Rubicon’s ‘September Blitz’

Since the pandemic forced its doors to close in March, Rubicon Theatre rose to the challenge by quickly pivoting in creating digital content, including taking its summer youth programs online, but also launched the nation’s first theatrical drive-in concert series. Now, as its Rubicon Goes Retro Drive-in Concert Series comes to a close this week, the Ventura company’s strategy for coping with COVID has returned to the virtual world.

Over the 30 days of September, RTC is presenting more than 30 events, including live-streamed full productions of its award-winning plays, a brand new live-streamed one-act with music, re-streaming of its summer youth shows as both live streams and on demand, and a rebroadcast of its Independence Day Black Lives Matter-themed special Voices of America. The events are all part of “Rise to the Challenge,” a fundraising effort to help RTC continue through the pandemic. While the viewing window for some events have already elapsed, the Youth Theatre production of Annie, with a cast of more than two dozen, can be downloaded on demand through September 13 for $18, while free digital performances of Gulf View Drive, the final episode in the Arlene Hutton‘s multi-award-winning The Nibroc Trilogy that ran at RTC and premiered on its streaming platform from London in late spring, take place September 12-13.

On September 19-20, Rubicon will present the world premiere of A Song, a one-act play with music that serves as a conversation about race, responsibility, hope, and belonging in these new and uncertain times. Emerging young playwright Taylor Fagins takes the audience inside the life of Gill, an artist, a son, a lover, and a young Black man in America as he fights to find his footing in society and to create his own song in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic and a world wracked with civil unrest, racial injustice, and a public health crisis. Admission is free but requires reservations.

After rebroadcasts of RTC’s Summer Youth Shakespeare program’s Macbeth on September 19 ($18), and Voices of America (September 16-19; free), Rubicon’s September Blitz winds up its month of online offerings with a blowout evening on Facebook Live, featuring guest appearances and giveaways every half-hour from 5 pm to after midnight. Visit www.rubicontheatre.org/allrise or call (805) 667-2900 for details and registration.