Recent Reviews
Review: El Channel by Latino Comedy Project
by Michael Meigs
Published on September 01, 2009
Dumb potty jokes and stupid wiggly sex jokes abound. Karinna Pérez plays a naive young thing who just can't understand why a man would want to get into her "empañada."
I had expected to like this show a lot more than I did.I'd seen and really appreciated the clever videos spots in which Guillermo Deleon as the "BC -- born citizen" compares notes with Adrian Villegas, as the "Mex" illegal. You can catch them either at the Latino Comedy Project website or on YouTube. They ran on MTV and they've been nominated for an Emmy award.In those one-minute sketches, each gets to shine. For example, …
Review: The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe by The City Theatre Company
by Michael Meigs
Published on August 27, 2009
The production rattles along so quickly that in order to appreciate it, one would need to know the story already -- for example, the reason that we find them in the countryside at the quirky professor's house.
Director Bridget Farias and her cast have put together a jolly version of The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe, with loving attention to the eccentricities of Narnia creatures. Audiences will enjoy the glim from the 2005 film version produced by Disney, which was the best selling DVD in 2006, but both that film and this script follow closely the novel for children written by C.S. Lewis in 1949.When this production was announced through ALT, …
![Review: I [Heart] Walmart, by Capital T Theatre](/media/uploads/production_images/i_love_walmart-capt_20090/ben_wolfe_walmart_opt.jpg)
Review: I [Heart] Walmart, by Capital T Theatre
by Michael Meigs
Published on August 26, 2009
This is vivid, exciting well-performed stuff. Too bad Capital T made the decision to bring all those gifted actors on at the end to harrangue us with factoids asserting that Walmart is, in essence, the most evil expression of repressive, heartless capitalism.
That great big pop heart in the title sends you the message: We're gonna send Walmart a great big exploding funny valentine, 'cause it's the place we love to hate!That fits very nicely with the demographic served by Capital T Theatre. Their Austin theatre public is generally young, generally irreverent, generally idealistic in a fuzzy Austin kind of way, and ready for amusement. Those of us who haunt the Hyde Park Theatre probably spend more …
Review: Uncle Vanya by The Classic Theatre of San Antonio
by Michael Meigs
Published on August 24, 2009
John Minton gives Vanya the boisterous emotions of a delayed adolescent, driven into a froth by the arrival of Yelena.
San Antonio's Classic Theatre has opened its second season with a beautifully designed, perceptive and subtly paced production of one of my favorite works, Chekhov's Uncle Vanya.That's the shorthand version of the title. It was published as Uncle Vanya - Scenes from Country Life. Although at the heart of it there sits an eternally frustrated love triangle -- Vanya and Dr. Astrov both yearning for the unhappily married Yelena -- the play contains much, much …
Review: Muses III: Memories of a House by Vestige Group
by Michael Meigs
Published on August 23, 2009
We strangers carefully tramped through the house, settled on sofas as directed, slipped along the corridors and lingered out by the pool. As in a diplomatic reception, our mission was to get to get acquainted -- not with one another but with this odd collection of characters.
Pocket theatre. Home theatre; intimate theatre. Theatre for no more of you than can fit comfortably into a 12x15 room with the actors.Muses III by the Vestige Group puts you into a small group for this experience. They have concessions available on the lawn beforehand, under the tall and twisty live oaks. They suggest that you get to know the persons in your group. You probably won't, because your guide is not going to push …
Review: Cymbeline by Shakespeare at Winedale
by Michael Meigs
Published on August 18, 2009
The crowded plot leaves little room to develop the characters. Imogen is much wronged, and Norma Balli-Borrero in that role is valiant and emotive.
Shakespeare wrote at least 36 plays over a period of about twenty years, beginning about 1591 with the histories of Henry VI and Richard III. Cymbeline, a historical fantasy about early Britons facing Roman legions, was among his last works. There's a mention of it in an account dated 1610, five years before Shakespeare's death, but it was not published until the 1623 Folio edition of collected plays. You won't get the chance to see …