Kathy & Mo: Darlings of Media, Off-Broadway

If they were hot before, now they’re sizzling. San Diegans Kathy Najimy and Maureen Gaffney, known to Off-Broadway audiences as “The Kathy & Mo Show,” are heading west--briefly--to do “The Pat Sajak Show” May 2.

Then it’s a swift flight to New York for the next-day performance of a show that has been nominated for two of the city’s Outer Critics Circle awards, including best Off-Broadway play.

But the critics aren’t the only ones heaping praise on Kathy & Mo. Among those who have checked out the show are Robin Williams, who went backstage afterwards, Alice Walker, author of “The Color Purple,” Gloria Steinem, Linda Lavin, Alan King, David Brenner, Roy Scheider and B.D. Wong, star of “M. Butterfly.”

You can read about Williams’ visit in the May issue of Esquire, a month when articles about Kathy & Mo will plaster the stands in People, Glamour, Savvy, New York Woman and the premiere issue of Mirabella, a new women’s magazine put out by former editors of Elle and Vogue. For those who can’t wait until May, the Kathy & Mo saga is already in “Ms.” and “7 Days.”

And to think the act started five years ago at the Theatre in Old Town.

The San Diego Repertory Theatre has a Soviet festival offering on its season schedule, but an Diego’s Soviet festival committee doesn’t have the Rep on its schedule--at least not yet.

What that means is that the Rep is determined to participate in the three-week October festival, even without city confirmation that the costs of flying in Soviet artists for the show will, in fact, be funded.

Wasn’t it a bit risky to put the production on the schedule before funding was approved?

Well, according to a spokesman for the Rep, the theater had to decide on a season, with or without funding. And it’s determined to put on a show, although the amount of funding--or the absence of it--may affect the scope of the project.

Right now, the Soviet festival has earmarked its theater budget for the Old Globe’s American premiere of “Brothers and Sisters,” which should prove a spectacular example of Leningrad’s famed Maly Drama Theatre. The American premiere of “Brothers and Sisters” was supposed to happen in New York last year. That fell through due to a lack of money, leaving regional theater, as is often the case these days, to come to the rescue.

The Rep hopes to round out the picture with a contemporary play, since most of the festival’s artistic choices hark back to old Russia.

The matter is still in negotiation, according to a member of the festival team. And in a Tuesday press conference at the Old Globe, Bruce Joseph, artistic director of the Soviet festival, said more money may be coming forth for ballet and theater productions. The Rep people hope that means money for their show, whatever that turns out to be.

For Christine Berry, playing the naked woman in Anne Bogart’s “Strindberg Sonata,” at Mandell Weiss Center for the Performing Arts through Saturday, has been more than just another revealing experience. The first thing that struck the UC San Diego undergraduate about the assignment was how funny it was.

“What do you (say) when you tell people that you’re going to be naked on stage?” the 20-year-old asked, rhetorically. “I would start to tell them and I would start laughing for five minutes.”

Berry admitted to being “a little nervous” about the role at first, but now sees it as a valuable experience, both as an aspiring actress and as a person.

“It’s the ultimate in being comfortable on stage . . . and it takes a certain amount of acceptance of yourself to do it.”

And then of course there are the unexpected advantages.

“It makes dressing easier in real life because I think what’s the point of hiding this and that? What difference does it make now?”

Woyzeck will return to the Carnation building downtown when Sushi opens its Neofest April 29 with “Maria and Woyzeck on Highway 94,” by Carla Kirkwood and Deborah Small. The last “Woyzeck” at the Carnation was Sledgehammer Theatre’s “Blow Out the Sun” in October.

Woyzeck is the story of an Everyman who gets battered around by the system. Fittingly, that seems to be the theme of the embattled Carnation building, according to Gloria Poore, who’s been allowed to book shows there, and the artists producing the work.

“Sometimes I feel like Woyzeck,” Poore said with a tired laugh. “He’s the one who gets shot at.”

“People like myself and Carla (Kirkwood) are in Woyzeck’s position and get pushed around by the powers that be,” said Ethan Feerst, executive director of Sledgehammer.

The ownership of the building is still in dispute between Poore, who wants to buy and develop the warehouse as an arts space, and the San Diego Community Foundation, which was willed property that may include either the value of the site or the site itself.

Sledgehammer had to postpone its upcoming production of Samuel Beckett’s “Endgame” when the dispute precluded any new productions going into the space. Now, Poore said she has permission from the bank, acting as a trustee for the property, to authorize the Neofest offering. But it’s too late for Sledgehammer, which has since found another space.

“Endgame” will play at Horton-Parsons Hall on 4th Avenue, across from Horton Plaza between F and G streets May 6-28.

The time Sledgehammer spent scrambling around for a space bled its financial coffers dry, Feerst said. So, it came as a welcome surprise this week when it was awarded $7,700, its largest grant ever, from the city’s new Commission for Arts and Culture.

PROGRAM NOTES: Gunther Gabel-Williams, trainer of tigers, horses and elephants for Ringling Bros.-Barnum & Bailey Circus since 1968, will perform at the San Diego Sports Arena July 11-16 as part of a farewell tour. . . . The Marquis Public Theatre has postponed the opening of “A Dream Play” to May 4. . . . “Kings,” a new play based on the Old Testament and written by San Diego State University professor Mack Owen, closes Saturday at SDSU’s Experimental Theatre. . . . The Bowery Theatre’s production of John Patrick Shanley’s “Italian American Reconciliation” will play June 16-July 30 at the Kingston Playhouse, a new small theater space in San Diego’s Executive Hotel on First Avenue near C Street. . . . The Pine Hills Lodge Dinner Theatre is offering some unusual fare this season, beginning tonight with Charles Ludlam’s “The Mystery of Irma Vep,” a risque sendup of Gothic horror and Crosby-Hope road movies. It features two actors playing eight cross-gender parts. If the sarcophagus looks familiar, it is. It is rented from last year’s San Diego Rep production.