A Tale of Two Scrooges

Three critters jumpstart the laughter in “Frogz,” a Cal Performances show in Berkeley.

Singing cowboy has a little trouble staying erect in “Frogz.”

Leapin’ lizards? No. They just slither, in “Frogz.”

Woody’s [rating:5]

Three humans in full frog costumes sit silently at centerstage. They don’t move.

For what seems a long time.

That alone makes much of the audience laugh — most likely in expectation.

When one head finally bobbles, I smile. My wife laughs. Our six-year-old granddaughter giggles aloud.

Moments later, when all three are leap-frogging, stretching via calisthenics and frog-kicking wildly, I smile a bunch, my wife laughs again, and the kid giggles and giggles and giggles.

She also squeals in delight.

And that’s the way it continues, intermittently, for an hour and a half at the multi-costumed, masked Cal Performances show in Berkeley — charming both children and adults in the cavernous, 2,000-seat Zellerbach Hall.

Who says today’s entertainment must be filled with sexploitation, f-bombs or blood and guts?

Not I certainly.

Wholesome family entertainment obviously still exists.

My wife and I had seen the Portland-based Imago Theatre’s signature piece before, years ago. Watching it with the kid made it even more pleasurable.

There were times when it became extremely difficult to decide where our attention should be — on the antics of the five performers or on the delighted face of our granddaughter.

The wordless but musical two-act performance was fantastic, in every sense of that word.

Mostly whimsical. Almost magical.

Momentarily, a viewer might find hints of the mask-mime performers of Mummenschanz, the dancers of Philobolus, the acrobats of Cirque du Soleil or the illusionists of Momix.

Somewhere over the rainbow — perhaps in Kansas, maybe in Brigadoon — there may be another show that features penguins playing musical chairs, sloths that have trouble spelling, papa and mama and baby accordions that move like a Slinky, flittering lights and flying schools of fish, huge balls that momentarily squoosh an equally huge toddler, an alligator and lizard that squirm into the audience, and a singing cowboy with a non-stop changing head.

But I doubt it: “Frogz” is special, one-of-a-kind.

Flawlessly, it blends lively cartoonish characters with imaginative illusions that utilize mime, dance, acrobatics and puppetry.

Carol Triffle and Jerry Mouawad, artistic co-creators, dreamed up the show in the late 1970s. And it’s clear they dreamed in comic relief and primary colors.

The original sound design of Katie Griesar complements their efforts.

Griesar, the program guide acknowledges, “makes music with guitar, antique and toy musical instruments, found objects, collected sounds, wrong notes, and awkward gestures.”

Imago began as a mask theater company, inspired by French mime-actor Jacques Lecoq’s idea that performers could show emotions and characters through moment despite their faces being hidden.

Since its inception, it has performed all over the world — including three Broadway runs.

The troupe also has ventured into purely adult fare such as Harold Pinter’s “The Carpenter,” Anton Chekhov’s “Uncle Vanya” and Jean-Paul Sartre’s “No Exit.”

In case you missed “Frogz,” Cal Performances offers other excellent choices for families. Try, for example, these upcoming show: the Peking Acrobats, Jan. 25 and 26; Michael Cooper’s “Masked Marvels & Wondertales,” Feb. 9; and “Aesop Bops!” with David Gonzalez and the Yak Yak Band, April 6.

  Woody’s [rating:5]

Analisa Leaming as Sara Jane is supported by Jeff Pew as Jerry in “Arlington.” Photo: Jennifer Reiley.

“Arlington” is a harsh study in contradictions.

Its world premiere at the Magic Theatre in San Francisco is all about naïveté and forced awakening.

It’s about distortions and truth.And it’s about a war across the globe and a girl-woman’s introspective fight to ease her mind and soul.

I find the play’s themes neither profound nor original yet am pleased it intentionally focuses on a couple that’s “not special…just normal…boring, in fact…like people in love.”

It’s a creative masterwork, a theatrical tour de force.

Possibly because it concentrates on those patriotic kids next door who can’t possibly fathom in advance what lies ahead.

“People are a mystery,” she confesses.

Sara Jane, a Pollyanna type, futilely tries to keep things upbeat while waiting for her husband, Jerry, who’s trapped in the middle of the muddle called Iraq.

She’d been coping well until he emailed videos of atrocities — women and children being killed and burned in a ditch.

Did he only photograph them, or did he participate? She excuses either action: “Sometimes the cost is innocent people…innocent people always die in a war.”

And I doubt that she could dwell on the notion she might have become a distant chunk of collateral damage.

She does, however, ponder the possibility of her husband’s death, mentally and emotionally tying it to her brother being blown apart in another war and her visit as a child to Arlington National Cemetery with her colonel father.

She considers, too, her husband’s current horniness and past crudeness and voracious sexual appetite. But she justifies those as well: “All men are sort of pigs.”

Analisa Leaming is amazing as Sarah Jane in this odd, unique one-hour, sing-through.

Her voice any given moment can totally express joy; a fragile, paralyzed Barbie Doll the next. Her face, similarly, can portray happiness or the anguish of questioning everything she’s believed in forever.

I find it marvelous that she gets to sing lyrics that aren’t fancy but in completely accessible, everyday language.

Obie-winner Polly Pen’s music distinctly adds to the atmosphere. It’s as choppy and fragmented as Sarah Jane’s thought processes (with the resultant dramatic pianistics overlaying the jerky James Joycean stream-of-consciousness).

Meanwhile, multiple sprinklings of humor — dark and sometimes unsettling — add texture to the play, which is skillfully directed by Jackson Gay.

Some mysteries, on the other hand, become minuses because they’re never resolved, merely hinted at.

For example, will Sara Jane, despite being pregnant, become a frequent drinker like her plastic surgery-addicted mother?

In toto, though, “Arlington” is unlike any musical I’ve ever seen — basically a one-woman show with the added fillip of a second strictly-in-her-head character onstage playing the piano.

And the piano artistry of the casually dressed, bearded Jeff Pew (a triple threat since he’s also the musical director and portrays Jerry) is astounding, especially when he’s in sync with thunderstorm sounds created by Sara Huddleston.

His percussive piano chords eventually become a deafening metaphor for Jerry’s losing control.

On reflection, I think the play itself may be a metaphor for what are alluded to as “bad dreams” and “devils of the past.”

Are those devils fabricated, or are they the real “foreigners” Sara Jane thinks may be terrorists? Are they akin to “little black bugs” that should be exterminated?

It makes me wonder if, in fact, the new American military mantra has been boiled down to, “Kill them before they kill you.”

There may be no uncomplicated or definitive answer, but either way, Pen, an Obie-winner, correctly labels this production a “musical that delights with breaking rules.”

It’s her first collaboration with Victor Lodato, who wrote the book and lyrics.

Lodato, whose award-winning play, “The Eviction,” was staged at the Magic in 2002, refers to “Arlington” as an “audacious new work” and says he and Pen are “doggedly trying to explore some uncharted territory in music theatre.”

I’ve become a true believer: In “Arlington,” the Pen and Lodato team may have reached the apex of their joint aspirations.

“Arlington” plays at the Magic Theatre, Building D, Fort Mason Center, Marina Boulevard and Buchanan Street, San Francisco, through Sunday, Dec. 8. Performances Wednesdays through Saturdays, 8 p.m.; Tuesdays, 7 p.m.; matinees, Wednesdays and Sundays, 2:30 p.m. Tickets: $15 to $60. Information: (415) 441-8822 or www.magictheatre.org.

Jan Brown gleefully holds the toilet paper she’d coveted. Photo: Woody Weingarten.

I wished for an instant I was curled up in fetal position, sucking my thumb, in bed at home in San Anselmo.

Instead, I was in Yonkers, a New York City suburb, watching my wife, Nancy Fox, play a concert grand Steinway piano to a nearly empty 300-seat library auditorium following a total publicity failure by the staff.And that misadventure followed a 9-1-1 call for my daughter, Jan Brown, who’d had a diabetic meltdown in a fancy-schmancy deli.

Not quite the 50th birthday celebration for her we’d envisioned.

Toward the rear of the auditorium sat an elderly couple that reminded me of Fred and Ethel Mertz from “I Love Lucy.” My daughter, son, grandson and I scattered around the room, pretending we were part of a mob scene.

“Looks like I’m playing for my family, two new friends and 294 ghosts,” said my wife, a pro.“I was scheduled to play Oscar-winning songs,” Nancy announced, “but if any of you have requests, I’ll play them instead — after I start with the first Academy Award tune, ‘The Continental,’ which has special meeting for me: It was my parents’ song. It was playing the night they met, the same night my father proposed.”

Vigorous applause — robust considering there were only six of us — greeted her finish.

Jan asked for “Sunrise, Sunset,” a mega-sentimental tune from “Fiddler on the Roof,” and the couple followed with requests for Cole Porter songs: “Begin the Beguine” and “Let’s Do It.”

Nancy cheerfully played them — and dozens more.Six people swayed to her hour-long artistry. The ghosts? Well, I couldn’t hear their applause, but I’m positive they gave her a standing ovation, too.

My wife had planned the concert as a surprise gift, intending to dedicate it to Jan. But my disabled daughter had been so excited to see us she’d forgotten to eat breakfast — and then taken her insulin anyway.

Blood sugar tailspin!

The paramedics helped her recover just in time for me to whisk her to the auditorium.

Regrettably, a similar incident occurred days later.Jan’s top birthday wish? No diamonds. No cavier. Just toilet paper that wouldn’t stop up her apartment toilet like the brand she’d been using.

So I drove her to Costco.

But Jan’s blood sugar decided to react badly to meds she’d taken.

Nosedive No. 2!

My daughter eventually got her wish, but the purchase jerked me back to a happier moment in Guasco’s market in San Anselmo.

A day after I’d interviewed Ram Dass, he was in an aisle buying odds and ends. Nancy giggled.“What’s funny?” I asked.

“Well,” she said, pointing to the toilet paper the world-renowned thinker had stuffed under his arm, “that’s the great cosmic equalizer, isn’t it?”

We all chuckled.

Being able to give life’s pitfalls a horselaugh, I’m convinced, is the best medicine.

Heading back home, Nancy and I sailed through airport security. Putting my belt back on, however, it broke. Using one hand to pull my carry-on, the other to keep my

pants from dropping to my knees, I entered every shop that might peddle belts. None stocked anything to fit my size-43 waist.So Nancy and I laughed.

I bought one later, at the other end.

Meanwhile, I also had time to ponder a pair of anecdotes Jan had happily recalled.

“I remember listening — as child lying on a couch in your den — to the tick-tick-tick of your typewriter, and staring at the thousands of books that went up to the ceiling,” she’d said.

“And I remember having the school call home to ask where I was — I was methodically chipping away at ice because there was a dollar frozen in it.”

Her memories moved me.Being a dad can be tough in the best of times. Being the father of a disabled person can be especially difficult, particularly when she lives 2,560 air miles away.

But I don’t plan to trade her in.

Jan’s bright, sensitive and generous with her love and time and money. A caring mom and daughter.

My trip was emotionally draining, mentally draining, physically draining. But worth it. After all, she’ll always be my little girl.

Besides, I was able to bask in her smiles when I bought her some new clothes and a dresser to keep them in.As her great-grandma used to beseech God, “Let her use them in good health.”

  Woody’s [rating:3.5]

Miranda (Iulia Mykhailova) discovers her sexuality and rubbery bones on and in “Amaluna” water bowl. Photo: Laurence Labat.

“Storm,” a segment of “Amaluna,” showcases Suren Bozyan and Karyna Konchakivska as God and Goddess of the Wind. Photo: Charles William Pelletier.

Clowns deliver laughs in an “Amaluna” childbirth scene. Photo: Laurence Labat.

The more things change, the proverb screams, the more they stay the same.

Except, maybe, when the change-maker is Cirque du Soleil.

Then it’s mostly different.

In the case of the famed circus’ latest creation, “Amaluna,” in which Tony Award-winning director Diane Paulus gender-bends Shakespeare’s “The Tempest” into a feminist panorama, I could swiftly hear the changes as well as see them.

They shook me out of my comfort zone.I’d grown contented over the years with the Cirque’s signature new-agey, otherworldly stringed melodies. But now, behind AT&T Park in San Francisco, I needed to deal with rhythmic, drum-heavy world music with vibrating overtones of electrified rock chords that, well, rocked.

High energy. Emotion-packed.

And undoubtedly aimed at a new generation of circus-goers.

But for white-haired types such as myself, the music sometimes came in three-stage waves: Loud, louder, too loud.

The show, a women-power fable that blends coming-of-age and royal-romance themes, starts and ends with a dancing scarf that resembles a lithe, floating feminine body. Those moments bookend sundry acts from a 52-member multi-racial cast that, for the first time, is more than 70 percent female — and that even includes a 100 percent estrogen-laden band.Perhaps the most memorable segment is the 15 minutes that spotlight Lara Jacobs as a Balance Goddess.

She creates an eerie but mystical skeleton-like mobile out of 13 palm leaf ribs, using her toes to grasp each delicate piece. Her increasingly labored breathing, seemingly broadcast via a body mic, adds tension to an otherwise quiet, almost meditative slo-mo sequence.

Paulus inspires “Amaluna,” a fabricated word that fuses two that signify mother and moon, with a simple switch of letters, an “a” for an “o.” She transforms the Bard’s Prospero into a female shaman, Prospera (Julie McInes).

And she shows her personal wizardry by turning a youthful Miranda (Iulia Mykhailova) into a romantic partner to Romeo (Evgeny Kurkin).

The director then showcases Mykhailova’s talent as a handstander and contortionist in and out of a bowl that weighs 5,500 pounds when filled with water — and Kurkin’s athletic ability to plunge headfirst down a pole.

Paulus utilizes, too, the superb juggling skills of Victor Kee, who portrays Cali, a half-lizard, half man who momentarily traps Romeo in the bowl.What else can be expected?Typical Cirque spectacles — imaginative and flashy costumes; dancing lights that complement dancing humans; a fast-moving assortment of Valkyries, Amazons and goddesses; and a pair of clowns who do an oblique, sometimes funny number on childbirth that even features an homage to “Brahms Lullaby.”

Most of the music, by the way, is sung in French, not the invented languages for which the circus gained renown.

Cirque du Soleil has produced 32 shows so far. I’ve seen 10 or 11 of them, and “Amaluna” is neither the best nor the worst. Many of its components, however, lingered with me long after I left its big tent.

So did the sensation of having had a melt-in-your-mind treat.And I recalled that if I weren’t particularly impressed with any given component, the chunky woman seated next to me still kept blurting out in amazement, “Oh my God, oh my God.”

The Quebec-based troupe employs a total of 1,300 artists from 50 countries. More than 100 million spectators have watched their animal-free performances in 300 cities, and a few thousand more will catch “Amaluna” in San Jose starting Jan. 22.

It’s not required to have had any familiarity with Willie the Shakes to enjoy “Amaluna,” nor is it necessary to be female to appreciate that the show represents a woman’s prospective. The only requisite is to like colorful, animal-less circus extravaganzas.

“We are such stuff as dreams are made on,” the Bard proclaimed in “The Tempest.”

“Amaluna,” for me, is crammed with dreamy stuff.

“Amaluna” plays in the big top behind AT&T Park in San Francisco through Jan. 12. Night performances, Tuesdays through Saturdays, 8 p.m.; matinees, Fridays and Saturdays, 4:30, and Sundays, 1 and 4:30. General tickets: $50 to $270. Information: (800) 450-1480 or www.cirquedusoleil.com.