Ben Krantz News Today

A critique of pandering theater companies gets alchemized into comedy gold in Jonathan Spector’s "Best Available," now enjoying a wickedly giddy premiere production by Shotgun Players in Berkeley.

A critique of pandering theater companies gets alchemized into comedy gold in Jonathan Spector’s "Best Available," now enjoying a wickedly giddy premiere production by Shotgun Players in Berkeley.

As conceived by writer John Cameron Mitchell and composer/lyricist Stephen Trask back in 1997, "Hedwig"— now being presented by Berkeley’s Shotgun Players — is intended to feel like a late night in a dive bar, not an evening at the theater.

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There’s a super-abundance of energy on Berkeley stages this holiday season. Shotgun Players’ "Natasha, Pierre and the Great Comet of 1812" and Wise Children’s "Wuthering Heights" at the Berkeley Rep each compress the soul of an epic literary masterwork.

There’s a super-abundance of energy on Berkeley stages this holiday season. Shotgun Players’ "Natasha, Pierre and the Great Comet of 1812" and Wise Children’s "Wuthering Heights" at the Berkeley Rep each compress the soul of an epic literary masterwork.

'Passing Strange,' Stew and Heidi Rodewald's Tony-winning show that travels from Southern California to West Berlin, returns to the Bay Area in an invigorating new production at Berkeley's Shotgun Players.

'Passing Strange,' Stew and Heidi Rodewald's Tony-winning show that travels from Southern California to West Berlin, returns to the Bay Area in an invigorating new production at Berkeley's Shotgun Players.

The Tony Award-winning musical by Stew and Heidi Rodewald offers nothing less than a vision of what it is to be human.

At Shotgun Players, the gritted-teeth panic of the not-quite-finished show seeps through.