Aisle Seat

Here's the Pitch
"It began with the boy's boy in both of us," says Bay Package producer Scott Stohler of himself and cohort David Bransten. "But also, all the issues central to American culture -- race, economics, media, public responsibility -- get played out on the baseball field." That's why Bay Package Productions decided to produce Hitting for the Cycle: Nine Short Plays About Baseball in "creative association" with the S.F. Giants. "Creative association" doesn't mean the Giants are putting up the loot, but they are helping with research and such details as lending uniforms to the costumer. Playwrights include Gary Leon Hill, Arthur Kopit, Howard Korder, Eduardo Machado, Heather McDonald and Eric Overmyer. The show is an intriguing mix of takes on the sport: Machado's Closet Games, for example, finds gay lovers at odds over baseball, while McDonald's Rain and Darkness focuses on a retired umpire, his daughter and an angel. Hill, of Say Grace fame, has developed The Real Cheese with Giants manager Dusty Baker. The series will play the entire month of July at the Magic Theatre. In conjunction with the run, George Krevsky Fine Art Gallery will exhibit "Art: The Great American Pastime."

Jung Love
Intellectual curiosity? Libidinal fascination? Transference? Whatever the reason, John Maxwell Taylor, former '60s rocker with the likes of Chuck Berry, has plumbed the depths of Carl Jung's life in creating his one-man show, Forever Jung, which premiered in San Diego last year and opens in our slightly more shrink-wrapped city June 8 at the Bayfront. In this piece, Taylor portrays 20 different characters in Jung's life, covering the early career of the psychologist/psychiatrist, his work in a mental institution and the 30-year love triangle between himself, his wife and his mistress. Jung's discipleship under Sigmund Freud and his subsequent falling-out with his mentor is also recounted. Taylor has come a long way since the era when his band opened for the Rolling Stones and the Beatles.

Explosive Dance
This summer marks the 50th anniversary of the bombing of Nagasaki, and some local performers are taking note: Theater of Yugen's Noh Space presents an evening of poetry and music May 29 titled "Atomic Mirror: Reflecting Our Nuclear History." The performance benefits Atomic Mirror Pilgrimage, a journey in which performing artists will literally retrace the route of the first atomic bomb, from its testing in New Mexico to the awful outcome in Nagasaki. Pilgrims/performers include Sheilah Glover, Barbara Borden, Edie Hartshorne and Pamela Meidell.

By Laura Jamison