Reviews for Zach Theatre Performances
Review: Rent by Zach Theatre
by Michael Meigs
Published on September 24, 2010
The show roars -- literally. The band dimly visible behind the chain link fence at center stage has got its amps turned all the way up under the direction of Allen Robertson. Microphones on the singers are not sufficient to protect them or us.
Rent is the sort of production the Zach theatre uses to pay the rent: the staging of a familiar rock and roll work with appeal for the young, for the young professionals, for the creatives and for the club goers. Seen as daring at its 1996 debut, Rent has become sufficiently mainstream that it can be staged in community theatres, summer theatres, and, this past February, even by the kidsActing studio here in Austin. Director …
Review: Metamorphoses by Zach Theatre
by Michael Meigs
Published on September 06, 2010
Call this the Cirque de Soleil approach to Greek myth. . . .(In case you didn't catch it, the Apple computer represented Pandora's box, the one that unleashed evils on the world.)
Call this the Cirque de Soleil approach to Greek myth. From its 1996 origin at Northwestern University Mary Zimmerman's piece used a pool of water as its central metaphor -- suggesting the chaos at creation and both the life-giving and life-threatening qualities of water and the sea. At Northwestern the piece was staged next to and in an Olympic standard pool. The water setting was retained at the Lookingglass Theatre in Chicago and at the …
Review: The Drowsy Chaperone by Zach Theatre
by Michael Meigs
Published on July 01, 2010
This cast hits every mark and lifts you into its singing, dancing world. There's a hysterical moment in Act II when we plunge momentarily into a different musical with the same stars.
When I got home, still bubbling from Zach's The Drowsy Chaperone, I was ready to write, "Run, don't walk, to the Zach box office to get your first set of tickets for this sparkling evening of music, comedy and light-hearted fooling, a clever reincarnation of Broadway at its wonderful beginnings." That's hyperbole, of course. Because you don't need to run anywhere. You just tap zachtheatre.org into your browser, click a couple of times and give …
Review: Becky's New Car by Zach Theatre
by Michael Meigs
Published on June 04, 2010
Preview night was not an adventure for Becky -- at least, not beyond the intermission -- and we walked away with the uneasy feeling that our heroine Becky Foster was stuck a long way from happiness with no towing service to call.
Zach's post card calls it "A Revved-up Comic Adventure!" The website is even more breathless, promising "[a] life-affirming comedy about an eccentric millionaire who offers Becky the keys to a brand new life [in][. . . . ] a fantastically funny exploration about class, wealth and selling out during Becky's wild ride through a clever twist of events. Huge laughs, hairpin plot turns and a story with the pedal to the metal. Buckle up!" So …
Review: Our Town by Zach Theatre
by Michael Meigs
Published on April 23, 2010
'Our Town' is both their town -- Thornton Wilder's Grovers Corners, New Hampshire, 1904 - 1913 -- and our town, Austin in 2010.
Our Town is both their town -- Thornton Wilder's Grovers Corners, New Hampshire, 1904 - 1913 -- and our town, Austin in 2010. Dave Steakley and the large, talented cast at the Zach have a good time with the clever palimpsest of modern Austin that they use to reinvigorate a text that many of us first read in high school. It works, too, at least most of the time. This styling reminds us gently, insistently …
Review: The Flaming Idiots by Zach Theatre
by Michael Meigs
Published on February 05, 2010
It's all juggling and comedy, and it's all spectacle. Don't expect any narrative other than the quirky bounce of their funnymen personalities.
They juggled and joked together for 20 years, and now they're back, while they can still do it. In his program note, Rob Williams -- the beaming little guy in the yellow shirt -- says that the Zach gave them the step up from renaissance fairs and comedy clubs to the world of regional theatres, network television and off-Broadway. They disbanded in 2004 but last year resurrected the act, playing in Edmonton, Canada, then moving …