A new play by a local author. Taste brings together Astrid, a radical young New York activist who has just inherited Chateau Chevalier, a winery in the heart of California’s richest wine region, and Joe Holbrook, its passionate head winemaker. Desperate to save his job and the Chateau from imminent bankruptcy, 2012-2013 Season Joe strives to transform Astrid into a wine-savvy, media-friendly heiress in a short thirteen days. Though she hates the industry’s decadence, Astrid agrees, but the two continually clash throughout the entire process.

Playwright Jody Gehrman grew up in Healdsburg and spent many weekends with her father in a Berkeley commune filled with anarchists and political activists. This is her attempt to play with those influences within the framework of the familiar Pygmalion story, to pit wine country hedonism against streety political activism to see who wins. As it turns out, they both do. Or rather, they fall in love, which is the next best thing.