BEST BETS NOVEMBER 12-18, 2000

JAZZ

One of the most significant jazz pianists of the past 30 years, Keith Jarrett (above) has been successfully fighting off a serious illness to make a full comeback. He will be performing Thursday at UCLA’s Royce Hall with his longtime trio, featuring bassist Gary Peacock and drummer Jack DeJohnette.

Theater

After a troubled residency at Cal State L.A.’s Luckman Fine Arts Complex, classical theater company A Noise Within kicks off its return home to Glendale with a Thornton Wilder classic, “The Skin of Our Teeth,” about the all-American Antrobus family facing the absurdities of modern life--and woolly mammoths and the Ice Age, too. Opens Saturday.

Music

“Focus on California,” LACMA’s four-concert festival organized in conjunction with the mammoth “Made in California” exhibition, begins Monday at 8 p.m. at the Bing Theater, with West Coast composers (John Cage, Lou Harrison and Terry Riley) played by UC San Diego’s red fish, blue fish ensemble. The performance is preceded by a 7:15 showing of “The Dreamer That Remains,” a film about composer, instrument inventor and all-around eccentric Harry Partch. The rest of the festival takes place Nov. 27, Dec. 11 and Jan. 8.

Dance

Salt Lake City’s 37-year-old Ririe-Woodbury Dance Company performs an ambitious selection of major moderns on Friday at El Camino College in Torrance. The program includes Alwin Nikolais’ “Noumenon,” Charlotte Boye-Christensen’s “Siesta,” and David Rousseve’s “Bittersweet Chocolate,” among others. Above: Natalie Berger, top, and Christine Hasegawa

Pop Music

Divas-in-waiting, another in her prime and one departing: k.d. lang headlines the Sun Theatre on Tuesday and the Universal Amphitheatre on Friday, while youngsters Jewel (Thursday) and LeAnn Rimes (Friday) play the Cerritos Performing Arts Center. And Tina Turner’s shows Saturday at Staples Center and next month at the Arrowhead Pond will be her final ever in Southern California.

Video

Wolfgang Petersen directed “The Perfect Storm,” the adaptation of Sebastian Junger’s best-seller about the horrific 1991 Atlantic storm and the crew of a small swordfish boat that became trapped in the maelstrom. George Clooney, Mark Wahlberg and Diane Lane star. The theatrical blockbuster arrives Tuesday on video and DVD.

Art

“Body Politics: The Female Image in Luba Art and the Sculpture of Alison Saar,” opening today at the UCLA Fowler Museum of Cultural History, pairs works by Los Angeles-based sculptor Saar with those of African artists from the 17th to late 19th century. The exhibition examines the representation of the female body in African and American art, and notions of the female body as a locus of identity, politics and spirituality. Below: “Bramble Dance” (1988).