4 into 49 = Bedlam

In an offering that wouldn’t appear out of place at a Fringe Festival, New York’s acclaimed theater company Bedlam makes its Santa Barbara debut on April 19-20 with a two-night stand featuring two different programs of classic works. The four actors take on 49 characters in adrenaline-fueled performances unexpectedly funny, stripped-down stagings of Shakespeare’s Hamlet and George Bernard Shaw’s Saint Joan, each the most famous and iconic of the author’s works. Even more Fringe-y, onstage seating is available for both shows. But make no mistake, this is a fully professional quartet of actors, as indicated by a rave from The New York Times: “The troupe calls itself Bedlam, which gives you some idea of its ferocious energy, but none at all of its clarity, precision, and blissful good sense.” Tickets for the 7 pm shows Thursday and Friday at UCSB Campbell Hall cost $25 to $40, students $15. Call 893-3535 or visit www.ArtsAndLectures.UCSB.edu.

Speaking of great storytelling theater, Speaking of Stories’s next show, titled and themed Speaking of Friends, features tales read by well-known actors Meredith Baxter (“Proper Wolf” by Ron Carlson), Joe Spano (John Roman’s “Take My Hand”), and Pamela Dillman (“Monster Ball” by Anabelle Gurnitch), plus actor/SBCC theater prof Matt Talbott reading his own “War”. Performances are Sunday afternoon and Monday night, April 22-23, at Center Stage Theater in Paseo Nuevo. Tickets cost $18 to $28. Info at 963-0408 or www.CenterStageTheater.org.

Pacifica Premiere

Tickets are scarce for Camerata Pacifica Friday concert at Hahn Hall, where the ensemble will play the world premiere of Lera Auerbach’s 24 Preludes for Viola & Piano, the latest work from the composer commissioned by Camerata Pacifica, this one for Richard Yongjae O’Neill, its principal violist and faculty member at Music Academy of the West, to be played with fellow Cam Pac/MAW colleague Warren Jones. The pianist is joined by violinist Paul Huang and cellist Ani Aznavoorian for Schubert’s gorgeous B-Flat Major Piano Trio, Op. 99, to round out the program. The program will be repeated at The Museum of Ventura County in Ventura on Sunday afternoon. Tickets are $48 to 56. Info at 884-8410 or www.cameratapacifica.org.

Classical Corner

Mary Jo Hartle on flute, Adelle Rodkey, oboe, and Per Elmfors, clarinet, will perform Paul de Wailly’s Aubade (1906) before being joined by cellist Nicoletta Browne for Swedish composer Dag Wirén’s 1956 Kvartett Op. 31 as the opening numbers of the Santa Barbara Music Club’s concert Saturday, April 21, at First United Methodist Church, 305 East Anapamu Street. Also, pianist-composer Leslie Hogan premieres his “Moments” for solo piano and will accompany oboist Evan Losoya on Hogan’s 1996 work “Call”. The Westmont Chamber Singers, directed by Grey Brothers, conclude the program with a set spanning several centuries and including 16^th-century madrigals by Luca Marenzio and Giles Farnaby, recent setting of Shakespearean texts by Andrew Carter and Bob Chillcott, and the classic tango Naranjo en flor, arranged by Aurelio Tello. The 3 pm concert is free. Visit www.sbmusicclub.org.

Edgy Entertainment Fuels the Fringe

Westmont College’s Fringe Festival, it’s annual out-of-the-box offering based on Edinburgh’s famed genre-hopping performing-arts smörgåsbord, began in 2005 and has grown over its dozen-plus years to now feature participation from more than 100 students, nearly 10 percent of the student body at the Montecito college. Included are nearly 30 pieces of film, dance, performance art, nightclub acts, original short plays, and even Hive plays, which are the result of MFA students working with undergrads during a week-long developmental process. This year’s crop of creations – which are written, produced, choreographed, arranged, created and/or directed solely by students, including many non-arts majors – explore themes that range from the decidedly current issues of feminism and the female body, sexual identity and racism, to other serious subjects such as faith, family relationships, authoritarianism, surrealism, and postmodernism, to lighter fare focusing on bananas, fairy tales, and the TV show Twin Peaks.

The vast majority of performances take place in and around Porter Theatre on campus, which in addition to its traditional seated space will also feature poetry readings and improvisational games outside in the fest’s hub while the hall’s conference room transforms into a mini art gallery. “Every space is buzzing with rehearsals, creating something wacky, tasty, and jabby,” said co-artistic director Karly Kuntz in a press release.

But Fringe is also heading to a downtown destination in another alternative space, the Alhecama Theatre, formerly the home of Ensemble Theater, which has a different feel than the on-campus sites, according to co-artistic director Leslie Duggin. “Every room influences a piece in different ways,” she said. “The Westmont campus has a specific atmosphere and cultural context, (while at) the Alhecama students can express themselves and their art without that weight and from a different point of view.”

A full schedule wasn’t available online at press deadline, and anyway that basically goes against the culture of Fringe, though you can likely get one on campus during the fest hours, which are 7:20 to 10:30 pm on Thursday, April 19; 7 to 11:15 pm Friday, April 20; 2 to 4 & 6:30 to 11:15 pm on Saturday, April 21; and 6:30 to 11:15 pm on Sunday, April 22. Full festival passes cost $15 general, $10 students & seniors, while daily tickets are $10 & $7. Buy them online at www.westmont.edu/boxoffice or call 565-7140.

In Other Words: Books, Authors, Poets, and Writers

Spoken word events are simmering over several post-weekend days this early spring week, beginning with Nicholas Kristoff at 7:30 pm on Monday, April 23. The two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and human rights advocate who has been a New York Times columnist since 2001 is offering a Town Hall-style on a timely topic, “Building a Resilient Community: Turning Adversity into Opportunity”. Radio/TV newsman John Palminteri will moderate the community conversation with the audience and Kristof following the keynote lecture at UCSB Campbell Hall, with tickets set at $5. At 4 pm the same day, Kristoff will also participate in the moderated discussion “Taking Action Matters: Santa Barbara Organizations as Global Change Makers” at the Santa Barbara Central Library, in a related, free Thematic Learning Initiative event based on the book A Path Appears: Transforming Lives, Creating Opportunity by Kristof and his wife, Sheryl WuDunn.

Word by Word

Author Anne Lamott – whose books Operating Instructions and Bird by Bird became unofficial handbooks for parents and writers whose “lives lean toward the joyously messy” – returns to Santa Barbara for an evening exploring where to find meaning in life, taking place Tuesday at the Granada Theatre. Lamott, admired for her ability to address such complex subjects as addiction, motherhood, and faith with self-effacing humor, wisdom, and uncompromising honesty, last year published Hallelujah Anyway: Rediscovering Mercy. Tickets are $20 to $35. Info at 893-3535 or www.ArtsAndLectures.UCSB.edu.

Spirits and Sonnets

The fourth annual Spirits in the Air: Poetry and the Liquid Muse reading takes place Wednesday, April 25, at The Good Lion next door to the Granada. Hosted by George Yatchisin, Drinkable Landscape columnist for Edible Santa Barbara, food writer for the Santa Barbara Independent, and author of the poetry chapbook Feast Days, the event features invited poets reading their work, and poems by other writers, all about libations. The Good Lion, meanwhile, serves up a special menu of literary-themed cocktails for purchase. Among the poets are two former Santa Barbara poet laureates (David Starkey and Chryss Yost), plus Ron Alexander, Laure-Anne Bosselaar, Mary Brown, Susan Chiavelli, Natalie D-Napoleon, Linda Saccoccio, and Emma Trelles. The 6:30 to 7:30 pm event is free.

Crenshaw’s District

Legal scholar and activist Kimberlé Crenshaw employs a Critical Race Theory (CRT) prism to discuss the Black Lives Matter and Say Her Name movements on issues of race, gender, and other hot topics. Crenshaw, a professor at UCLA and Columbia Law School who has served as an advisor to the United Nations, coined CRT as a field of study, while her groundbreaking work on “Intersectionality” has traveled globally and was influential in the drafting of the equality clause in the South African Constitution. Her lecture at 6 pm Wednesday, April 25, at UCSB’s Campbell Hall is part of UCSB’s Living Lives of Resilient Love in a Time of Hate Series. Free. Info at 893-2108 or http://mcc.sa.ucsb.edu.

One hour later that same night, UCSB professor Jeffrey C. Stewart addresses the black experience going back a century as he signs his new book, The NewNegro: The Life of Alain Locke, at Chaucer’s. The father of the Harlem Renaissance, Locke – who was the first African-American Rhodes Scholar and earned a Ph.D. in philosophy at Harvard – served as mentor to a generation of artists including Langston Hughes, Zora Neale Hurston, and Jacob Lawrence, protégées he called “the New Negro” with the intention they would inspire black Americans to greatness. Black Studies professor Stewart is the author of Paul Robeson: Artist and Citizen and 1001 Things Everyone Should Know About African American History. Admission is free. Call 682-6787 or visit www.chaucersbooks.com.

Healing through Harmony: Liv On Live

Singer-songwriters Olivia Newton-John, Amy Sky, and Beth Nielsen Chapman – who in the in fall of 2016 co-created Liv On as a collaborative grief and healing album instigated by the loss of loved ones – are bringing the project to Santa Barbara to help with recovery from the Thomas Fire and Montecito debris flow disasters. Produced by local thespian/playwright/producer Rod Lathim and Dream Foundation founder Thomas Rollerson, the special performance at the Lobero on Wednesday, April 25, is a free community concert offered as a gift of love and music for emotional healing. The singers will perform selections from the album, as well as some of each’s best-known songs and hit singles, including Chapman’s “This Kiss,” a bit hit for Faith Hill. Complimentary tickets were first offered to victims as well as organizations directly caring for those grieving loss and supporting recovery, while those that remain are available to the general public at the Lobero box office. Call 963-0761 or visit www.lobero.com.