Loeb loads `Shooter’

Playwright Aaron Loeb is what you might call multitasking. He has a 16-month-old daughter, Talitha Jane; he just moved from Oakland to Berkeley; he’s readying his play First Person Shooter for its world premiere Saturday at the SF Playhouse; he has a short play in the Best of PlayGround festival coming up; and he’s just finished another commissioned play, Abraham Lincoln’s Big, Gay Dance Party!

“It’s a lot, I know,” Loeb says with a laugh. “It’s really kind of silly.”

Foremost on Loeb’s mind is Shooter, a play that deals with issues of violence and video games in the wake of a Columbine-like incident.

Loeb actually works in the video game industry –_ he’s the COO of Planet Moon Studios, developer of video games — and he remembers after Columbine, the rush to blame violence in games and movies.

“Looking back, it’s terrible that that’s what we were talking about at the time,” Loeb says. “Nobody was talking about the parents or the kids except in basic terms. We as a culture try to nail down a simple, easy explanation of something so unexplainable, so unspeakable.”

What Loeb wanted to accomplish with First Person Shooter (the title refers to the type of video game in which you see the action through the shooter’s eyes, gun in hands and all) was to explore both sides of the violence in video games debate: those who say the games ruin children and those who say they don’t.

“I also wanted to humanize both sides and explore the need for human connection in the face of tragedy rather than finding the easy sound byte that makes it easier for us all to look away.”
We’ve heard similar types of conversations recently in the wake of the shootings at Virginia Tech. That gunman did not play video games, but there are still commonalities.

“There’s a similarly dehumanizing national conversation we’re having,” Loeb says. “I’ve seen it in the reaction of the parents: Please stop showing (the shooter) every 30 seconds and talk about my kid!

“I can’t imagine what it must be like for them. And we as a nation want to get through it quickly so we can go back to talking about Anna Nicole.”

First Person Shooter Saturday, May 5 at the SF Playhouse, 533 Sutter St., San Francisco. The show continues through June 9. Tickets are $36. Call (415) 677-9596 or visit www.ticketweb.com.

Congratulations, Peter — AGAIN!

San Francisco playwright Peter Sinn Nachtrieb has won yet another award for his play Hunter Gatherers.

Here’s some of the press release that came out of Louisville, Ky., on Saturday:

The American Theatre Critics Association (ATCA) has selected Peter Sinn Nachtrieb’s Hunter Gatherers to receive the 2006 Harold and Mimi Steinberg /American Theatre Critics Association New Play Award.

The presentation occured March 31 at Actors Theatre of Louisville during the Humana Festival of New American Plays. The award includes a cash prize of $25,000 — the largest monetary prize for a national playwriting award — and a commemorative plaque. Two others, Michael Hollinger and Jeff Daniels, will receive citations and $7,500 each. All are first-time recipients of these prizes.

“The long-standing partnership between the Harold & Mimi Steinberg Charitable Trust and the American Theatre Critics Association has recognized some of today’s greatest writers, and helped identify the great playwrights of tomorrow,” said trustee Jim Steinberg. “We’re delighted to help support the unique telling of tales on the American stage.”

Hunter Gatherers is an inky dark comedy portraying two seemingly civilized couples descending into the chaos of primal urges. It was first produced in June 2006 at Killing My Lobster in San Francisco.

And to think we got to see it first. As you may recall (if you don’t, see below), last weekend, Peter won the Glickman New Play award, which is presented to the best play to have its premiere in the Bay Area.

Illuminating `Lighthouse’

The next Berkeley Repertory Theatre’s Page to Stage event is with playwright Adele Edling Shank, who recently opened her adaptation of Virginia Woolf’s To the Lighthouse.

The onstage moderator — a position that requires astounding intellect, keen theatrical insight and literary grace — will be yours truly.

Page to Stage is at 7 p.m. Monday, March19 at the Roda Theatre, 2015 Addison St., Berkeley. The event is free, but space is limited.

The onstage conversation will be followed with a question-and-answer session.

Come on down.

For information, call (510) 647-2949 or visit www.berkeleyrep.org.