but no fizzy contemplation of the fine lines that distinguish class or equality. (Call for times. 128 NW 11th Ave. $16.50- $59.50 from 503-445-3700.) Hard-working Sonya (Valerie Stevens) and Uncle Vanya (Allen Nause) share a moment of tenderness as their world falls apart in Vanya, through Feb. 25 at Artists Rep. renowned as the quintessential Bel Canto masterpiece, Feb. 10,15 and 17 at Keller Auditorium. (7:30pm. 222 SW Clay St. $39 $ 140 from Ticketmaster.) Portland Opera's Broadway Across America presents Altar Boyz, a smash off-Broadway musical-comedy spoof about a heavenly boy band on the rise to stardom, through Feb. 4 at Newmark Theatre. (Call for times. 1111 SW Broadway. $41-$51 from Ticketmaster.) Portland Story Theater presents And Then the Bed Broke, a seamless collection of stories, from the heart- warmingly tender to the deliciously dark and cynical, about finding love by any means possible, Feb. 9-17 at Brooklyn Bay Performance Space. 18 pm Friday and Saturday. 1825 SE Franklin St. $15 from 503-793-5484; includes one complimentary beverage and light snacks.) Profile Theatre Project continues its Wendy Wasserstein season with The Heidi Chronicles, a Tony- and Pulitzer-winning play that follows an art histori an through two decades of personal change as women begin to question their roles in society, through Feb. 11 at Theater Theatre. This solid performance of Wasserstein's '80s period piece offers a nonstop parade of witty zingers and a buzz of upper-echelon East Coast name-dropping that at times limit the seriousness of her underlying subjects. Still, several touching moments and conundrums are effectively rendered. (8 pm Thursday-Saturday, 2 pm Sunday, 2 pm Feb. 3. 3430 SE Belmont St. $10-$28 from 503-242 0080.) Profile Theatre Project continues its Wendy Wasserstein season with a staged reading of Isn't It Romantic, a wry lament about the single life, through Feb. 7 at Theater Theatre. (7 pm Sunday-Wednesday. 3430 SE Belmont St. $10-$15 from 503-242-0080.) Portland Center Stage presents Act a Lady, gay play wright Jordan Harnson's gender-bending farce about three middle-American men who decide to stage a French melodrama in drag, through March 11 in Gerding Theater Readers Theatre Repertory explores the dark and funny Studio at the Armory. (Call for times. 128 NW 11th Ave. 1 side of love in Love Bites Feb. 9 and 10 at Blackfish Gallery. $15-$30 from 503-445-3700.) (8 pm. 420 NW Ninth Ave. $8 from 503-295-4997.) Portland Center Stage presents The Thugs, a humorous Rising Tide Productions presents Winter Words: Cold tale of paranoia and tedium in the lives of a group of law Readings of three plays by gay writer William S. Gregory firm temps, Feb. 9-March 10 in Gerding Theater Studio at through Feb. 12 at CoHo Theater. (7 pm Monday. 2257 NW the Armory. (10:30 pm Friday and Saturday. 128 NW 11th Raleigh St.) Ave. $21.50 from 503-445-3700.) Slocum House Theatre presents The Odd Couple (Female Portland Civic Theatre Guild presents a reading of Version), Neil Simon's famous update of his contemporary WonderBroads, a fast-paced comedy music revue about classic, through Feb. 4. (8 pm Friday and Saturday, 4 pm the women who influenced and reinvented our world, Sunday. 605 Esther St., Vancouver, Wash. $8 $ 10 from Feb. 6 at The Old Church. (10:30 am. 1422 SW 11th Ave. $6.) 360-696-2427.) Portland Metro Performing Arts presents Flashbacks, the Spring 4th Productions presents Loop: An Original long-awaited sequel to the hit musical Hot Flashes, show- I Workplace Comedy about all of your worst co-worker ing women embracing the challenges of aging and cele nightmares come to i fe, written and performed by gay brating the second half of their lives, through Feb. 24. (Call actors Tobin Gollihar and Ian Sieren, through Feb. 9 at Shoe for times. 9933 SE Pine St. $20 $24 from 503-775-8017.) Box Theatre. (10 pm Friday. 2110SE 10th Ave. $12 at the Portland Opera presents Vincenzo Bellini's Norma, I door, $10 in advance from 503-235-2633.) Tabuki Theatre presents Goa: A Ghost's Story, a tale of clashing cultures about two couples (one straight and one lesbian) who fall under the spell of a backgammon-playing guru at a backpacker hostel in India, Feb. 16-March 3 at Back Door Theatre. (8 pm Thursday-Saturday. 4321 SE Hawthorne Blvd. $10 from 503-284-6392.) Theatre Vertigo presents Escape from Happiness, a farce/ whodunit about an oddball matriarch who calmly doles out wisdom in her kitchen as her family is plunged into may hem, through Feb. 10 at Theater Theatre. (8 pm Thursday Saturday. 3430 SE Belmont St. $15 from 503-306-0870; Thursdays are "pay what you will.") Theatre Vertigo presents If You Take One Elf Off the Shelf, a maze of theatrical pranks and "actor" back-stories inter woven with a hilarious tale about an author and her char acters, through Feb. 9 at Theater Theatre. (10:30 pm Thursday-Saturday 3430 SE Belmont St. $5 from 503-970-7277; Thursdays are "pay what you will.") Third Rail Repertory Theater presents the world ^““premiere of Number Three through Feb. 10 at Interstate Firehouse Cultural Center. In this full-volume madcap portrait of 1950s military childhood, Third Rail drags a finger across the sadness and sickness that smudge an American family's gleaming countertops with a production of immaculate details and breakneck pace, though the material is one notch below the cast's poten tial. Notable: Scott Coopwood goes beyond the bad guy with his broken, touching cries of "royal blood." (8 pm. 5340 N Interstate Ave. $15-$24 from 503-235-1101.) Triangle Productions presents the Northwest pre miere of Bark!— a sometimes funny, sometimes poignant musical about man's best friend, as told and sung from the doggie point of view—through March 10 at Artists Repertory Theatre. You might howl at the premise or growl that the score is mathematically derived to please, but canine lovers will find no fault with the precise delivery of this well-trained ensemble that's happily dogged by both the powerful pipes and the personal panache to make this a winning revue of musical bones. (8 pm Thursday-Saturday, 2 pm Sunday. 1516 SW Alder St. $30 at the door, $22-$28 in advance from 503-239-5919 or www.tripro.org.) White Bird presents the world-acclaimed men in tutus Les Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo Feb. 14 at Arlene Schmtzer Concert Hall. (7:30pm. 1037 SWBroadway. $19- $43 from Ticket ma st er.) Reviewed by T imothy K rause or W inston G oodbody . Read more and comment at followspot. blogspot .com. • 100% LOANS Katrina • STATED INCOME • 1 DAY APPROVAL J CK I ÌOIÌÌCS k • CHALLENGED CREDIT OK F Where open minds result in closed loans Don Williams (503)680-4444 Infro©CW-kohidA.cohi. • E>O3-335-Q8Q8 MOW. 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