Point Break Live!
At Charlie O’s Downtown

words by Devoe Yates
photos by Robert Todd Williamson

Blood, beer, and salty ocean spray in only the way Gallagher might’ve dreamt? Even if you’ve never seen the cult B-movie action classic that is Point Break, there’s no doubt that you’ll find this wondrous punk theater gem truly one of the best shows around. They’ve terrorized Seattle, Minneapolis, New York, and now they’re here, every Saturday and Sunday night at the historic downtown dive, Charlie O’s, a perfect venue that showcases the wild event in the round and supplies the audience with good old-fashioned cheap booze.

The show, like the movie, is the tale of one Johnny Utah, an ex-college quarterback who goes undercover to bust a gang of bank-robbing surfers, with the help of an aged and squirrelly mentor of the Gary Busey variety. It’s been called the first-ever reality stage show because each night a member of the audience is picked to play Keanu Reeves’ Johnny Utah. As the story goes, when the show was originally put together in Seattle, the actors that auditioned for the part were all too good, so it was decided best for a non-actor to play the part, someone like you and me. Some wonder if perhaps the picking is rigged, but go and see for yourself, it’s the audience that picks their main man from a line-up of up to a dozen or so gents or gals. The writer of the film, W. Peter Iliff, has even tried out for Utah twice and lost out both times. What you should know is that clever Keanu imitators never make the cut, it’s always the oddest, plainest, and most unseemly candidate that’s picked, and for good reason.

The suspecting mark makes his way through the maze of nearly every scene in the movie with an eager and athletic female P.A. to guide and cue him with the movie’s ever so unforgettable lines. By the end of the play, he or she will usually find themselves a wet n’ bloody rock n’ roll hero, if only forjust one night.

So as you can imagine, every show is different, and not just because there’s a new Johnny Utah every night, but also because the wild and rambunctious cast likes to change it up from show to show, adding new jokes and new bits of whimsy. But what you will always find is a little bit of uncertain chaos, meatball subs abundant, harrowing skydiving, presidents masks and a bank heist that ends up in the street outside, and more homoerotic surfing than you can shake a gun at. I’m not sure if there’s anything more fun to do in the space of two hours. As veteran cast member Thomas Blake confides, “It’s a place where a bunch of people can have a really good time and not take anything too seriously. That’s the point, to keep it playful and fun. If we ever lose that, there wouldn’t be any point to doing the show.” Recent attendees have included Joel Schumacher, Tobey Maguire, and the director of the film herself, Kathryn Bigelow. But the question that seems to be on everyone’s mind is if, one shiny day, Keanu himself will attend the show and try out to reprise his legendary role. Recently his agent did attend, and after the show the PBL chaps were led over to Bar 107 where Keanu was staked out having cocktails with Alex Winter of all people. And while Keanu never committed to an appearance, it’s not out of the range of possibilities that he might show up one night of the blue, and ask you and yours if it’s time to jump…or jerk off.