Dismembering the Holidays

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More About

• Will Franken
• Michael Caine
• The Texas Chainsaw Massacre
• Monty Python
• Holiday Season

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For those overwhelmed by the omnipresent carolers, poinsettias, bedecked halls, and holiday wreaths, S.F. vagabond comic Will Franken would like to share his chainsaw with you. He’d also like to show you his Texas Chainsaw Yuletide, a delirious one-man show that cuts the holiday spirit into shapes previously unknown. Franken takes his cues from the Monty Python school of absurdity and unleashes character after effed-up character, including Father McJagger (who watches Texas Chainsaw Massacre every Christmas with the children of an orphanage) and Michael Caine’s 120-year-old mother and father, just to name a few. Franken, as heard on his podcast (which spawned the idea for this show), can riff with the best of the comedians in the local clubs. But he prefers the theater because he can develop his surreal characters without having to, as he puts it, make genitalia or Facebook jokes. In fact, he says he can get away with much more in the theater, such as Raphael the Gay Archangel, “who narrates the fall of Lucifer as if it was a bitch-fight at a techno club between Satan and God.” Franken, who is from Missouri and has spent time in New York City, says he’s always surprised to see a secular city such as San Francisco celebrate the holidays, so consider this his take on what our city’s traditions should be more like.
Dec. 21-23, 9:30 p.m., 2010