Reviews for touring company Performances
Review: Phantom of the Opera by touring company
by Brian Paul Scipione
Published on April 28, 2017
By bringing each scene to a towering set in the middle of the stage, the director and designers show characters essentially trapped like mice by a prowling Phantom who may appear any place at any time. Yet this setting is intimate and realistic, even gritty.
The play begins with a count-down. An auctioneer’s resonant bellow calls out various lot numbers. The numbers eerily foreshadow as we approach the dreaded lot 666: a once shattered chandelier from what “some of you may recall the strange affair of the Phantom of the Opera, a mystery never fully explained.” The chandelier has been fully restored for the auction and before the people’s eyes it bursts into life, rising phoenix-like to the ceiling and …
Review: The Illusionists - Live from Broadway by touring company
by Brian Paul Scipione
Published on November 02, 2016
I want to gush about it and tell the reader everything I saw but I don’t want to give away any spoilers. And let’s face it, when you are talking about illusions with stunning conclusions everything is a spoiler. The show is amazing from start to finish
This exhilarating, dynamic and nearly flawless magical variety show from Broadway is both very easy and difficult to review. The difficult part is simple to explain: I want to gush about it and tell the reader everything I saw but I don’t want to give away any spoilers. And let’s face it, when you are talking about illusions with stunning conclusions everything is a spoiler. The easy part, as you would expect from a professional …
Review: Chicago
by Michael Meigs
Published on November 21, 2014
An enthusiastic voice behind us as we exited Bass Concert Hall at the University of Texas last night: "That was nothing like the movie!" Live performance, even in the cavernous space of the Bass, can seize your attention and send your heart racing in ways that no flat screen image ever can. And that's what happens in the 15th (annual?) tour of Chicago, playing in Austin through this coming Sunday. The story is familiar and, …
Review: Chicago
by Michael Meigs
Published on November 21, 2014
An enthusiastic voice behind us as we exited Bass Concert Hall at the University of Texas last night: "That was nothing like the movie!" Live performance, even in the cavernous space of the Bass, can seize your attention and send your heart racing in ways that no flat screen image ever can. And that's what happens in the 15th (annual?) tour of Chicago, playing in Austin through this coming Sunday. The story is familiar and, …
Review: The Book of Mormon by touring company
by Michael Meigs
Published on October 05, 2013
Mix in with those absurdly over-the-top contrasts all the combustible hormones of adolescence, rev it all up with high-energy clowning and Las-Vegas-style choreography, and you can just ride over the cognitive bumps in the road.
The crowd at Bass Concert Hall at the University of Texas was bubbling with gleeful expectation for the opening performance in Austin of The Book of Mormon tour. They responded enthusiastically throughout the evening and went away plainly satisfied with the spectacle and the storytelling. Those South Park guys did it again, as confirmed by all those Tony awards, including the one for best musical, using their cheerful cynicism and satire to tap into the …
Review: Priscilla, Queen of the Desert by touring company
by Catherine Dribb
Published on May 11, 2013
Priscilla Queen of the Desert is a rambunctious montage of 80s chart-toppers and truly magnificent costuming. The national tour which pulled into Austin last week is no exception. Unlike our trailer eateries, Priscilla (a fabulously renovated old bus) supports no hipsters, cowboys or college students typical to the Austin scene, but rather a trio of performers. Two drag queens and a transvestite are traveling through the outback to perform at one of their member's, Tick's, …