The San Francisco Examiner from San Francisco, California • 39

"30 tr" lively Aim hlm theater MTJSIO AItT Page 39 ZERO MOSTEL briefs Robert Redford on plan to break his son out of prison, Wednesday, February 16, 1972 A Terrifically RousingMovie Of 'Cabaret' I i. IK I'M Diamond Thieves it i vt i "CABARET." Allied Artists releasa of ABC Picture; produced by Cy Feueri directed by fiol) Fos8i fccreanvlay by Pressor! Al-en. from ChristonliBr hhnrwood'i "Hurlin Stories," John Vbh DrutBn' play, "I Am a Camera" and thu mimical, "Caliaret," with book by Joe music by John Kander and lyrics by frad Hb: musical direction by Kalnh Burnb; photograuhy by Geolfrey Unsworlh. With Lia Minnelli, MichaH York, Hiilmut Griem, Joel Grey, Fritz Wepper. Marita Beranson.

Rated PG (parental guidantu advisedl. At tli "THE HOT ROCK." Century fo presentation! produced by Hal Lander and Bolihv KobfrUi direr. euert by Peler Yates; screenplay by William Goldman, from Donald Wf'Mlake'i novel. With Robert Redford, I i ii i ii mi irjN KJl Geome bKVal, Hon leibman. Paul band, Mikm diinn, William Redtield.

Topo Svope, Zero Mostel, Rated (parental guidance At the Renency I. By Stanley Eichelbaum You'll be bowled over by aret," the best and most heartily latisfying movie of a Broadway musical in years, It opens today at the' North- point, where It's certain to bring down the house with its rousingly vivid depiction of the bad old days of Berlin in the troubled nous era (around 1930) that brought Hitler to power. You may wonder that such a baleful subject involving ram-pant decadence amid ugly out- ON STAGE at Berlin's Kit Kat Club Liza Minnelli as an American singer, Joel Grey as master of ceremonies. Four genial and not especially efficient crooks have one helluva lime stealing a huge diamond from the Brooklyn Museum in "The Hot Rock," a briskly entertaining crime caper film opening today at the Regency I. Except that it's been done before (in "Topkapi," among others), there's no reason why you should not enjoy this diverting genre piece starring Robert Redford and George Segal as outlaw brothers in law who recruit Ron Leibman and Paul Sand to help them with the job, which they proceed to bungle badly.

Segal is married to Redford's sister (Topo Swope) and there's a homey, quite human quality that freshens the film, like Redford's gastritis attack along the way and Segal's queasiness, which makes him faint at the very thought of blood. The comic spirit of William Goldman's screenplay (from Donald E. Westlake's novel) comes through with much of the disarming impudence he brought to "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid," a Western variation on an analogous theme about amiable rogues. Since Sundance was Redford's most successful role, it's no accident that he's back in the criminal fold as a tactictl expert who masterminds the heist. rnond hich is part of the national treasure of an African country, to Moses U.N.

ambassador of another African government which claims the gem, and ii willing to pay $100,000 to get it. They manage to nab the diamond, but lose it and then pick up its trail, which necessitates breaking into a state prison and a police station. The last feat is accomplished by a rooftop landing in a helicopter one of th film's suspenseful highlights. Director Peter Yates Is a mechanical addict a former racing car driver who hasn't resisted injecting motorized sequences that are a good match for his memorable car chase in "Bullitt." Redford turns in another of his persuasively underplayed performances.vEel is splendid as the nervous locksmith and family man. Leibman (who was Segal's brother In "Where's contributes a spendid portrayal of the Bronx- accented mechanic of the group.

There's also Zero' Mostel aptly playing Sand's father, a shyster lawyer. What "The Hot Rock" lacks in originality, it more than makes up for in lively and engaging fun. Stanley KU-helbauni could be treated musically. It's done through a terrifically entertaining series of tough, tinny, raffish eaberet songs reminiscent of the bitter, off-key German jazz airs of the period. Bob Fosse's movie improves on the stage musical in being far more realistic and believable.

All the song are performed as nightclub numbers, including some new ones, which replace others that have been dropped or are heard as background music from a wind-up phonograph. The bright, tuneful score by John Kander and Fred Ebb has therefore been though Sally is, of course, the flamboyant, depraved and marvelously engaging heroine we met in the previous version Am a of Christopher Isher-wood's "Berlin Stories." Liza Minnelli now plays her as an American wastrel (rather than British) and her enthralling portrayal of Sally an appealing, self-deluding, vulnerable but resilient kook who hides her loneliness behind garish eye makeup and green nail polish is going to land her right into next year's Oscar race. Some will find too much of the ungainly neurotic of "The Sterile Cuckoo" in Liza's Sally. And there's perhaps too obvious an effort by Fosse to exploit the Judy Garland relation in Liza's musical numbers, like her torchy ballad, "Maybe This Time," a new song which comes over in every way (even photographically) in the Garland image. But Liza's performance is absolutely lovely warm, soulful, funny, sensual -and she reaches out with the dazzle of a real star.

As Sally's confused, English-writer lover, Michael York is aptly convincing. The bisexual role is more logically developed than it was on the stage. And there's a handsome German baron, Helmut Griem, to carry on both with Sally and her boy friend. Jay Presson Allen Prime of Miss Jean has done a creditable job with the screenplay, bringing to it a hard edge of veracity and quite a lot explosive humor. Her dialog is rougher and gamier than we've ever had in a musical film.

Director Fosse (a Broadway choreographer who came to films via "Sweet has devised some brilliantly inventive staging for the musical numbers which dominate "Cabaret" and are fascinatingly evocative of the raun-. chy permissiveness of pre-Nazi, 1930 Berlin. Which, by the "way, is chillingly similar to San Francisco in the '70s. Fosse has gone a bit overboard with fussy camera work and tricky editing. Geoffrey Un-sworth's cinematography is, however, stunningly effective and the production (shot in a Munich studio and in authentic German locales) superbly captures the mood of the times.

Here and there, "Cabaret" falters in its dramatic exposition. It never establishes why the English writer (York) has come to Berlin (originally, to write an "I Am a Camera" novel). Other soft sjMjts mar the story, like the flat, unconvincing sub-plot involving a Jewish department store heiress (Marisa Berenson) in a romance with a would-be gigolo (Fritz Wepper). But I think you'll find "Cabaret" uniquely enjoyable and the two hours, 8 minutes it runs Mill seem only a fraction of that. The hurly burly of contemporary New York makes an effective background for the caper, which is frustrated by more obstacles than the toughest steeple-chase.

The four thieves must deliver the dia- the original show-stoppers remain, like the smashing opener I i song of welcome delivered in a rlsp of total cynicism by Joel Grey, who skillfully and drolly recreates his Broadway role of a caricatured master of ceremonies in the Kit Kat Club, the sleazy cabaret where Sally Bowles works as a singer. 4 Xi try 4vH TODAY'S HIGHLIGHTS ACT to Stage 'Sleulh Alt' A will have its Northern California premiere on Tuesday, April 4, when it joins the ACT repertory at the Geary, replacing the previously announced revival of "An Enemy of the People" on the current season schedule. Gallery, 2323 Market, to March 4. "Antiquities of Cyprus" Stanford Museum, to March 26. High School Art San Marco Gallery, Dominican College, San Rafael, through March 2.

The American Conservatory Theater has secured production rights to the London and Broadway hit, "Sleuth," following months of negotiation with its New York producers. Anthony Shaffer's thriller Ii t1 If Is, "f4 MUSIC San Francisco Symphony Istvan Kertesz conducts I Haydn's Symphony No. 67, Hindemith's "Nobilissima Vision and Dvorak's Eighth, Opera House, 8:30. I Oakland Symphony Harold Farberman conducts Peter Mennin's "Pied Pi-5 per" cantata with narrator I S. I.

Hayakawa, plus Mozart works, Oakland Auditorium Theater, 8:30. "Totentanz" Dance Spectrum revives Carvajal UfflGI! Iffi OPERATE! WmWmtmWttSS, 5 4 MMiwi lf ir V' joooooV XyfiA -2 a- so; sr woiK at urate wuii, Nob Hill, Plus new "Esper- 8:30. Mama Ig- Folk Club "Why do they always 1 oiipiia. inis is vrryijyi I fortonightrXJoO wsm I Qhii'- OOOOOo7 "1 i -tv. t'; ii Do 1 A fc I rs Jazz-Folk Concert Kenny Burrell quartet and Judy Mayhan, tonight at 8 at the Joint Effort Coffee House, San Jose Slate College campus, San Jose.

STAGE Mime Show Mime Leon-ard Pitt performs tonight and tomorrow and each Wednesday and Thursday at 8:30 through March 2 at the Intersection, 756 Union St. Poetry Reading Fernando Alegria reads from his works tonight at 8 at Panjandrum Press, 99 Sanchez St. Theater The Magic Theater of Berkeley performs Michael McClure's "Gargoyle Cartoons," tonight at 8 in Merritt College Student Center, 12500 Campus Drive, Oakland. Admission free. FILM SPECIALS Film Scries "It Happened One Night" (1935), tonight at 8 in Oakland Museum Theater, 10th and Oak Streets.

Pacific Film Archive The films of Charles Eames, tonight at 7:30 and 9:30 at the University Art Museum, UC Berkeley. ART Graphics By Vincent Rascon. at Frame Shop Gallery, 542 Ramona, Palo Alto, through March 17. John Sloan Retrospective of the early 20th century painter, at do Young Museum, Golden Gate Park, through April 2. Recent Paintings By Ray Parker, Quay Gallery, 521 Pacific, through March 4.

Stephanie Polos Paintings at Upjer Market Street I SM; "I may be crazy, but 1 think I've operated on the wrong Iumu 1 nave youi jf. I 'uana, tonight at 9 at the -Family Farmacy, 2301 California St. Jim Nesbitt, to- night and tomorrow at 9 at the Mother Lode, 2001 Union st. Latin The Latin Bloods, presented by Chepi-I to, tonight at 10 at the North Beach Revival, 1024 Kearny St. Is, tonight and to-t morrow at 9 at the Boat- bouse, Bridgeway and Tur- ney, Sausalito.

'IJazz Chris Ibancz trio, tonight through Sunday at 9 at Gatsby's, 39 Caledonia, Sausalito. Rock-Bald Ego, tonight I through Sunday at 9:30 at On Broadway, 334 Broad- way, Oakland. Rock Dr. Hook and his i Medicine Show, tonight and tomorrow at 9 30 at Long-branch, 2504 San Pablo, Berkeley. I Rock Wolfgang and Strauss, tonight at 9 at New Orleans House, 1505 San lablo, Berkeley.

FWk Victrola, tonight at I ct In Your Ear, 135 University, Palo Alto. tvO ai i i -5 IV rt -r' VJv 'Va 1 m. 1 aiawiw mm 9, i On t'i "THE FLICK IS A KICK ALL i L'v, It si THE 1 1 I 1 Id 'a I Twiqqy VI I I I "'ii mi I rv'-tn hv KinRiismU's (3 I rrortijtffi hv ARTHUR HILLER HOWARD GOTTFRIED the BOY A HOWARD GOTTFRIED -PADDY CHAYU SKY PflODUCIION amihiih hiiifr jjjijnili WMWI IIHCIIIII Diutcil Artists miEND IJ I 1 9 I I'iPiVUrJTI STARTS TODAY i If TODAY "IHHU MONDAY MAIINEtS DAILY ft VifillfrnW1- i 1 FiMpathin4ftr (10 A day Sim. Barg M4U.T1M 5 00 P.M. Toriny and Saturday riHirHBir i 9 Ki.1 Co hit wnli Sit(ny Poitir "THE ORGANIZATION" OPtN Al t.

P.M. Riifjin V.ti $1 so Itl 2 09 (f i pt Vun ni Mnlidjvv A I L.iO.J Jb.b 4U7 I O.bOp.r..