Daily Loaf

Hot on the heels of her appearance in Jobsite Theater’s And Baby Makes Seven, recent Tampa Bay area transplant Jessica Rothert slips into Stageworks’ production of Bad Dates, which previews tonight at the Shimberg Playhouse. Theresa Rebeck’s one-woman show, which premiered Off Broadway in 2003, is about Haley Walker, a Texas transplant living in Manhattan with her teenage daughter. And lots of shoes. Six hundred, in fact. Having found a measure of success in the big city as a restaurateur, single Haley is ready to dip her feet and their fashionable footwear back into the dating pool. From her bedroom, Haley addresses the audience as she prepares for or reacts to her titular encounters with the opposite sex. Read the rest of this entry »

Comedian Roy Johnson has been beefing up his funny resume since his first-ever open mic at Tampa Improv in 2000. A year later, he headlined and produced his first homegrown showcase of local talent (eight followed) and the Improv eventually hired him on as the house MC in 2002. He continued to carve a name out for himself on the road, got a ringing endorsement from standup legend David Brenner (who said Johnson “is absolutely brilliant and is destined to be a world class headliner”), won the Maxxim/Bud Light-sponsored Real Men competition and enjoyed a cushy gig opening for Charlie Murphy, Joe Rogan and John Heffron on the Read Men of Comedy Tour, released a CD, Love Notes From the True Romantic, and triumphed in the I-4 Comedy War against the best comics of Tampa and Orlando. Johnson is headed to LA and performs one more night of his observational comedy at Roy Johnson’s Hollywood or Bust – about anything from his experiences living in Florida and dealing with hurricanes and redneck neighbors, to the follies of romance and life after marriage – tonight at his farewell show. See him off, buy him a beer, and be prepared to laugh your ass off. Wed., Nov. 4, 8 p.m., Tampa Improv in Centro Ybor, Ybor City, $8, tampaimprov.com. – Leilani Polk Read the rest of this entry »