Upcoming: The Best Christmas Pageant Ever, Sam Bass Community Theatre, Round Rock, December 2 - 17

Found on-line:

presents

The Best Christmas Pageant Ever

based on the award-winning book by Barbara Robinson

directed by Veronica Prior

December 2 - 17, Thursdays - Saturdays at 8 p.m., Sundays at 2 p.m.

Sam Bass Community Theatre, 600 Lee Street, Round Rock (click for map)

Tickets $13 - $18; click to purchase on-line

Just in time for the holidays comes a wonderful story about the beauty of the season and the true meaning of Christmas...Wrong! When two well-intentioned parents decide to direct the school play, they make the terrible mistake of casting the Herdman kids; probably the most inventively awful kids in history! Chaos and hilarity results as the cast and crew collide with the Christmas story head on!

A Christmas Carol, told by Bernadette Nason at the Larry L. King stage, Austin Playhouse, December 9 - 21

Austin Playhouse provides an atmospheric little set for Bernadette Nason's telling of A Christmas Carol, and she's in costume when she enters primly from the single door at upstage right. Nason smiles an acknowledgment of us as she hangs up coat and scarf, then turns to address us.

From that point the story takes over, for Bernadette delivers Dickens' quick-moving, vivid text with crisp assurance and deft, economical mime. No exaggerations or mugging here; a shift of the shoulders, a roughening of the voice, a glint in the eye and she creates Ebenezer Scrooge in our minds, not in pantomime on the stage. Hers is the opposite of a bravado performance. She invites us into the fable, sketches the characters, and articulates the text with such precision and relish that we realize for the first time that Dickens has created a prose poem.

Yes, it's a morality play, and a powerful one. One may question the enthusiasm of those who propose that this short creation, which runs barely an hour in Nason's re-telling, gave shape to the English and eventually to the American celebration of the holiday, with gifts and roast meats and hearty family gathering. After all, the bleak mid-winter has been since pagan times a period for huddling together and sharing, and early church fathers had good reason to set the Christmas story at that season of the year.

Read more at AustinLiveTheatre.com . . . .

Upcoming: Boxed Set, Rob Nash solo at the Vortex Repertory, December 17 - 18

Found on-line:

The VORTEX presents

Rob Nash’s

Boxed Set

2 Nights Only! Dec.17-18, 2010 Friday-Saturday 8 p.m.

Vortex Repertory, 2307 Manor Road (click for map)

Tickets:$30-$10
$30-$25 Priority Seating, $20-$15 General Admission, $10 Starving Artists
Limited seating. Advance purchase recommended.

Selected scenes from Rob’s 20 award-winning theatrical works including the one that started it all: 12 Steps to a More Dysfunctional You (Rob’s 1st play); The off-Broadway sensation, Holy Cross Sucks! (his 8th play), Bette Davis and Joan Crawford as Scrooge and Marley in A Christmas Carol Roasting on an Open Fire (16th play) and last summer’s smash hit Special Needs (20th play). Plus some new stories and standup and maybe a song or three…

Brad Hastings will be making a guest appearance both nights. He was “Whipping Boy” back in the 90’s and 00’s, and created sound design for the Dysfunctionals and Holy Cross Sucks plays.

Have a Rob Nash Xmas!!!