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Night Howl
By Karen Reardanz

Crossing the Line: Performance artists Susan Herold (left), Selpha Boyd and Bruce Lee explore the darker realms of humankind Saturday night in Lee's Summer on Stage performance at Watsonville's Henry J. Mello Center. Photo by Darryl Ferrucci Artijoke Hearts: Performance artist Bruce Lee travels through space and time for a surreal evening of experimental theater EVERYBODY WILL BE KUNG-FU FIGHTING in the streets of downtown Watsonville this Saturday night when legendary martial arts master Bruce Lee rises from the dead for a showcase of his faster-than-the speed-of-light moves. What? Oh, I see. So the Bruce Lee showing up at the Henry J. Mello Center is not that Bruce Lee, but Santa Cruz's very own head honcho of performance theater coming straight at ya for a night of the surreal, the provocative and the disturbing. Hot on the local performance art circuit before there really was a performance art circuit, Lee's been socking it to SC audiences since 1982, when he started out with the Rites at Roots Dance Studio, and then as a member of the eclectic Bulkhead collective. He reappears Saturday, along with the help of his capable cohorts Sara Wilbourne, Cynthia Strauss and Dresden-ites Nancy LeVan and Jeremy Lutes, for an exploratory mission into life's simple things, like say, oh, the protean nature of gender, future anthropological views of our current TV culture and the sort. The show includes performances of his 23 Sexes, parts of 1995's Subtle Body and a brand-spanking-new work, Third Hand Think Box. Leave the kiddies at home, grab your thinking caps and trudge on out to the South County, 'cause this promises to be a take-no-prisoners kind of night. Mr. Lee shows his stuff Saturday at 8pm at the Henry J. Mello Center, E. Beach and Lincoln streets, in Watsonville. Tickets will set you back $7. For more questions, call 763-4047. Radio Days There's a new radio show in town, and it's not the type your grandparents listened to. This American Life, making its local debut on KUSP 88.9 FM this Friday afternoon, features host and public radio guru Ira Glass breaking all the NPR rules. A show of storytelling, anecdotes and interpretation, This American Life weaves a yarn like nobody's business. More controversial than, say, Prairie Home Companion and its Garrison Keillor, but eons away from being an NPR Howard Stern show, it returns public radio to its roots, with all its straightforward, classic simplicity, and brings it screeching to the end of the '90s. Glass and his guests leave no subject unturned, taking on everything from the sex industry to basketball to Frank Sinatra, and wrestling it to the ground with humor and insight. The newest addition to the KUSP family plays Fridays at 4pm. FutureThink John Chamberlain, Randy & Joe and a host of other local musical types take it to the streets Saturday for an afternoon of music in the great concrete outdoors of Squid Alley. ... What Is Art? hosts local female musicians for two WomenFolk shows on Saturday and Sunday, while songstress Ariel Thiermann makes a solo appearance at Kuumbwa on Saturday. ... A Psycho-Sexual Incantation reappears at Bookshop Santa Cruz and Actors' Theatre on Aug. 2. [ Metro Santa Cruz | MetroActive Central | Archives ]