Yesterday is Tomorrow: The Vaudeville Boy Band Show You Need to See

When sisters and San Francisco natives Genie and Marie Cartier started working on a duo theater show, “Yesterday is Tomorrow,” they were first inspired by an unlikely source: boy bands. Fueled by their teenage love of groups like the Backstreet Boys, the sisters created the first of what would become an hour of hilarious sketches. It consists of a drag act in which washed up 90s boy band 2BTru sings, dances and resorts to corporate sponsorship in an attempt to stay relevant. “We spent hours watching videos of the Backstreet Boys and copying their dance moves,” Genie says. “This sketch did not come from a desire to mock them, but rather a genuine love for them as entertainers and the fun of emulating their style.”

The show took off from there, with an array of wildly different but thematically linked sketches– a spoken word poem, a vaudevillian song and dance number, a TED Talk-style speech. “We wanted to use multiple forms to explore the dangerous cocktail of capitalism and technology and its effect on society,” Marie says. As SF natives, the sisters have certainly experienced both the economic and social changes the tech industry has unleashed upon the City. The show not only comments on the current state of technology, but the terrifying future possibilities of what our society could become if technological advances are not morally evaluated before being widely distributed.

Photo credit: Paul Cartier

The diverse backgrounds of the Cartier Sisters explains the varied forms on display throughout the show. Marie has a BA in Theater from Cal, recently became a collective member of the San Francisco Mime Troupe, and is a prolific plein-air painter. Genie has an MFA in creative writing, a performance background in acrobatics and aerial rope, and also tap dances. With all these skills and more on display in only 55 minutes, these ladies work hard to keep you entertained. To sum it up in one audience review “The writing was beautiful and the dancing was on point.” (Keith Arc)

“Yesterday is Tomorrow” will play ONE NIGHT ONLY at 7:30pm on March 14th at The Marsh, with the possibility of more shows if attendance is high. This is an opportunity to support local art with a tangible effect– your presence at this show will help these local artists share their work with more audiences. So get your tickets right here in advance!