Among the al fresco summer shows, the San Francisco Mime Troupe came up with one of its funniest spoofs yet, 1600 Transylvania Avenue. If nothing else good comes of the Bush presidency, it will provide plenty of fodder for the irreverent Troupers, and playwrights Michael Gene Sullivan (who also directed) and Ellen Callas don't miss a comic beat.

Parodying Dracula, 1600 presents an America ruled by all-powerful "corporate bloodsuckers" from deep within their White House lair (superb comic actor Ed Holmes is an uncanny Cheney look-alike, and Amos Glick nails a smug, malaprop-spouting buffoon of a president). Will idealistic inventor Shamina Jones and intrepid Prof. Van Helsing (Velina Brown and Victor Toman, both spot-on) save the country from the bloodsuckers' evil clutches?