BORN READY

After a 12-year run, The Dark Room is shutting it’s doors. The iconic indy comedy venue’s Grand Poobah Jim Fourniadis sits down to share memories, history, and the scoop on why the venue is closing. The guys wonder what, if anything, this means for arts in San Francisco, agree on the value of letting artists fail, and get the skinny on how the company skated the line between parody and cease and desist orders. Also, Nicaraguan pirates release Ray who returns as co-host this week with another FaceBeat.

This week we’re on with Brian Gibbs aka B Troubles, a choreographer, art director and skater who is back in the Bay Area for his upcoming new show Life In Trouble (Aug 5-7 tickets here). We hear how he went from hyper active kid with ADHD to getting booted from art school to becoming a professional artist in LA. We also get into recent news of the closing of the Dark Room Theater, 50 Mason Social House, Viracocha and Elbo Room and what this means for funky indy art venues in SF. Plus Ray is kidnapped by Nicaraguans and Duncan runs our social media segment FaceBeat.

This week we get into government funding of the arts with the Director of Cultural Affairs for the City and County of San Francisco, Tom DeCaigny. We also deep dive into the dude who plugged his phone in to an outlet on a Broadway set, Ray’s epic Medium post, major increases to arts funding in both California and SF, and we pwned SF Barkast. Also, Ray answers a ton of listener questions.

We’re back people! And this week we have Pearl Marill with us to talk about dance, moms, and why pandering in art is a must.

Also, in case you’re curious what happened to episodes 27 and 28, those will here forward be known as the lost episodes. Perhaps they will become unlost at some point. Only time will tell.

This week we’re back LIVE (recorded) from PianoFight’s Main Stage in San Francisco with two Bay Area Theater Heavyweights, Stuart Bousel and Jamie DeWolf, weighing in on the State of the Theatrical Union.

We get a glimpse into the lives of two of the busiest creators in the Bay Area indy scene and find out why they do so much, and how they manage it all. We talk about awards and how they are and are not bullshit, and the effect they have on winners. And Rob asks the age old questions, do sales equal quality?

And finally, the identity of @FakeDuncanWold is revealed startlingly in our social media segment, #FaceBeat.

Hit us up in the comments below or @BornReadyShow on Twitter or Instagram and as always, thanks for listening!

And we’re back! After a break for the holidays and opening the space, local comedian Kevin O’Shea joins Rob and Ray for Born Ready, recorded for the first time in front of a LIVE audience at PianoFight.

The guys tell the story of PianoFight’s fabled porn-soul theater seats, set the rules for a drinking game with the audience, answer listener questions in our social media segment FaceBeat, and Ray and Rob call out the shows they are most stoked to see in the next few months.

From there the guys bring on local comic, Kevin O’Shae, and find out how he got into comedy and why. They ask Kevin, who has toured extensively across the country, how different cities have developed their own unique comedy scenes and Kevin explains the defining characteristics of the SF scene. The guys also get into how SF SketchFest fits into the Bay Area community, and Rob calls out SketchFest for not paying local performers what they’re bringing in.

After the show, stay tuned for a stand up set from Kevin on turning 30, people losing their shit in public, and reviews of Kevin on Yelp.

Hit us up with questions or comments below or on Twitter @BornReadyShow. As always, thanks for listening!

Welcome to episode 24! This week, in honor of announcing the opening of PianoFight’s new venue on Dec. 19, Ray and Duncan stage a coup and take over the show to interview Rob about everything that went in to building SF’s Next Landmark Entertainment Venue.

We respond to Daniel Faigin again, and talk about how to give and receive criticism in a constructive way – a skill the Born Ready crew has not mastered. From there we get into the construction of PianoFight’s new venue – how long it’s taken, and the challenges that go into pursuing your passion, a major sacrifice being time.

The ladies of Chardonnay stop by to judge us and announce their first show at PianoFight – a co-billing with Mission CTRL on December 19th at PianoFight. We also announce that Sean Keane and Drennon Davis will be performing Dec. 30 and 31 at PianoFight.

From there, we pull Dan Williams away from hanging curtains to chat about how the build out process has gone for him. PianoFight’s Executive Director gets candid about the struggles with people he’s hired, and the joys with people who show up and work for free because they’re passionate.

And we close out with a fun FaceBeet section where Ray answers a TON of questions from listeners.

Thanks for listening!

 

Welcome to episode 23! Our guest this week is Revolva, writer, comedian, and hoola hooper who recently took on Oprah Winfrey on her decision to book local talent at her recent “The Life You Want” tour without offering to pay those performers.

Before we get into “the meat of our displeasure,” we respond to two listener comments, one from Daniel Faigin on how DOPE our podcast is, and another from Wylie Herman on making a living as an artist by taking corporate gigs.

With Revolva, we get the story of why she wrote an Open Letter to Oprah, and what happened when the post went viral.  We find out why Revolva didn’t take the gig, and the response that her post got. We get into how artists need to project success so that audiences will think you’re in demand which makes it difficult to talk about the real financial situations of working artists. We talk about exposure vs. pay, and wonder if exposure is ever really worth it, or more importantly, fair. And we dive head first into the debate on when it’s ok (if ever) to not pay artists given the society / culture / economy in this country.

We ran out of time on the show but for anyone listening, you can check out this article on Pomplamoose’s recent national tour and this post on Howlround about Equity productions.

You can subscribe on iTunes here, hit us up in the comments section below or by tweeting @BornReadyShow, and as always – thanks for listening!

Welcome to episode 22! Our guests this week are Lisa Steindler and Peter Nachtrieb, the artistic director and playwright in residence, respectively, at Z Space. This week we’re talking to Lisa and Peter about The Totalitarians, Peter’s world premiere dark comedy running now at Z Space.

The Totalitarians is a rolling world premiere, part of the National New Play Network, a network of 26 companies across the country that raises money and rallies three theaters to produce the same play in the course of a year. We get into royalties, and the different way that music and theater treat the re-production of art. We find out that Peter (and Rob) aren’t particularly interested in working in film, and Lisa and Rob make the bold statement that all theater (like politics) is inherently local.

We give BIG UPS to the WORLD CHAMPION Giants and wonder if there’s anything that can throw a city off-script in the way sports can. Theater used to do it, with massive drunken festivals in ancient Greece, and we all hope that it will again sometime soon.

Lisa plugs upcoming performances at Z Space by Wooster Group and Killing My Lobster.

Shout outs to Daniel Heath and A Merry FORKING! Christmas, TBA’s new podcast Theatre Process, Elevator Repair Service, Mr. Burns, Hundred Days, Word for Word, and KISS.

As always, you can hit us up here or on @BornReadyShow and thanks for listening!