PANGEA Mixes Politics and Art in March

As New York girds itself for a fight across party lines, Pangea is the place to party before the fight. Some mean hombres like Jeremy Lawrence, Salty Brine and MargOH! Channing will show you what they're made of. Singer-seers like Gay Marshall and Carol Lipnik will blast through doors and glass ceilings, and cabaret confederates like Kevin Malony's rogues' gallery of talent in the "Happy Cry Pretty" series will break conventions with disarming ease. Top off the month with The Secret Variety Society on Friday March 31 and you've got a recipe for dealing with the disaster.

Tonight, Monday March 6, TWEED TheaterWorks' popular performance series "Happy, Cry, Pretty!" welcomes none other than David Cale in his first all-singing show of original songs. Next up it's the innovative storyteller Edgar Oliver with prose and poetry (Mar 13); Bianca Leigh doing jazz her way (Mar 20); comic Steve Hayes in "We Only Have Brains on Tuesdays," (on Monday Mar 27); the otherworldly ragamuffin Poor Baby Bree (April 3), and songstress Laura Kenyon (April 10). Produced by Kevin Malony, these shows are Mondays at 7pm, the cover for all shows $20.

You ready for a dash of Salty Brine? Say yes, as Salty keeps playing his latest installment of his Spectacular Living Record Collection series (an on-going series of performances built around popular albums). This time it's Radiohead's "OK Computer" -- slashed with the Rat pack -- that gets a new spin. Yeah baby, it's Salty Brine in "Dean. Maybe Frank. Maybe Sammy" on Tuesdays, March 7 and 14, all at 7:30pm, cover $20.

Hung over by popular demand, it's everyone's favorite lush MargOH! Channing in "Hung," her popular ode to power drinking and letting it all hung out. One show is all you deserve, so come! for all the fun... Friday March 10 at 9:30pm and see what it's like to be hung. Cover $25.

In a sobering reminder that the dire warnings sounded in Weimar Berlin's decadent underground, should be repeated again for complacent ears, Jeremy Lawrence continues the timely run of his Bistro Award-winning "Lavender Songs -- A Queer Weimar Berlin Cabaret." In the guise of the tragic fallen drag princess Tante Fritzy, Lawrence -- by day the noted translator, lyricist and actor -- is here another oracle of the deep... This moving and inspiring theatrical cabaret is directed by Jason Jacobs, with Ariela Bohrod on piano. Saturdays March 11 and April 8, both at 7pm, the cover $20. Watch your ass!

The East Village cabaret siren Carol Lipnik continues her Pangea reign with her new show "Goddess of Imperfection," a dreamlike meditation on the broken, uncertain state of the world. With fellow songwriter Matt Kanelos on piano, the show features a parade of musical surprises from week to week, including special guests, new material and old heirlooms plucked from the attic. Lipnik's carnival-psychedelic performances, multi-octave voice (which Stephen Holden says "is, in a word, phenomenal") and Cassandra-like pronouncements have transformed this product of Coney Island into the new downtown diva of the moment. Her Sunday séances are March 12, 19, 26 etc., all at 7pm. Cover is $15.

Yes, there's always Paris, and the fierce gamine who wanders through its streets is our Broadway baby Gay Marshall. She starts up another love affair in "Gay's Paree," the return of her deliciously eclectic ramble through a decidedly bohemian Paris. Marshall's highly accomplishEd English renditions of songs by Aznavour, Vian, Lemarque, Brel and Piaf shed a new light on the City of Light, the French and French culture. With Ian Herman on piano... Wednesdays March 15, 22, 29, and April 5, all at 7:30pm. Music charge $25.

Pangea's monthly "The Secret Variety Society" is an evening of wild, weird and wonderful pleasures. Hand-picked to fit our comfy confines like a latex glove are these deliciously talented deviants who make up the ensemble: Singer Mad Jenny, piano banger Sabrina Chap, Magic Brian, comedy vaudevillian Matt Roper and contortionist Miss Ekaterina. Friday March 31, at 9:30pm. Cover is $15.

Downtown's supper-club Pangea, which Stephen Holden recently called "a bohemian oasis not unlike the fabled Max's Kansas City from days gone by," plays home to some of the best in alt cabaret. There is a $20 food and drink minimum for all shows. To purchase tickets online visit www.pangeanyc.com , or for info call 212/995-0900. Pangea is located at 178 Second Avenue (between 11th & 12th Streets).

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