Out There :: Czech, Please!

Out There's weekend begins after our presstime on Tuesdays. We've been toiling away all through the weekend to bring these few Arts & Culture pages to you in some sort of edited shape. After presstime finally we're free at last, free at last, from the exigencies of copy, from the drumbeat of publicity. But of course the Arts beat never ends.

This past week was stuffed to the gills with arts & cultural opportunities for OT. Tuesday evening the international auction-house Sotheby's invited us to Gallery Wendi Norris for a special reception and private viewing of highlights from their fall Impressionist & Modern Art and Contemporary Art auctions in New York. The glamorous haul included works by art superstars Gerhard Richter, David Hockney, Laszlo Moholy-Nagy, and Cy Twombly.

It's not that often you see work of this caliber, even on blue-chip gallery walls, on offer in SF. A rare colorful work by Robert Motherwell, a Robert Rauschenberg collage from 1961, a moody Edvard Munch and works by Miro, Tanguy, and Dali competed for our attention. Colors in a landscape by Maurice de Vlaminck (1906) leapt right off the wall. Dazzled by the art. Thanks to Sotheby's for showing the goods.

Then we hot-footed it over to the War Memorial Opera House in time for San Francisco Opera's "The Makropulos Case," in director Olivier Tambosi's beautiful staging, a co-production with Finnish National Opera, reviewed last issue. Russian conductor Mikhail Tatarnikov made his Company debut leading the San Francisco Opera Orchestra, sensational German soprano Nadja Michael vivid as Emilia Marty, American tenor Charles Workman in his SFO debut as Albert Gregor, and American baritone Stephen Powell as Baron Jaroslav Prus. Czech composer Leos Janacek watched on from the heavens of High Art. We can hear him now, too bad we don't know Czech.

Kudos to SF Opera for holding fast to its 7:30 p.m. night curtain times. After three acts of grand opera, a full intermission and long, spirited ovations, we were still out of the opera house by 9:30 p.m. A giant onstage clock, part of the set, kept us ontime. That first-act scenery, a giant, curved bookcase spilling books onto the floor, looked just like OT's own humble abode. Except their books, made of real bindings, had their innards replaced with a foam core. (Last perf., Sat., Oct. 29.)

Next night, distinguished AIDS Legal Referral Panel (ALRP ) executive director Bill Hirsh invited Pepi and OT to ALRP's annual gala held in the beautiful Julia Morgan Ballroom atop the California Merchant Exchange Building. Morgan was that rare 20th-century California woman architect who was given important commissions, such as the Hearst Castle, and the Ballroom is a real fantasy of woodwork and baroque touches high above the Financial District. ALRP offers important pro bono legal services for people living with HIV and other life-threatening conditions. A dedicated group of folks, they're doing work worth your charitable contribution: alrp.org

The event happened to take place during the final Clinton /Chump debate, so smartphone bulletins were shared across cocktails, but not during speeches. The whole thing could wait until later. Thanks to our buddy On Demand, we caught up with all the ins and outs, the political shenanigans, post-party. We also spilled a bunch of wine, oops sorry, Wilder.

Friday night we attended the opening night of playwright Jeff Augustin's "The Last Tiger in Haiti" at Berkeley Rep, reviewed in this issue. In Berkeley, the home team was playing in a nationally televised event of some sportsball significance, we were assured. Inside Berkeley Rep, in Peet's Theatre, there was Haitian storytelling and singing, poetry and stagecraft. Also, in the Roda Theatre, "It Can't Happen Here," continuing its main season run. All the vibrant theatre energy made a nice contrast with the sports stuff going on outside.

Finally it was the weekend, and we could get to work!