Video Promo: Der Bestraffte Brudermord, Hidden Room Theatre, January17 - February 9, 2014

Video by Lowell Bartholomee:

Tiffany Stern Lectures on 'Der Bestrafte Brudermord,' at the Harry Ransom Center, University of Texas, January 16, 2014

Tiffany Stern (image via Hidden Room Theatre)

Join The Hidden Room in welcoming scholar/superhero Tiffany Stern to Austin! She'll be speaking as the honored Thomas Cranfill Lecturer on the mysterious Der Bestrafte Brudermord, and why it might, or might not be a puppet show. Absolutely free, and completely priceless. Don't miss this wildly influential and delightful individual.

Many thanks to the UT English Department for their kind sponsorship of this event.

Tiffany Stern is a Professor of Early Modern Drama (English Faculty), and Beaverbrook and Bouverie Fellow in English (University College) at Oxford University.

Tiffany specialises in Shakespeare, theatre history from the sixteenth to the eighteenth century, book history and editing. Her work arises from an interest in the contexts that shaped the ways playwrights wrote and actors performed. Her first book was Rehearsal from Shakespeare to Sheridan; her second book, Making Shakespeare, focused on Shakespeare’s London, actors, theatres, props and music. Both books are used by theatre companies interested in experimenting with ‘original’ methods of Shakespearean production. Shakespeare in Parts, a book she co-wrote with fellow Oxford faculty member Simon Palfrey, concentrates on Shakespeare as a playwright and actor performing from, and writing for, 'parts' (the texts actors received, consisting of cues and speeches, nothing else). Combining Simon’s expertise as an interpreter and Tiffany’s as a theatre historian, it is a work that takes its interpretative momentum from archival research to discover not only a newly active, choice-ridden actor, but also a new Shakespeare. It is complemented by Documents of Performance in Shakespearean England, which considers the other papers of performance not examined in 'Parts': plot-scenarios, playbills, arguments, prologues, songs, scrolls and backstage-plots.

Tiffany is also an editor, and has produced editions of the anonymous King Leir, Richard Sheridan’s The Rivals, and George Farquhar’s The Recruiting Officer.

Video Appeal: Support Robert Matney's Fight Against Cancer, via YouCaring

A few weeks ago, Robert Matney- actor, technology designer, and all-around extraordinary person was diagnosed with a malignant melanoma that had spread to his lymphatic system. In 2008, Rob was diagnosed with bladder cancer. Rob beat it. Last year, a pulmonary embolism tried to do its worst. But Rob beat that, too.

Rob started his new fight the day after Lowell Bartholomee and Beth Burns of Hidden Room Theatre shot this. We want to help get some of his medical bills out the way so he can win this one, too. Any contribution means the world to Rob, his family, his friends, and his future friends family family. Because he's awesome. Please click on the YouCaring image to go to the contribution page.

There will be a benefit performance of Hidden Room's THE TAMING OF THE SHREW at York Rite Theatre (311 West 7th Street 78701) on June 30 and a "tent revival" benefit at The Off Center (2211 Hidalgo 78702) in late July. Go to youcaring.com/matneyvscancer for benefit details and to make a contribution to the medical bill fund.

Rob constantly proves himself to be a treasure among people. We want to make sure that stays true for many years to come. Thank you!

TAMING OF THE SHREW, benefit for Robert Matney, staged reading by Hidden Room Theatre at York Masonic Hall, June 30, 2013

The Hidden Room Theatre
[performing at the York Masonic Hall 311 W. 7th St., Austin - click for map]

presents
a staged reading and benefit for Robert Matney:
the original practices staging of
The Taming of the Shrew
by William Shakespeare
June 30, 2013
at the York Masonic Hall, 311 W. 7th Street - click for map
Please join us as we band together to support our very own and much beloved Robert Matney. We are proud to announce that the launch event of the Matney vs Cancer: Fight! benefit is a reunion staged reading of our award-winning Taming of the Shrew Original Practices, Sunday June 30th at the York Rite Masonic Hall. Tickets go one sale shortly. What a wonderful way to show the love for Matney and stand with him in this fight!

(Click to go to the AustinLiveTheatre front page)

Opinion: Robert Matney on Hacking Theatre in a Networked World, Howlround.com

Hacking Theatre in a Networked World

by Robert Matney
April 15, 2013

Robert Matney

We come to the theater to satisfy a Luddite urge for something more visceral, more live and less mediated, more unpredictable than a two-dimensional screen provides. It is, then, no surprise that the theater selects for, and cultivates, in its practitioners a reticence to integrate new technology. Let's own up: collectively we are late adopters.

As theater artists, we have an obligation, I think, to remedy this, or we find ourselves sprinting (faster) toward our obsolescence and abdicating our duty to hold a “mirror to nature” in an increasingly technological culture. Let us hack theater for a networked world, using the Internet's numerical, geographical, and temporal scalability to interact with new audiences, insist on an ongoing and authentic relevance for our work, test new forms, and propagate new possibilities while preserving what is essential about our discipline. Let us trust that theater is resilient enough to make this leap as it has made many others, and that it will survive a modest but important re-programming. And of course, in the pursuit of this remedial integration, let us seek methods that integrate deeply into the art and the aesthetic, rather than yield to the easy seduction of bolt-on and gimmicky technical appendages.


Austin, a bubbling cauldron of new works for theater and a world-class center of hi-tech startups should be a focus of this work, and yet its marvelous potential as a capital of innovation for digital integration with performing art remains largely unrealized. There are virtually no dedicated performance spaces with a functional wired internet connection with proximity to the tech booth/performance space, and only one, to my knowledge, offering a connection greater than low-end residential speeds (>15 Mbps down & 1.5 Mbps up). 

So our work is cut out for us in making good on these extraordinary possibilities in Austin.
I've been collaborating with Beth Burns at Hidden Room Theatre, Graham Schmidt at Breaking String Theater, Ron Berry at Fusebox Festival, Paul Menzer and Matt Davies at Mary Baldwin College (Staunton, VA), and Philip Arnoult at the Center for International Theatre Development (CITD; Baltimore, MD) to work on disparate pieces of hi-tech integration into the work of theater on stage and off.

Our world is networked, and our theater need no longer be wholly defined by a proscenium arch, a black box, or any physical space (empty or otherwise).

For Mary Baldwin College, we are currently working with the Shakespeare and Performance faculty and graduate students to co-create actorscholar.com as an experimental platform for digital dramaturgy (or "digiturgy," a term recently introduced to me by Cassidy Browning during the Cohen New Works Festival). We seek here more than a simple web publishing site (with fair use and copyright sensitive access-control that attends to professional and academic contexts, of course), but also a means of integrating open APIs and freely available web-based data streams to open up new possibilities for dramaturgical content and analysis (such as the ability to easily plot a plays locations in an interactive map so artist and audience can pull the kind of data they desire about the play's location(s)).

With the CITD, Mr. Arnoult, Susan Stroupe, and I are preparing to digitize and live stream for real-time interaction many of the events of Beyond the Capitals II, an international exchange project funded by the Bilateral Presidential Commission: American Seasons in Russia, a program of the US Embassy in Moscow, and which will travel throughout Russia this May. Our goal is to ensure that all of the American participants in the Beyond The Capitals I project can take the journey with us, engage digitally, and interact with the artists we will be visiting in Russia.

At Fusebox, we are in the early stages of building an Art+Technology platform to feature and sustain exploratory work, education, and presentations that innovate in the area of art and technology integration. This year's festival features a number of exciting works, including Motion Bank and Ant Hampton's Cue China.


In the Hidden Room, we seek to solve a distinct art/technology challenge with each project. The first challenge we undertook was to patch together two disparate geographical locations into one contiguous aural and visual performance space. In You Wouldn't Know Her, She Lives In London (named so in Austin) / You Wouldn't Know Him, He Lives In Texas (named so in London), we teamed up with Mimi Poskitt and Look Left Look Right theater, and tethered a site-specific venue in Austin with the Roundhouse in London, with each venue containing a portion of the cast and a full in-location public audience. We picked up video in each location and cross-displayed it, "lining up" the people and equipment for mutual visibility for all participants. Additionally, we microphoned and cross-amplified the spaces such that if an Austinite opened a candy wrapper during the performance he could successfully annoy the audience in Austin and London. We then used a separate computer in London to encode the video conversation between the Austin and London locations, streaming the results to the web for a third, online audience. In all locations, a Twitter-hashtag- delimited text stream was presented, and all audiences were encouraged to interact with each other and the performers for shared textual visibility.

Hidden Room's next project was to tune our technical process to enable transcontinental rehearsal. With Rose Rage, we conducted our rehearsals with actors located in London, Cornwall, Virginia, and Austin. This process took us through 75% of the rehearsal period before all gathered in Austin to present a run of this six-hour production.
 
Click 'Read more' to continue or click HERE to go to the article at www.howlround.com

THE GIRL WITH TIME IN HER EYES, Hidden Room Theatre at SXSW, March 10, 2013

The Hidden Room Theatre is proud to present

Robin Jones’ and Beth Burns' mind-bending interactive time-travel pulp play

THE GIRL WITH TIME IN HER EYES

March 10 at SXSW

Become a volunteer test subject for an emerging technology that allows you to witness and document a mystery that happened sixty years ago. Change the fabric of history as you untangle clues and avoid deceptions. Running time 40 minutes, Next Stage Austin Convention Center, SXSW Interactive. Come back with us as we travel through crime!

Starring Judd Farris, Julia Lorenz-Olson, Toby Minor, Ryan Hamilton, and Robert Matney. Directed by Beth Burns. Story by Robin Jones and Beth Burns.

(Click to go to the AustinLiveTheatre front page)

Invisible, Inc. by Paul Menzer, Hidden Room Theatre at Rolllins Theatre, Long Center, January 11 - 20, 2013

by Dr. David Glen Robinson and Michael Meigs

Outside the Austin skyline was bright and magical as ever while enthusiastic crowds gathered for last Thursday’s preview and Saturday’s performance of Invisible, Inc. The Hidden Room Theatre created a delicious, dark and intriguing world in the Rollins black box theatre at the Long Center, emerging from the secret shadows of the historic York Rite Masonic Temple on W. 7th Street and going big time. It's too bad that the company and its director and proprietary matriarch Beth Burns can't occupy that venue for a longer term, because Invisible, Inc. is an elegant and witty entertainment. It’s their first theatre outing since last year’s multiple-award-winning Rose Rage.


One special appeal is that its leads are Robert Matney and Liz Fisher, a young husband and wife pair who enjoy the sort of respect and affection in Austin that Alfred Lunt and Margot Fontanne had on Broadway from the 1930's through the 1960's. Noël Coward wrote his 1933 Design for Living for that famous couple; coincidentally, Austin Shakespeare will be doing that work in this same venue in just a few weeks. Now, there's a thought experiment: substituting Matney and Fisher for Miller and Merino.


Burns presents a gorgeously designed package. Ia Ensterä's set makes the black box into a Manhattan highrise living room with a broad window at deep center stage, decorated in Art Deco via Bela Lugosi. At the audience's far left stands an upright piano that's part of the same playing space; at the far right there's a tumble of furniture representing a garret somewhere far downtown. With furniture shifts the central playing space can belong to either of these. With a shift in lighting, the flare of a spotlight and a change in the image at deep center stage, the space becomes a theatre complete with proscenium.


Patrons desiring premium seating can pay a bit extra to settle at one of the four-person nightclub tables on the floor with the performing space, where they'll be handsomely welcomed and entertained by an amiable professional magician who does up-close illusions and prestidigitation. On Saturday evening the company's Master of Magic (coach) J.D. Stewart was resplendent, gregarious and astonishing. He left us dumbfounded with his skills. We have no idea how those playing cards flew invisibly through the air or those coins appeared impossibly at his bidding.


Invisible, Inc. is soaked with atmosphere and its spookiness is boosted when the lights first go down and that upright piano erupts into lengthy evocative passes of the keys by the invisible Graham Reynolds. His score for MIDI-assisted player piano punctuates the action with the same dexterity as the big Wurlitzer organs at the cinema palaces of the 1930's.


Menzer’s play offers us the world of vaudeville magic acts and magicians in the 1930’s. The potential for a peek behind the magician’s cabinet is immense, and the playwright gives us several such peeks on our way through the story. The characters present magic turns in every scene, their very gestures accented with flash paper. Handcuffs fall off wrists; cards appear and disappear; straitjackets and cabinets cannot contain them. The disappearance of objects, people and reality raises the tension and the ante, and the onslaught of illusions challenges the audience’s perceptions and certitudes.


Click to read more at AustinLiveTheatre.com . . . .

Opening This Week in Central Texas, January 6 - 11, 2013

Opening This Week

in the Austin - (*) San Antonio region

January 6 - 11, 2013

Click images for additional information

Click HERE for a list of all productions CONTINUING on stage

Opening in Austin . . .
 

Georgetown Palace Theatre, January 11 - February 3

(poster design: JennyMarie Jemison)

Way Off Broadway Community Players, Leander, January 11 -February 2

============================================
(Nothing announced in SAN ANTONIO)
=============================================

INVISIBLE INC. by Paul Menzer, Hidden Room Theatre at Rolllins Theatre, Long Center, January 11 - 20, 2013

The Hidden Room

presents

 


January 11 - 20, 2013
January 11-20 at the Long Center, every night except on Tuesday 15th.
Mondays - Saturdays 8 pm, Sundays 5pm
Click to purchase TICKETS

The Hidden Room is proud to present the world premiere of this stylish and crackling noir mystery by Paul Menzer (author of The Brats of Clarence). This fantastical event swirls around feuding magicians in New York: one in the ritzy theatres of Manhattan, the other in back alley speakeasies, both knee-deep in danger.

Starring Robert Matney, Liz Fisher, Joseph Garlock, Laurence Pears, Todd Kassens, and Julia Lorenz-Olson.

Original music by Graham Reynolds, set by Ia Enstera, lights by Megan Reilly, props by Justin Cox, and magic consultation by JD Stewart.


Purchase a general admission ticket, or enjoy the magic close up at table seating!

SPECIAL TALK BACK WITH PLAYWRIGHT MENZER post-show Friday the 11th and Saturday 12th.

There will be no extensions! 10 performances only!

Running time 90 mins.

Proudly supported by the Redd Carpet Fund
Presented at the Joe R. and Teresa Long Center for the Performing Arts

(Click to go to the AustinLiveTheatre front page)

This Week: Shakespeare and the Law, panel at the University of Texas with scenes from The Merchant of Venice, September 28

From the on-line magazine from UT Law:

Shakespeare and the Law:

Scenes and a panel on legal issues in The Merchant of Venice, September 28

Actors from Spirit of Shakespeare, a University of Texas student organization; the University of Texas at Austin Department of Theatre and Dance, under the direction of Fran Dorn; and Hidden Room, an Austin-based original practices company under the direction of Beth Burns, will perform versions of the courtroom scene from The Merchant of Venice as part of a panel discussion titled “Is that the Law?: Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice,” on Friday, September 28, 2012, in the Eidman Courtroom at the University of Texas School of Law from 6:30 p.m. to 9:30 p.m.

The event, free and open to the public, is sponsored by the Department of English at the University of Texas at Austin and the University of Texas School of Law.

A reception will be held at 6:30 p.m. in the Jamail Pavilion adjacent to the Eidman Courtroom in the Law School’s John B. Connally Center. (See Maps and Directions.) The panel, which includes the performance, starts at 7:00 p.m.

This year, four panelists will discuss legal and related issues central to The Merchant of Venice. They are:

• Alan Friedman, professor of English, coordinator of Actors from the London Stage, and faculty advisor for Spirit of Shakespeare at the University of Texas at Austin
• Angela Littwin, Assistant Professor at the University of Texas School of Law
• James Loehlin, director of Shakespeare at Winedale and professor of English at the University of Texas at Austin
• James Shapiro, Larry Miller Professor of English, Columbia University

Spirit of Shakespeare (SOS) is a group of University of Texas students involved in promoting Shakespeare programs on campus and in the community. For several years now, the SOS players have performed scenes from the annual Actors from the London Stage (AFTLS) play and have helped to augment and elucidate the Shakespeare and the Law panel discussions.

Shakespeare and the Law grew out of the AFTLS residency, a familiar and regular part of the University’s Shakespeare offerings since 1999, and a conference on “The Law and Other Performing Arts” held at the Law School in 2002. AFTLS, a London-based theatrical touring company, brings its unique educational and theatrical program, which features a troupe of five classically trained actors from major English theaters, to this campus and city for week-long residencies every year.

Upcoming: Rose Rage, adapted from Shakespeare's Henry VI trilogy, Hidden Room Theatre, July 26 - August 11

The Hidden Room 

proudly presents 

Rose Rage

a conflation of Shakespeare's Henry VI trilogy

as adapted by Edward Hall and Roger Warren for Propeller Theatre

July 26 - Aug 11, times and performances vary (see below)

in a hidden room somewhere within 311 W. 7th Street Austin, TX 78701 (click for map)
 

Please find information, tickets, and your secret password at our website: www.hiddenroomtheatre.com

On-line tickets available via BuyPlayTix - or at (310) 243-6426. $20 general admission, $35 gallants' seats, $70 combined tickets, meal available for $27

Part 1 running time: approx 1 hour 50 minutes ; Part 2 running time: approx 1 hour 40 minutes
recommended for ages 13 and up

Presented in two parts using the Original Practices style, Rose Rage is performed by an all-male cast with musicians playing live on period instruments, universal lighting, and Elizabethan period costumes made with exquisite detail by the Baron's Men.

Rose Rage begins our "Foreign Actor Exchange Program." Visiting actors from the UK have rehearsed with us via Skype, and are now here to complete our international team. Please help us welcome them to Austin.

A sumptuous feast is provided by Megan Turbeville, executive chef of the Root Cellar July 28, 29, Aug 3, 4, 5, and 11 for an additional $27. Please reserve dinner and request your main course at least one week in advance from one of the following: ale-poached salmon, capon, or spinach tarte.

Thurs July 26: Part 1, 8PM
Fri July 27: Part 2, 8PM
Sat July 28: Part 1, 5PM / dinner break / Part 2, 8PM
Sun July 29: Part 1, 2PM / dinner break / Part 2, 5PM
Fri Aug 3: Special late night party! Part 1 8PM / dinner break / Part 2, 11PM
Sat Aug 4; Part 1, 5PM / dinner break / Part 2, 8PM
Sun Aug 5: Part 1, 2PM / dinner break / Part 2 5PM
Mon Aug 6: Part 1, 8PM
Tues Aug 7: Part 2, 8PM
Thurs Aug 9: Part 1, 8PM
Fri Aug 10: Part 2, 8PM
Sat Aug 11: Part 1, 5PM / dinner break / Part 2, 8PM

Upcoming: Rose Rage - an adaptation of Shakespeare's Henry VI trilogy, July 26 - August 11

The Hidden Room Theatre

presents

Rose Rage

a two-part adaptation of Shakespeare's Henry VI plays

July 26 - August 11

Details forthcoming

The Hidden Room is honored to have been granted the rights to Edward Hall and Roger Warren's Rose Rage - an adaptation of Shakespeare's Henry VI trilogy, cut down into an epic two-part event. Theatrical Deviser Beth Burns will be the first director since Hall (Propeller) to tackle this cutting of Shakespeare's earliest historical masterpiece. The production will also introduce our Foreign Actor Exchange Program, where we will be joined by three actors from the UK, first rehearsing via Skype, then traveling to Austin to perform as an international team. 

Filled with political intrigue and ruthless ambition, Rose Rage witnesses the toppling of kings, the loss of France, and the making of the monster that takes over young Richard III. July 26 - August 11th, in a hidden room somewhere within 311 W. 7th Street, Austin TX. Featuring an amazing all-male cast, beautiful live period music, and a bawdy, robust style. Costume design made with careful attention to Original Practices detail by the Baron's Men.

Upcoming: View Live On-Line trans-Atlantic Rehearsal of Rose Rage, Hidden Room Theatre, May 15

From www.howlround.com (with a tip of the hat to Travis Bedard):

Blog

A Risky Experiment Live on #NEWPLAY TV Tuesday, May 15

 

:

Hidden Room’s Transatlantic #RoseRage Rehearsal

on Tuesday, May 15 at 9 a.m. Austin time

May 13, 2012 | BY HowlRound 

Austin’s Hidden Room Theatre, Brisbane, Australia’s Anywhere Festival in partnership with #NEWPLAY TV invite you to enjoy a backstage sneak peek of the very first transatlantic rehearsal of Rose Rage. 

Simply click here to be whisked to a split screen of rehearsal originating from London and from Austin. Watch the Shakespeare sparks fly between actors who are working together for the first time. Then, stick around for a chat where the artistic team elaborates on the pitfalls and benefits of international collaboration—online and off. Use the Twitter hashtag #RoseRage to tweet your questions and say hello to the artists, and to your fellow worldwide viewers. 

Rose Rage, Edward Hall and Roger Warren’s thrilling adaptation of Shakespeare’s Henry VI trilogy marks the inauguration of the Hidden Room’s Foreign Actor Exchange Program. Actors from the UK rehearse with actors in Austin via video teleconferencing before traveling to Texas to complete the international team.

The Hidden Room is taking an Original Practices approach to Rose Rage, employing period costumes, live musicians on period instruments, an all-male cast, and a bawdy, muscular delivery. Their last Original Practices Shakespeare production was honored with Austin Critic’s Table awards for Best Production of a Comedy, Best Leading Actor, and Best Director.

To watch, tune in on Tuesday, May 15 at 9am CDT (Austin, Texas) / 10am EDT (New York) / 2pm GMT / 3pm (London) / 4pm (Berlin) / 12am Wednesday, May 16 (Brisbane) or calculate your own timezone here.

Auditions for Rose Rage, Hidden Room Theatre, February 18 and 19

The Hidden Room is proud to present The Henry VI trilogy by William Shakespeare cut into an epic two-evening event, Rose Rage as edited by Edward Hall of Propeller. We are honored to be the first company not directly associated with Hall to be granted the rights to this amazing adaptation.

All roles are currently open, but please note that the cutting and an Original Practices approach requires an all-male cast. Each actor will be cast in multiple roles. Rose Rage runs July 26 - August 11th.

This production will introduce our Foreign Actor Exchange Program. We will be bringing in several actors from the UK to rehearse via Skype, then incorporate them into the team shortly before the show's opening. This will mean a new rehearsal structure with a long revving-up period that will take some getting used to, one that should also be very rewarding.

Please email hiddenroomtheatre@yahoo.com to schedule your audition for either Saturday, February 18th or Sunday the 19th between 1 p.m. and 5 p.m. We ask that you bring a speech from Shakespeare of no more than 16 lines.

Please feel free to contact Beth with any questions at all, and please do share this notice with any actors that you believe would fit the bill and enjoy this process.

Profile of Hidden Room Theatre by Dawn Youngs at Culturemap

On-line at www.austin.culturemap.com:

The Hidden Theater: A secretive Austin gem that's going global

By Dawn Youngs,12.31.11

As Master of Company and Theatrical Deviser Beth Burns put it, “The Hidden Room Theater is a Theatrical Curiosity Shop specializing in Original Practices classics, technologically forward-thinking works, intriguing new plays, and rarely-done oddities.” The company, critically acclaimed for its media jumping cross-Atlantic theatrical event You Don’t Know Him He Lives in Texas/You Don’t Know Her She Lives in London, will be bringing all of these diverse specialties together in this season’s production of Rose Rage.

Hidden Room has been making waves in the modern world of Shakespeare by going old school. Their recent Original Practice production of Taming of the Shrew had a historically accurate all male cast, period Elizabethan dress and stayed true to the minimalist staging of Shakespeare’s time. The company is not lost in the past, however, evidenced by a recent Kickstarter campaign which harnessed the power of the internet to take the company to the Blackfriar’s Conference at the Shakespeare Center to present the work to some of the world's most renowned Shakespeare scholars. This trip was a big success for Hidden Room Theater, solidifying their place on the international stage.

Read full text at www.austin.culturemap.com . . . .

Upcoming: Mystery Show, Hidden Room Theatre, December 22 (only)

Found on-line:

Arts Reporting from the Blackfriars Shakespeare Conference: Beth Burns and cast on the original Practices Taming of the Shrew

Notes from Cass Morris at the Blackfriars Shakespeare Conference in Staunton, Virgina, October 27:

Beth Burns, Hidden Room Theatre:

"Original Practices at Hidden Room"

Beth Burns introduces her support team from Hidden Room, noting that she met her dramaturg for The Taming of the Shrew at a previous conference. She positions herself clearly on the side of practitioners as opposed to strict academics, but states that she tries to make her practice as well-grounded in scholarship as she can. She thanks the scholarly crowd for "letting me steal your work, as I do do and will do today."

Burns discusses her experiences with Original Practices and notes that, while different companies and scholars have different views on what that means, they all come down to: "let's not fight the text; let's go with it." She's curious about the idea of "male playing female, and what that does to the text," particularly what it does to jokes -- which she doesn't like to cut just because the reference isn't relevant. She wondered if the idea of men playing women would balance out the gender issues in Shrew. "What I found instead was, actually, a love story. A really sexy love story." It also produced a theme of identity.

She noted two challenges: 1) to get the audience to believe the man playing a woman as a female character, and 2) to make the audience perceive the relationship displayed as a heterosexual one, not a homosexual one. Her actors from Hidden Room then present the introduction between Kate and Petruchio (2.1), in (as in her production), late-sixteenth-century costumes and (lead-free) makeup. The scene is fast-paced and full of action, with a Kate visibly enjoying the challenge of sparring with Petruchio, and a Petruchio utterly unwilling to part company with her. Kate also seems moved (though somewhat uncomfortable) by a Petruchio speaking to her sexually -- as, this staging seems to suggest, no other man has ever done.

Burns notes that the scene is "a veritable cornucopia" of the techniques they use. She notes that, to make the steaminess palpable, they don't just go for the obvious sexual jokes, but also those words that "sound sexual" by virtue of their sonic qualities or the face-shapes the sounds cause. They also explored "non-standard touch", to break the expectation of the usual courtship interactions. She moves to the next scene, which she hopes will cause us to look at gender role and power.

In the "sun and moon" scene, 4.5, Kate's concession to Petruchio's declarations comes with more than a light touch of sarcasm -- but she laughs when Petruchio address Vincentio (an impromptu substitution of Matt Davies) as a fair mistress. When Kate gets the joke and flirts with Vincentio, Petruchio intervenes a bit hastily, to cut off a kiss -- which represents, as Burns points out, that she's now playing on an even field with him. They move to the final scene: 5.1, on the street -- the "kiss me, Kate" moment. Their frenetic energy slows to tender regard, but loses none of its passion.

Burns brings her actors out and first asks Ryan (Kate) about building the character. He talks about placing her "center" low, to ground her and also give her grace. Burns and Judd (Petruchio) talk about building the "uber-macho" Petruchio, who Judd describes as "the archetypal alpha male" who goes beyond the typical plateau of gentlemanly behavior.

Matt Davies opens up to questions from the audience for either presenter.

Click for notes on Q&A session at AustinLiveTheatre.com. . . .

Kickstarter Appeal: Hidden Room's 'Original Practices' Taming of the Shrew Travels to the American Shakespeare Center

Received notice on line of the following

appeal for $3250 by October 21:

The Hidden Room has been invited to present a staging session at the world famous American Shakespeare Center's Blackfriars Conference. We will be performing scenes from last year's Taming of the Shrew - Original Practices and discussing Original Practices techniques. This is our big chance to have our amazing Austin actors perform for some of the world's most renowned Shakesperean scholars.

But, first we need to get to Staunton, VA.

And preferably survive while we're there.

Plus it would be nice to return to Austin when we're done. We're fond of it.

Your donation of any amount will help fly our Hidden Room team to Staunton and provide accommodations while we are there. All our folks have already taken care of their own conference fees, but additional moneys raised will go to reimbursing those and other costs incurred on the road. Like food and other such niceties.

Throughout our week in Staunton, the Hidden Room will have the opportunity to learn from and meet with some real academic heroes in the world of Renaissance Drama. Then on Thursday October 27th, we will perform and present on the Blackfriars stage - an exquisite recreation of Shakespeare's original indoor playing house. You can help make a dream come true for our band of players, and allow us the chance to bring Austin to the American Shakespeare Center.

Take us to the ASC. They're waiting for us.

We are grateful for your support - more than you know.

[image by Kimberly Mead: Judd Farris as Petrucio, Ryan Crowder as Kate]

Click for details, FAQ, enticements and to donate at Kickstarter.com. . . .

You Wouldn't Know Him/Her, He/She Lives in Austin/Edinburgh, Hidden Room Theatre & others, August 6 - 28

by Michael Meigs

Austin's Hidden Room Theatre and its British partner Look Left Look Right ran this intercontinental production for the first time last March, linking Austin and London in a breathless Skype video dialogue between fictitious lovers Ryan Peterson and Elizabeth Watson. You Wouldn't Know Him/Her is an intriguing bauble, a digital spinning top and crystal ball that draws audiences into the fiction that they're assisting and supporting these young folk trying to overcome the challenges of long-distance romance.

The production and story-line have changed only modestly since the ALT review on March 11 of the first production.

That staging became a trial run for the game now underway at the Edinburgh Festival. Each Saturday and Sunday in August at noon and at 2 p.m., Austin time, the hopeful lovers will Skype-dial one another, exchange greetings, engage the supporters physically present and respond to comments supplied via the Twitterfeed with the tag #texasedinburgh

Can't make it to the Hidden Room in east Austin? You can set this playful fantasy spinning on your desktop, laptop or smartphone and watch it in split-screen at the "Watch on-line" page on their website (www.youwouldntknow.com). Since I am traveling right now in the southeastern United States, I did just that, revving up my laptop in the mountains of east Tennessee, where my brother lives. He has an extensive theatrical background and is living in a rural region relatively distant from theatrical activities.

Read more at AustinLiveTheatre.com . . . .

Upcoming: You Wouldn't Know Him/Her, He/She Lives in Austin/Edinburgh, Hidden Room Theatre & others, August 6 - 28

received directly:

present

BY BETH BURNS

STARRING UK IMPROVISATIONAL ACTORS Rachel Watkinson, Sally Hodgkiss in Edinburgh

& US IMPROVISATIONAL ACTORS Judd Farris, Ryan Hamilton in Austin

Fringe First winners Look Left Look Right connect live across an ocean from the Edinburgh Fringe Festival to make live long distance theatre love to US partners, the award-winning Hidden Room Theatre in Austin, Texas for the world premiere of You Wouldn’t Know Her, She Lives in Edinburgh.

This fully immersive, interactive Skype theatre experience casts audience (both online and in person) as the friends and family of the play’s long-distance lovers Ryan and Elizabeth. Audiences are then invited to meet and play together live from the UK and the US in this delightful romantic comedy that tests the common definition of what makes a relationship “real.”

Saturdays and Sundays in August

August 6 - 28

Two Shows a Day
12 noon and 2 p.m. Texas time

in a hidden room somewhere within
the East Village Apartments, 1211 E. 7th Street,
Austin, Texas

or streaming at

www.youwouldntknow.com
please contact the Matriarch to acquire your complimentary in-person reservations: (310) 243-6426

hiddenroomtheatre@yahoo.com

Read more at AustinLiveTheatre.com . . . .