Freebie of the week: Regardless of the occasional blockbuster and annual consideration lavished on Hollywood as awards season takes maintain, the film enterprise stays troubled, the results of audiences’ altering tastes and the ever-ballooning prices of constructing motion pictures. (Dwayne Johnson earned a reported $50 million to play Santa Clause’s bodyguard in “Red One”; let that slide down your chimney for a minute!) The actual problem, nonetheless, is in conserving film theaters open. The U.S. misplaced 2,000 film homes in the course of the pandemic, the Hollywood Reporter says. Within the Bay Space, some two dozen chain and impartial theaters reportedly have shuttered within the final 5 years or so. These closures have an effect on greater than the film enterprise and actual property values, they’re a intestine punch to downtowns determined for foot visitors and a loss to those that nonetheless relish watching a film on a giant display screen in a room full of individuals. So when a spirited indie theater just like the one in Orinda unveils a intelligent and interesting movie collection, we should always concentrate. From Thursday by means of Dec. 26, the Orinda Theater is screening 11 vacation movies free of charge. On Thursday, it’s “The Polar Express” (6:30 p.m., with particular visitor Eddie Deezen); Friday brings “Meet Me in St. Louis” (4 p.m.), Saturday has “How the Grinch Stole Christmas” (1:30 p.m.), “It’s a Wonderful Life” (aka the best Christmas film ever made, at 4 p.m.) and “A Christmas Story” (7 p.m.); Sunday brings the 1938 model “A Christmas Carol” (2 p.m.) “Scrooged” (4 p.m.), and “National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation” (6:45 p.m.); Dec. 25 presents “Fiddler on the Roof” (1 p.m.); and Dec. 26 options “An American Tail” (4:15 p.m.) and “Joyeux Noel” (6:15 p.m.) Whereas the movies are free, the financially challenged theater is searching for an infusion of money by means of a GoFundMe web page. Extra info is at orindamovies.com.
Anese Jade performs the title character in African-American Shakespeare Firm’s “Cinderella” onstage Dec. 20-22 in San Francisco. (Courtesy Lindsey McIntire)
A glass-slipper vacation deal with: The centuries-old Cinderella story of an neglected and demeaned lady getting the final chortle (and the good-looking prince) when she is given the prospect to shine has numerous variations with quite a few totally different origins discovered across the globe. These generally seen in American standard tradition replicate the story’s European Seventeenth-century beginnings, and as a rule, a largely white forged. And there may be hardly ever a vacation connection, besides, in fact, for the 2019 teen rom-com “Cinderella Story: A Christmas Wish (now boasting a 40 percent audience approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes). But San Francisco’s African-American Shakespeare Company counters these trends with its adaptation of “Cinderella.” The manufacturing, directed by Tavia Percia and starring Anese Jade within the titular position, has grow to be A-A Shakes’ standard vacation staple, which regularly sells out. Although the story line follows the normal story to a degree, it additionally celebrates African American tradition and serves up a female-empowerment narrative. The present returns this weekend, with performances at 7 p.m. Friday, 2 and seven p.m. Saturday and a pair of p.m. Sunday at Herbst Theatre, 401 Van Ness Ave. Tickets are $45, $18 for these 21 and beneath. Go to african-americanshakes.org.
Oakland Ballet brings again Graham Lustig’s adaptation of “Nutcracker” to the Paramount Theatre Dec. 21-22. (Courtesy Oakland Ballet by way of Bay Metropolis Information)
East Bay ‘Nutcracker’: The “Nutcracker” vacation ballet has a reasonably unimaginable historical past within the Bay Space. There’s the San Francisco Ballet, in fact, which offered the primary full-length U.S. manufacturing of the basic in 1944. The San Jose Dance Theatre’s annual model is a few 60 years previous. And a grand East Bay “Nutcracker” custom returns this weekend to the Oakland venue the place it has been carried out for some 15 years. Oakland Ballet’s “Nutcracker” was created by firm inventive director Graham Lustig, whose model, set in Edwardian period Vienna, follows the unique model of E.T.A. Hoffmann’s story and incorporates components of an oft-discarded act that encompasses a fantastical dance within the lands of sweets. Oakland Ballet’s manufacturing additionally encompasses a beautiful artwork nouveau set and good worn by a forged of some 40 dancers. Lustig’s “Nutcracker” premiered in New Jersey in 1999, however it’s the satisfaction of Oakland now. Accompanied by the Oakland Symphony and Piedmont East Bay Kids’s Choir, Lustig’s “Nutcracker” might be carried out 1 p.m. Saturday and Sunday on the Paramount Theatre, 2525 Broadway, Oakland. A post-performance “Sweet Dreams” reception lets guests meet with performers. Tickets are $34-$154; go to oaklandballet.org.
The 12 singers of Chanticleer are within the midst ot their run of Christmas concert events packages within the Bay Space. (Courtesy Joel Simon by way of Bay Metropolis Information)
A practice noticed: World-renowned and San Francisco-based Chanticleer, the 12-member a cappella males’s vocal ensemble, has mounted its “A Chanticleer Christmas” program in numerous venues across the Bay since 1978. The standard opening is a sluggish, candlelit procession into the church, cathedral or mission whereas the singers carry out some Gregorian chant. This 12 months’s model will embody the motet “Ave Maris Stella” (Hail, Star of the Sea), which can have verses set by a number of totally different composers, and the group will proceed to carry out early music that’s its trademark for the primary a part of this system. Extra up to date, rousing and joyous choices comply with within the second half, together with excerpts from Benjamin Britten’s famed “A Ceremony of Carols” and a comparatively new piece from Canadian choral composer Sarah Quartel. Chanticleer is already halfway by means of the run of the December concert events, however remaining performances happen at 7:30 p.m. Thursday at Mount Tamalpais United Methodist Church in Mill Valley, at 4 and 6:30 p.m. Friday at Mission Santa Clara, 7:30 p.m. Saturday at First Congregational Church in Berkeley, 8 p.m. Sunday at St. Ignatius Church in San Francisco and 6 and eight:30 p.m. Monday on the Carmel Mission. Discover tickets, $45-$91, at (415) 392-4400 or chanticleer.org.
Bob Newhart, as adoptive Papa Elf, exhibits Will Ferrell’s Buddy a photograph of his actual father within the 2003 film “Elf,” being offered with reside music in San Francisco this week. (Courtesy New Line Cinema)
Santa’s not-so-little helper on the Symphony: For many who’d get a kick out of watching that green-garbed elf named Buddy getting as much as all types of shenanigans on a large display screen whereas a reside orchestra offers accompaniment, Davies Corridor is the place to be this weekend for one in every of three screenings of director Jon Favreau’s hilarious 2003 Christmas basic “Elf,” starring a wide-eyed Will Ferrell within the title position. The laughs come at a gentle tempo because the clueless orphan character, a human who has outgrown his place in Santa’s workshop, heads to the Huge Apple in the hunt for his actual start father. John Debney conducts the San Francisco Symphony taking part in the rating he composed for the film, which additionally stars Bob Newhart, Ed Asner, James Caan, Mary Steenburgen and Zooey Deschanel. The concert events happen at 7:30 p.m. Thursday and Friday and a pair of p.m. Saturday; discover tickets, $43-$213, at sfsymphony.org or (415) 864-6000.
