Intellect and Ivories

Stage

ON THE SUBJECT of the male intellect, Robert Dubac is bidding to become the reigning expert. The writer-performer’s first foray into the topic, titled The Male Intellect: An Oxymoron?, has played all over this country (and nine others), including successful stints here as a Broadway/San Diego offering at the Civic——the San Diego Theatre Critics Circle honored it as 2004’s top touring show——and a subsequent six-month run at the Old Town Theatre under Miracle Theatre Productions.

Now he’s returning, again under the Miracle auspices, with Male Intellect: The 2nd Coming! (June 4–July 13 at the Lyceum Space). In it, as in Oxymoron, he creates a lineup of characters——some of them reprised from the original cast——to comically demonstrate male (non)thinking concerning relationships.

This work, however, is somewhat fancier. “It has more production value,” Dubac says, “more multimedia to get into place.” Oxymoron’s illustrative chalkboard is back, but this time it converts into something else. “The characters start as chauvinists,” he says, “then walk through the Door of Truth. It’s one big metaphor.”

The 2nd Coming also goes beyond the focus on the differences in male versus female perspectives and into humorous political observations. “Not political in the sense of politics,” Dubac quickly says, explaining that it’s more like social and contemporary commentary. “I try to make my jokes in such a way that Democrats think, ‘He must be a Democrat’ and Republicans think, ‘He must be a Republican.’ ”

He likens his ideas to “trying to create a third party” and wanting elections “not to be about a woman or a black man. Maybe we should just put a paper bag over their heads and then be surprised.”

This new direction, Dubac says, is “testing the waters” for the third part of his Male Intellect trilogy, which he’s writing as he tours with the first two. Tentatively, it’s subtitled Piss and Moan, but he laments, “I may have to change the title.”

The 2nd Coming signals a welcome return to local stages by Miracle, which, for 15 years, presented a succession of popular plays and musicals at the Old Town Theatre. Jill Mesaros, Miracle’s producing director, says her company has been concentrating on creative projects around the country and that she likes not having the constant pressure of filling the Old Town’s 248 seats. Nonetheless, she says, future collaborations with Cygnet Theatre, which now produces at Old Town, are possible.

SCHEDULING at the Old Globe seems to be a little easier these days: If concert artist Hershey Felder is available, they slot him in. The pianist-writer-performer was a major hit in 2007 with two of his productions, Monsieur Chopin and George Gershwin Alone, and through June 8, he’s doing the world premiere of Beethoven, As I Knew Him. Like the other two, Beethoven——directed by Joel Zwick——features Felder on his Steinway playing selections from a famous composer’s oeuvre while dramatizing his life.

Beethoven completes Felder’s Composer Sonata trilogy. For those who may have missed the others, Felder and the Globe are reprising Chopin (June 11-22) and Gershwin (June 25-29). The former re-creates a private piano lesson in Chopin’s Paris salon; the latter uses many of Gershwin’s compositions to underscore the importance of his influence on U.S. pop and classical music.

A nontheatrical note in light of political spouses being much in the news: Felder is married to Kim Campbell, former prime minister of Canada.

SOMETIMES RIGHTS GO WRONG. Both Lamb’s Players and San Diego Musical Theatre had scheduled June plays that had to be replaced because owners of the works withdrew the rights. Lamb’s was slated to present the West Coast debut of Leaving Iowa, a nostalgic comedy, but now is staging The Hit (May 30–July 13), a spanking-new romantic comedy by Lamb’s mainstay Mike Buckley. Although the plot involves an attempted assassination, it’s billed as family-friendly. Meanwhile, instead of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Cinderella, SDMT offers the Elvis-to-the-Army spoof, Bye Bye Birdie (June 20-29, East County Performing Arts Center). It seems theatrical contracts occasionally are as ephemeral as their subjects.

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