Recent Reviews
Review: Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? by City Theatre Company
by Brian Paul Scipione
Published on May 14, 2022
I always wonder if Albee suggests that this night of mayhem is a once-in-a lifetime experience of Martha and George play this routine every chance they get. I now know that I, for one, am afraid of Virginia Woolf.
One of the commonplace declarations about the perpetually popular plays of Shakespeare is that his subjects are timeless. Another view, less often proposed, is the simple observation that they are really good (despite sometimes being something of a slog for modern audiences). Edward Albee’s Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? is exactly that. Describe the play as you will—wonderful, exceedingly clever, intellectually moving, disturbing, daunting, outright scary—but at its core it is very high quality. It …
Review: Crimes of the Heart by Gaslight Baker Theatre
by Annie Knox
Published on May 11, 2022
Beth Henley's CRIMES OF THE HEART is still acutely relevant, a beautiful tapestry of storytelling.
Beth Henley wrote her Pulitzer Prize-winning play Crimes of the Heart more than 40 years ago, but its treatment of racism, domestic violence, and metal health issues makes it acutely relevant still. Henley weaves her complex characters, a trio of sisters in 1970s Mississippi, into a beautiful tapestry of storytelling. Under Tysha Calhoun's expert direction, the actors deliver quick, witty dialogue. Calhoun, recently voted Broadway World Austin’s Director of the Decade, has created a believable …
Review: Capsule by Alyson Dolan
by David Glen Robinson
Published on May 04, 2022
Alyson Dolan and collaborators created CAPSULE as a performance of three distinctly different and intriguing pieces, performed April 30 and May 1 for many members of Austin's dance community.
This past weekend in Austin was loaded with fine arts dance concerts, two highly notable: Andrea Ariel Dance Theatre’s Reimagine at the downtown Long Center, and Alyson Dolan’s Capsule at the shoes-off Café Dance on Hancock Drive in northwest Austin. The settings showed great contrasts, but the two shows were well-matched in their high creativity and polished, professional performances. Our delighted concern here is with Capsule, a short work choreographed and produced by independent choreographer …
Review: Mack and Mabel, A Musical Love Story by Alchemy Theatre Company
by Michael Meigs
Published on May 04, 2022
This is almost certainly your last chance to enjoy in person the heights and experience the depths of Herman's gorgeously sad musical tragedy. It will stay with you long after the applause fades.
An image comes to mind for the musical theatre piece Mack and Mabel (1974) by Michael Stewart and Jerry Herman: a black pearl, infinitely rare, darkly lustrous, almost never seen. I see so many ways to approach this piece: Michael Cooper's darkly intimate staging of it in the oddly shaped forty-seat Mastrogeorge Theater used by the Carol Hickey Acting Studio; discussion of the sparkling, sometimes blazing talents of this choice cast; examination of why this …
Review: ¡Estar Guars! by Latino Comedy Project
by Justin M. West
Published on May 04, 2022
This show is damn funny! Its acerbic wit is wild yet on-point. Buy a ticket and go see it. Period. And bring a conservative friend. Make 'em squirm.
Just in case you’re the type who reads only the first paragraph to get the gist, then let me put it all above the fold for you: This show is damn funny! Its acerbic wit is wild yet on-point and just as relevant now as in 2019 at the Ground Floor Theatre. Maybe a bit more so. Buy a ticket and go see it. Period. And bring a conservative friend. Make 'em squirm. I wasn’t …
Review: REIMAGINE: Celebrating 30 Years by Andrea Ariel Dance Theatre
by David Glen Robinson
Published on May 02, 2022
Reimagining such bright art works is challenging creative exploration. Quoting T.S. Eliot: ". . . the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time.”
What does it mean to reimagine? To imagine again, after having imagined a thing once? What does that mean? Stepping through the door to imagination, that some think of as a storage closet door, one revisits the private universe that everyone has, colored with the crayons of childhood memories, dream fragments, visions, epiphanies, ambitions, primal fears, and the pixillating disintegration of lost passions. Yes, the imagination vault can be bright and creative, but it is …