Stave Off January Chills With Art

1. Banana, Bag & Bodice‘s Beowulf – A Thousand Years of Baggage: The New York-San Francisco theatre collective is commandeering Berkeley Theatre’s Roda Stage for a one-night performance of its feisty-clever rock music-tinged homage to Beowulf scholarship on January 8. The company will also be reprising selected highlights from the show the following evening, July 9, at The Famous Chez Poulet Gallery-Cabaret in The Mission.

2. Les Yeux Noirs at Yoshi’s San Francisco: On Thursday 14 January, the French gypsy and klezmer music ensemble brings its high-energy, careening sounds to the San Francisco branch of the famous Bay Area jazz establishment. My father tells me that the group’s violinists, Olivier and Eric Slaviak, are distant cousins of mine.

3. SF Sketchfest: From January 15 – 31, San Francisco hosts its annual Sketchfest comedy festival. The excellent lineup includes Dana Carvey in conversation with Robert Smigel, Rob Corddry, Janeane Garofalo and one of my fave comedians, Will Franken.

4. The Crucible‘s Dracul Prince of Fire: The latest “fire ballet” project by Oakland’s 10-year-old fire industrial arts organization combines industrial and performing arts to tell the story of the birth of the vampire legend through the eyes of Dracula’s father, Dracul. The show runs January 7-10 and 14-17.

5. The Contemporary Jewish Museum‘s Warhol’s Jews Exhbition and Josh Kornbluth’s one man show, Andy Warhol — Good for the Jews?: The Contemporary Jewish Museum presents Warhol’s series of controversial portraits of famous Jewish public figures such as Sarah Bernhardt, Albert Einstein, and the Marx Brothers. Famed American monologist Josh Kornbluth throws in his two cents about Warhol in a new solo show premiering at the Museum from January 10 – 18.