MEDIA ALERT

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Not Quite Opera Productions, Inc.

c/o The Alcove Theater

414 Mason Street, #502

San Francisco, CA  94102

Telephone: 1.415.992.8168

www.notquiteopera.org

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

May 2011

ABSOLUTELY SAN FRANCISCO - A musical “trip” by Anne Nygren Doherty

San Francisco, CA –Not Quite Opera Productions’ world premiere one-woman musical Absolutely San Francisco continues in the new Alcove Theater, with local actresses – including the author herself – in rotation as “Sunshine” – a free spirit living under the Embarcadero’s Cupid’s Span sculpture – and five other “typical” San Franciscans.

Insightful humor abounds in this heartwarming musical dramedy treasure about lost love and the San Francisco experience. The uplifting, whimsical book and lyrics by Anne Nygren Doherty turn the city’s stereotypes inside out, revealing the heart and soul of its citizens. The audience laughs and cries while taking an up-close, and mildly interactive, tour of the “City by the Bay.”

Guided by signals from Sutro Tower, “Sunshine” takes a cable car ride where she meets a hippie billionaire, a Chinese shopkeeper, an Indian engineer, a gay wine merchant, and an empathetic cable car conductor. The plot, which revolves around Sunshine’s effort to make a permanent home out of the bow-and-arrow sculpture on the Embarcadero called “Cupid’s Span,” twists and turns on an unpredictable comic journey that unites the contrasting characters and heals their wounds of lost love.

Part of the fun is the idea that local actresses rotate in the role. The featured actress plays all of the roles, using simple hats and props to indicate character. Watching the rapid-fire transformations between characters is also part of the fun, but the idea that various women can play the roles underscores one of the show’s central themes that the city’s people – however disparate – are all connected through their San Francisco experience: “Everybody comes looking for something…even if you were born here, you have to be looking for something, even if it’s only acceptance, because the search is what ties us all together.”

Check with The Alcove Theater 415.992.8168 for the rotation schedule.

By age 27, Anne could say she was an actress, award-winning playwright and songwriter whose works had been performed in Los Angeles, New York and Chicago. The Chicago Reader called her  “an actress with appreciable presence” and “a writer with real promise.”  In Los Angeles, her late mentor Bob Merrill – the musical theatre legend who wrote Funny Girl – called her lyric writing “genius.”  But at age 28, her career took a detour when she was stricken with severe rheumatoid arthritis. The next twenty years were a journey to healing in which she learned, as Sutro Tower so wisely puts it in Absolutely San Francisco, that everything is related – that what appear to be curses are actually gifts, and that gifts may be curses in disguise. The journey took her to San Francisco, where she has lived with her husband and two children for 11 years. There, she formed Not Quite Opera productions in order to develop new works for musical theatre – both her own and those of local writers.

Not Quite Opera Productions was founded in 2002 by John Doherty and Anne Nygren Doherty with the intention of developing original musical theater. In addition to Anne’s works, they have produced four shows, and have developed works by local writers Diane Sampson, Brad Erikson, Richard Kogl, Michael Kaulkin and C.J. Ver Burg.

Absolutely San Francisco utilizes the entire Doherty family. John Doherty, a former Hollywood lighting director, produces while Anne Doherty directs. Son Trevor, a composition student at The Juilliard School, wrote and recorded the digital arrangements. 15 year-old daughter Elizabeth, currently home-schooled, shot and edited the 150 photographs that are projected onto a screen as the “set.” The show has been a labor of love for the entire family for the past several years.

The Alcove Theater is a new 49-patron venue at 414 Mason Street, Suite 502. With its modular, raised platform stage and environmentally friendly LED lighting, The Alcove is an intimate, yet flexible performance space.

Insightful humor abounds in this heartwarming one-woman musical treasure about lost love and the San Francisco experience.  Join ‘Sunshine’ – a free spirit who lives under the city’s “Cupid’s Span” sculpture – and a spectrum of “typical” San Franciscans, as they take a cable car ride together into a life changing fog.  The whimsical book and insightful lyrics by Anne Nygren Doherty offer an intimate glimpse into the hearts and souls of San Franciscans that ultimately turns the City’s stereotypes inside out. You will laugh AND cry – and see our unique city with new eyes. Northside SF calls it “Absolutely Amazing!” SF Bay Times calls it “Fun and Funny!” Beyond Chron: “Absolutely San Francisco is very SF!”

Open Run through August 20

Thursdays and Saturdays at 8pm; Sundays at 3pm

The Alcove Theater, near Union Square; 414 Mason Street, 5th floor, San Francisco; one block from Union Square

$32 – $50 For tickets, call 415-992-8168 or go to www.absolutelysanfrancisco.com.

John Doherty

Not Quite Opera Productions

415.992.8168

email: john@notquiteopera.org