Julia Morgan News

Pocket Opera's 32nd season is decidedly different. We're presenting six operas at the Legion of Honor in San Francisco (we've done that before), three at the Napa Valley Opera House (again, not new) and four at the Julia Morgan Theater in Berkeley (New!) Pocket Opera audiences have a fondness for Offenbach, so we're inaugurating the season with his 'La Belle Helene'. We are also staging two of Donald Pippin's brand new translations: 'La Favorita' by Donizetti and Moniuszko's 'The Haunted Manor', considered by many in Poland to be their national opera. We're thrilled to announce that we're co-producing Moniuszko's opera with the National Endowment for the Arts (New!) and The Polish Arts and Culture Foundation (Even Newer!). With the exception of Handel's Alcina, all the operas will be performed in English, using Donald Pippin's acclaimed translations. Our season usually wraps up with one razzle-dazzle blockbuster- this year we offer two: 'The Barber of Seville' and 'Carmen'.

Currently celebrating its 17th season, Berkeley's acclaimed Aurora Theatre Company announced today the company's plan to expand its Addison Street space. More than halfway through a $2.1 million capital campaign, Aurora will officially break through the wall connecting its current space to an adjacent space during a ceremony to be held on January 12, 2009. Once completed, the expansion space will add 2,600 square feet to the 7,200 square feet the company currently occupies, and will house a new rehearsal space for main stage productions, readings, and workshops of new productions, as well as artistic offices; the expansion will also increase space for in-house set-building. The projected completion date of the expansion project is summer 2009.

Brooklyn's Premier Off-Off Broadway Company kicks off its 42nd season with the social satire The Underpants. The Underpants, the Steve Martin adaptation from the classic German farce by Carl Sternheim, is directed by Seth Soloway (artistic director, Brooklyn Center for the Performing Arts), and features an entertaining veteran Gallery Players cast.