Arts And Entertainment

FRIDAY, SEPT. 22 -more-

Film was the dominant art form of the 1920s, an international cultural phenomenon which, in the days before sound, was considered a universal language. -more-

Fritz Lang is best known today for Metropolis, the 1927 science fiction classic that recently screened at Pacific Film Archive. The film has been tremendously popular throughout the decades, and the fact that much of the film has been lost, cut by censors and misguided studios, has only added to its allure. -more-

Ranging from a violent clash between brothers in a quiet orchard, to edgy life at court under the onus of a suspicious usurper, to philosophical exile in the Forest of Arden where the usurper’s own brother, the deposed duke, has fled with his retinue, CalShakes’ As You Like It, directed by artistic director Jonathan Moscone, spreads out from a series of situations and encounters into a big show (if not quite a spectacle), incorporating a gypsy band, vocal renditions of The Bard’s sublime songs, a rather modest drag act, a little Big Time Wrestling, a good deal of business and routines imported from cabaret, burlesque and sitcom ... in other words, something of an extravaganza, played out under an enormous moon waxing through the boughs of trees (all scenery) to the nighttime sound of crickets (very real), in the Bruns Amphitheatre, facing the hills over Siesta Valley near Orinda. -more-

TUESDAY, SEPT. 19 -more-

From ancient geological ages through the present, plus selected eras in between, the heritage of Berkeley is on display this fall in six walking tours. -more-

“Both the theater and the circus are places where imagination thrives, springs up and flies high,” says Ismail Azeem, coproducer with Lisa Marie Rollins of The Secret Circus, to be presented by The Marsh Berkeley on Wednesdays and Thursdays from Sept. 20 to Oct. 19. “So to take all kinds of artists and put them together under one tent—it’s genius and magic all at once.” -more-