Profile by participating artist Dr. David Glen Robinson: Art Show/Model Show, Paper Chairs at the Off-Shoot, August 29 - September 14, 2013

(www.paperchairs.com)

by Dr. David Glen Robinson


A Participating Artist's Impressions

The artists stood at easels or sat at drawing tables in the well of the theatre, downstage center, or more aptly, house center. The stage was multilevel, rising before us and offering sightlines better than in most figurative art workshops. The lighting on the models was also much better than in any workshop. My choice of oil on canvas as the medium ensured no relaxation on my part. I sweated and labored continually, and my brushes and charcoals hummed throughout the show; I panted through the entire five-minute break the artists were given in the middle of the performance. But my earnest efforts had actually begun before the show, with hauling four loads of art equipment and supplies from my pickup into the theatre. And I thought I had a minimal setup! Lesson: Oil painting never allows a minimal setup.

I was a guest artist for one evening performance of Paper Chairs’ Art Show/Model Show at the Offshoot Theatre in East Austin, where creativity seemsy always to find new and brilliant expression. This show simulated in its setting an art class or workshop, where artists actually strive for, well, something in the realm of figurative art. The workshop setting gave rise to the need for working artists in the show, and so I signed up. But it was the art models/actors who controlled the action and gave all the lines and spoke all the texts in the show. The only artists who spoke were those who did so in projected video interviews on a screen above the stage.

(photo from Paper Chairs)

The art models, you may surmise, showed some attitude, i.e., ‘tude, and with good reason. Artists and art models exist in an archetypical relationship. They have left their traces on Paleolithic cave walls and in every succeeding stage of world art since that time, with the possible exceptions of Hebraic and Islamic art. In all those eras, expression and communication were the province of the artists, while the fully exposed models remained silent, ultimately and ironically invisible in terms of their identities, female or male. The model merely provided a useful form for the visual telling of allegories and mythic adventures. The exception of portrait art proves the rule: there, the dominance of the artist fell away when painting a fully empowered and clothed king, queen or aristocrat as portrait subject, not model. The portrait titles are the names of those depicted.

The models who created Art Show/Model Show raged against all of that. They spoke and the artists remained silent. Art instruction videos contextualized their world, and then the models offered commentary on it all, never more hilariously than when model Kelli Bland walked among the artists in faux art teacher mode giving ironic, almost snide, instructions in how to draw body parts, mostly by making impersonal and insensitive comments about “the model.” (“You can’t see that bone on that model, but it is there under all her fat.”) All models have heard such brutally clinical and basically rude comments in the course of their modeling careers.

Read more at AustinLiveTheatre.com . . . .

Video Promo: Art Show Model Show by Paper Chairs at the Off-Shoot, August 29 - September 14, 2013

paper chairs enthusiastically presents

ART SHOW/MODEL SHOW

a play about art modeling and the creative/human questions found in a figurative drawing session

The show will run at
The Off Shoot. 2211 Hidalgo Street.
Thurs, Fri, and; Sat: Aug 29- Sept 14th
(all shows at 8pm &doors open at 7:30pm.)
Special Sunday Benefit Performance Sept 8th.
(must be 18+ to attend. There will be nudity.) 

 
Tickets on sliding scale, $15-$30 plus fees via






or for more details please see www.paperchairs.com

ART SHOW/MODEL SHOW is a multi-media performance that has been in development over the past year, earning a listing as one of the “Six stops to make your 2012 East Austin Studio Tour extra special” from Austin Chronicle’s Robert Faires and running a workshop performance in FronteraFest’s Mi Casa es su Teatro. Devised by performers who work as models in Austin’s visual arts community, this collaborative performance is also an exploration in documentary theatre, with interviews of local artists and models as well as live drawing and painting. It will also include a gallery show, curated by the Austin artists who hire these models.

ART SHOW/MODEL SHOW aspires to be: an honest representation of this (usually) very private world, a life drawing session, a living gallery, an exercise in perspective and time, a conversation about the purpose of art in society, and an intimate look at the singular relationship between the artist and model in the creative process. 

Devised by: Kelli Bland, Meghan Morongova, Michelle Keffer, Jorge Sermini and Jen Brown Directed by: Kelli Bland, Meghan Morongova Assistant Director: Rachel Dendy Technical Director/Design By: Steven Shirey Video by: Eric Graham, Tag Simler, Eliot Haynes Features interviews and work of: Jennifer Balkan, Eve Larson, Dave Larson, Chris Chappell, David Ohlerking, Karen Maness, Matt Stavsrowsky, Pablo Taboada, George Anderson, Steve Dubov, Heather Tolleson, and more!

ART SHOW/MODEL SHOW, Paper Chairs at the Off-Shoot, August 29 - September 14, 2013

[click logo above to visit paper chairs on Facebook; click HERE for website -- www.paperchairs.com]

presents

Art Show/Model Show
August 29 - September 14, 2013

 

at the Off-Shoot, 2211-A Hidalgo Street, near E. 7th Street and Robert Martinez (behind Joe's Bakery - don't park there; they tow!) 

ART SHOW/MODEL SHOW is a multi-media, interactive performance experiment undergoing creation by Kelli Bland, Meghan Adriel Dwyer, Michelle Keffer, Jorge Sermini and Elizabeth Doss based on our experiences as art models. The piece will investigate three folds of art modeling that interest us: the physical experience, the contemporary and historical context, and the queries we encounter in the discipline. Paper Chairs is excited to present our most fruitful findings at the end of summer 2013!

ART SHOW/MODEL SHOW aspires to be these things: a living gallery, a life drawing session, a voyeuristic experiment, a lesson in drawing and art history, a conversation about the purpose of art in society, and an intimate look at the relationship between the artist and model in figurative art.

This collaborative performance will include live drawing and painting by local Austin artists. Alongside the composition of timed poses and staged scenes will be sensorial stimulation, including documentary-style footage and sound bites pieced together from interviews with local artists and models, as well as live drawing projections. It will also include a gallery show, curated by the Austin artists who hire us, and will be presented, or rather, categorized by each model, so that the audience can see the varied and unique perceptions of each individual person

(Click to go to the AustinLiveTheatre front page)

ART SHOW/MODEL SHOW, Paper Chairs at the Off-Shoot, August 29 - September 14, 2013

[click logo above to visit paper chairs on Facebook; click HERE for website -- www.paperchairs.com]

presents
Art Show/Model Show

August 29 - September 14
at the The Off-Shoot, 2211-A Hidalgo Street, near E. 7th Street and Robert Martinez (behind Joe's Bakery) 

paper chairs’ upcoming multi-media performance that will explore the usually private experience of art-modeling and the human & artistic queries that are encountered through the discipline. Created by Kelli Bland, Meghan Morongova, Michelle Keffer, Jorge Sermini and Jen Brown, ART SHOW/MODEL SHOW is based on their experiences as art models as well as interviews with local visual artists and other art models in the Austin community.

ART SHOW/MODEL SHOW aspires to be these things: an experiment in documentary theatre, a living art gallery, a life drawing session, a voyeuristic adventure, an exploration of figurative art in the context of both art history and contemporary times, an honest conversation on body image, and an intimate look at the relationship between the artist and inspiration in the creative process. This collaborative performance will include live drawing and painting by local Austin artists.

paper chairs is excited to present this new devised work at at the OffShoot Aug. 29 through September 14th. Stay tuned to paper chairs’ Facebook and website for more details as we get closer to the production! 

(Click to go to the AustinLiveTheatre front page)

MURDER BALLAD MURDER MYSTERY by Elizabeth Doss, Paper Chairs at Longbranch Inn, May 21 & 22, 2013

[click logo above to visit paper chairs on Facebook; click HERE for website -- www.paperchairs.com]


presents

Written by Elizabeth Doss
Directed by Keri Boyd
Designed by Lisa Laratta

May 21 & 22
8 pm start
Longbranch Inn
1133 E 11th St. Austin, TX 78702 - click for map
Pay What You Can ($5 suggested)
Tickets at the Door! Cash Only!

For two nights only, paper chairs will haunt our neighborhood bar, the Longbranch Inn, with a workshop resurrection of Murder Ballad Murder Mystery. Saddle up to the bar, sip yer whisky and watch a host of legendary killers commit crimes riddled with ghoulish slapstick, frantic line dances, and tear-jerking ballads. This romp-through-the-swamp musical takes a stab at gutting the inner animal and spills its contents at close range.


Cast:
Tom - Mark Stewart
Tom’s Wife- Cami Alys
Felicity - April Perez-Moore
Sadie- Emily Tindall Burke
Bea- Elizabeth Doss
Jay- Nigel O’Hearn
Stagger Lee- Noel Gaulin
The Sheriff- Kelli Bland


This project is funded and supported in part by the City of Austin through the Economic Growth & Redevelopment Services Office/Cultural Arts Division believing an investment in the Arts is an investment in Austin’s future. 

(Click to go to the AustinLiveTheatre front page)

Adam Sultan by Steve Moore and Zeb L. West, Physical Plant Theare, March 28 - April 13, 2013

(poster design: Jennymarie Jemison)

by Dr. David Glen Robinson


For the committed theatergoer, this was a long-awaited premiere. The blended live-action and puppet play previewed at the 2012 Fusebox Festival. The preview tantalized audiences with its potential for taking many different directions.


The premiere at the Salvage Vanguard Theatre on March 28 satisfied our aroused curiosity with a long sequence of wise story choices. They took us through some surprising ways yet never strayed from its emotional heart. Sure, it was about death, and innovative puppetry sustained all its moods and action; at the same time the production remained light, humor-filled and entertaining. 
 A demanding ticket buyer couldn’t ask for much more.


The play follows the character of Adam Sultan, played by the artist Adam Sultan, through to the far distant future of A.D. 2052 (not quite forty years from now). 

 Aged and infirm, Sultan sees and feels the loss of his artist friends all around him. Seemingly despairing, he collects mementos of their lives and seals those objects into glass jars. His bookshelf fills with the jars. Then one day a half-scale doppelganger puppet enters his apartment, drinks heavily and passes out. Sultan doesn’t know what to make of it; he never does know what to make of it. What’s sure is only that from this point forward puppets carry equal weight with human actors in conveying the story and its meanings.

(photo: Physical Plant Theatre)

The Physical Plant team of Steve Moore and Zeb L. West wrote and crafted the show. In addition to makiing unerring choices in a mature story revolving around death, they incorporated advanced concepts of new puppetry that took Adam Sultan to the edge of theatre and puppetry. 

Completely black-garbed puppeteers were visible onstage. In conventional theatre, anyone wearing black is a technician and therefore invisible in the sense of operating the play and not figuring in the scripted action; technicians are merely making it happen.


The Adam Sultan puppeteers pushed this envelope or bent this frame in several ways. First and most fundamentally, the puppeteers manipulated and changed the human actors throughout the play; they did so subtly and tellingly when they reshaped the postures and stances of the living to reflect advancing age, as for example in the touching moment when they placed wedding rings on the fingers of the lead characters. In addition, the puppeteers removed their black headgear to speak narrative voice-overs at a microphone stand at stage left. With this, the audience no longer held the puppeteers comfortably framed in invisibility as helpers for the story. Attention, audience: they might do other things, so be ready.

Read more at AustinLiveTheatre.com . . . .

Upcoming: The Becomings, Popworks at the Golden Apple, June 27 - 29

Popworks is excited to present a workshop production of

THE BECOMINGS

with

Cyndi Williams, Jeffery Mills, Adriene Mishler, Rosalyn Mandola, Jennymarie Jemison, Kelli Bland and Robert Pierson as The Bear

Step Inside The Golden Apple: JUNE 27th-JUNE 29th, 8PM
LATE NIGHT JUNE 29TH, 10PM
*limited seating*
RESERVE YOUR TICKETS HERE! Free advance tickets via Brown Paper Tickets.

ARRIVE EARLY TO CLAIM YOUR TICKET.
TICKETS THAT ARE NOT CLAIMED BY 7:45 WILL BE SOLD TO PRESENT PARTIES ON THE WAIT LIST.
TICKETS $8 at the door
CASH OR CHECK ONLY PLEASE

* * free parking in lot! * *

"Do you feel bad for a mom who turns into a monster and is destroyed? It seems like fate to me, and fate's got no pity. But man, you gotta feel bad for those kids. Because Matricide is pure Curse-Starter, for sure.

Maybe though tonight, things might change. There's a ritual for that. But it's gotta be just right. "

Trapped under a terrible curse, a deeply troubled family and minor showbiz clan withers away. Convinced their long dead mother is haunting them, they are paralyzed with fear, ashamed of her death, and stuck at their last gig, The Golden Apple. But a secret coiled as tight as theirs is bound to spring. An outsider crashes thru their careful silence and the spring is tripped. The truth can open a door, but it can also kill a man. What remains after the falsehoods - tiny and tragic - come crumbling? And what happened that fateful night to send the family reeling?


From some of the people that brought you THE ASSUMPTION comes the story of a troubled and ridiculous family. Part greek tragedy, part 60's girl group musical, part Grey Gardens, THE BECOMINGS is the next venture for the fledgling collaborative experiment that is POPWORKS. This stellar company of performers shares the stage with a live-band with Justin "The Judge" Bankston (formerly of Winslow) playing original music from Sally Crewe, The Bandana Splits, Sonnet Blanton, Alejandro Rose-Garcia of Shakey Graves, and house band, Fast Moustache.

Direction Sonnet Blanton
Music Direction & Arrangement Justin Bankston and Alejandro Rose-Garcia
Production Management Sam Webber
Words: Blanton, Mills, Williams
Movement: Adriene Mishler

"People who have survived the cruel fate of tragedy do not make sweet stories well. They come across all funny. Hollow. Crooked. Like a smile hides the dark words you struggle to keep trapped behind your teeth. Our stories - Our story holds so much dark. But there is power in the dark. There is unsuspected depth."

poster design by Gabe Vaughn

Upcoming: Who Is Karen Finley by Kelli Bland, Salvage Vanguard Theatre, January 4

Via an SVT Tweet:

Who Is Karen Finley?

a performance art piece

by Kelli Bland

January 4, 8 p.m.

Salvage Vanguard Theatre, 2803 Manor Rd. (click for map)

WHO IS KAREN FINLEY? is a cutting-edge exploration of sensuality, domination and humiliation in the 21st century. The P.A.P., or Performance Art Piece, is a first offering by local neo-feminist Ivy, who, with the aid of her art slave, Daud, will shock, titillate, nauseate the spectator with post-postmodern polytheatrical CLITartistry.

Tito's Vodka! Wunder Pilz Kombucha!
All proceeds will go towards the making of the art film THE QUIET GIRL'S GUIDE TO VIOLENCE!

If you don't show, you are a fucking loser.

Upcoming: Skype and Performance, a discussion, Salvage Vanguard, July 7

Found on-line:

Skype in Performance

a discussion facilitated by Robert Matney and Kelli Bland

organized by the Exchange Artists

Thursday, July 7, 7 - 9 p.m.

Salvage Vanguard Theatre, 2803 Manor Rd. (click for map)

[Click image to view Facebook event page]

You are cordially invited to attend a sweet little affair highlighting the role of Skype in Performance. We will begin with introductions from two local groups engaged in international performance via Skype. Robert Matney, of The Hidden Room's production of "You Wouldn't Know her she lives in London", and
Kelli Bland, of the U.S. contribution to Imploding Fictions "You are Invited" will share their experiences in the creation and performance of theatrical productions utilizing Skype to connect to international audiences.

This free to the public event will include refreshments and an opportunity for questions and discussion about this new vehicle for performance.

Hope to see you there!

Upcoming: The Story Seekers, Exchange Artists at the Elizabeth Ney Museum, March 25 - April 10

Found on-line:

present

[image: Kelly Bland, by Kimberley Mead]

The Story Seekers

by Katherine Craft

March 25 - April 10

Thursdays - Sundays at 7 p.m.

A new play on the grounds of The Elisabet Ney Museum

304 E. 44th Street, Hyde Park neighborhood, Austin

Tickets are a suggested $15 donation and can be reserved by emailing exchangeartists@gmail.com or calling (979) 255-8292.

A band of children live as prisoners in an alternate world, never changing as long as the storyteller who trapped them holds the endings to their stories in her book. Some of these characters are familiar – Lupe, who escapes La Lorona; Abini, the Yoruban miracle child; and Hans, who followed the Pied Piper out of Hamlin – but there are other children caught in the forest as well. Only when a young princess, Bet, flees her comfortable castle after catching a glimpse of the future through a magic window and finds herself trapped in the storyteller’s world do the children find hope of escape. Hope in the form of a gardener’s son: Bet’s best friend Gil.

THE STORY SEEKERS, a new play by Katherine Craft, developed in collaboration with Exchange Artists actors, transforms the grounds of Hyde Park’s landmark castle into the setting of a fantastical drama. The performance is participatory in nature with actors leading the audience throughout the grounds as the stories and the mysteries of the space unfold.

THE STORY SEEKERS cast includes Karen Alvarado, Isaac Arrieta, Kelli Bland, Jen Brown, Bastion Carboni, Bridget Farr, Emily Kennedy, Sidharth Khanejar, Steffanie Ngo-Hatchie, Mindy Rast, Michael Slefinger, Karina Dominguez Smith, and Frederic Winkler. Set and lighting design is by Spencer Pharr, Costume design by Katherine Craft, with Props and Crafts by Katie Richter. Choreography and direction by Rachel Wiese.

In the event of any rain cancellations, makeup performances will be held April 15, 16, and 17. Please bring a flashlight and wear shoes for walking on the museum grounds.

Baal by Bertolt Brecht, Paper Chairs at the Salvage Vanguard Theatre, November 11 - 28

Baal was Brecht's first play, written in 1918 at the age of twenty. He had avoided the draft by taking a medical course and he was called up to staff a venereal disease clinic only a month before the war ended, and much of that time he was studying theatre.

Brecht did not articulate his doctrine of theatrical alienation until 1935, but this text and the production of it by Dustin Wills and the Paper Chairs company suggest strongly that he was on his way in that direction from the very first of his career. Playwright and company achieve the Verfremdungseffekt by using plot devices and staging techniques that remind spectators that they are witnessing a theatrical enactment, not real life -- the intent is didactic, pressing viewers to question and to rouse themselves from the comfort of their passivity. It is a tidy justification for a presentational (not representational) stage technique. Many readers and theatre practitioners consider that Brecht's stories and characters gripped his audiences despite of the V-effekt instead of because of it.

I wanted to like this production because I appreciate Wills' exploration of early 20th century theatre and I enjoy the brash ensemble techniques he encourages. You enter the Salvage Vanguard to find a square central stage oriented in proscenium fashion, even though there's no proscenium. Instead, on either side, you see "backstage" dressing and costuming areas, with cast members boisterously preparing for the show. They wear baggy underclothes of tan-colored muslin, they pay little attention to the gathering spectators, they josh, they fret, they give the impression of a circus troupe preparing for one more day on the boards. Some will wander by to greet spectators; others do vocal or physical exercises. The energy is attractive and invigorating.

Read more at AustinLiveTheatre.com . . . .

Upcoming: Baal by Bertolt Brecht, Paper Chairs at Salvage Vanguard Theatre, November 11 - 28

Received directly:

Paper Chairs excitedly announces its sophomore production

Baal

by Bertolt Brecht, translated by Peter Tegel from the 1922 edition

directed by Dustin Wills.

Ba·al [bey-uhl, beyl]

1. any of numerous local deities among the ancient Semitic peoples, typifying the productive forces of nature and worshiped with much sensuality.

2. (sometimes lowercase) a false god.

The slightly intoxicated, morally bankrupt patrons of “The Night Cloud” are putting on a play about their idol, Baal. Baal is a mysterious figure said to have roamed the forests, inns and bars leaving nothing but poetry, destruction and a hefty bar tab in his wake. The perfect – though some may disagree – idol for a band of hooligans in a seedy cabaret.

Bertolt Brecht’s first play, Baal, drags its audience deep into a body of youthful desires and complete moral abandon. Written in 1918, when Brecht was 20 years old – before the Epic Theatre and the overtly political work for which he is lauded – Baal unfolds in fragments; like a piecemeal of the nearly forgotten events of a drunken evening. It tells the story of our poet-musician and title character, Baal, fleeing the civilized world to live the extreme life somewhere in the forest finding plenty of people and pursuits to indulge his insatiable appetite for experience. The themes coursing through this text are especially pressing today: emerging adulthood, substance abuse, nature’s destruction, homosexuality, and exploration of the body. This performance of Baal also features original score and 8 songs written to Brecht’s verse performed live by the bar patrons and composed and directed by boozers Andy Tindall and Rob Greenfield. We also invite 12 audience members to buy priority seats at tables on stage – free refreshments included!

Featuring bar patrons Joey Hood (2010 Critic’s Table Best Actor), Robert Pierson, Jacob Trussell, Noel Gaulin, Michael Amendola (2010 Critic’s Table Best Supporting Actor), Rob Greenfield, Kelli Bland, Adriene Mishler, Elizabeth Doss, Kimberly Adams, Chase Crossno, Sonnet Blanton, and Gabriel Luna (2010 Critic’s Table Best Actor) in the title role, Baal. The Night Cloud Cabaret is designed by Lisa Laratta (2010 Critic’s Table Best Scenic Design), the costumes by bar regular Benjamin Taylor Ridgeway, and the lovely Natalie George hanging lights from the trees.

Baal runs Wednesdays – Sundays from November 11 to November 28 nightly at 8:00 p.m. (three weekends in total) at The Salvage Vanguard Theater (2803 Manor Rd.; Austin, Texas 78722). Tickets: Pay-What-You-Want Wednesdays and Thursdays; Fridays-Sundays - $15.00 general seating, $30.00 table seating. Advanced Purchase ticket pricing ($15 each) will be available through our website as of October 18, 2010 (www.paperchairs.com). There will be no performance Thanksgiving, November 25.

Paper Chairs creates sensorially dynamic theatre combining fractured subjectivity, music, unconventional audience situation, surrealism, provocative design and labor-intensive mechanics. We favor challenging texts that allow for a fusion of various performance styles, music genres, and historical periods to excite modern sensibilities and educate by suggesting past and present cultural connections. The work is outrageous, well-researched, and a little bit dangerous.

Upcoming: Desire Caught By The Tail by Pablo Picasso, staged reading by Listrunk at Salvage Vanguard Theatre, March 11

Found on-line:

LISTRUNK,
a brand spankin' new collective of visual and performing artists, invites you to digest our first public offering: a salon reading of Pablo Picasso's stage play

Desire Caught by the Tail

complete with Picasso-inspired illustrations, a talk about Picasso's life in Paris during World War II, and refreshments.

MARCH 11 at 8:30 p.m.
Salvage Vanguard Theatre, 2803 Manor Road, Austin
$5 suggested donation
Call 409-365-7306 for reservations and pay at the door.

Directed by Meghan Adriel Dwyer
Illustration by Todd Mein
Featuring Zeb West, Michael Ferstenfeld, Melissa Recalde, Briana McKeague, Jorge Sermini, Kelli Bland, Cassidy Risien, Steven Shirey, Courtney Outlaw and Walter Young

Murder Ballad Murder Mystery, Tutto Theatre at Vortex Repertory, October 23 - November 7

Murder Ballad Murder Mystery is imagined and delivered as a clown show balanced precariously on deep and true traditional ballads.

Those ballads are deep, because stories of passion, violence and murder are rooted somewhere pretty close to our shared DNA; true, because they contain archetypes of our culture. The restless husband; the innocent and defenseless girl-child; the rapscallion, the rapist, and the rowdy. Including, of course, musicians and theatre folk.

Playwright Elizabeth Doss, who appears here as the female half of a Bonnie-and-Clyde type duo, began this piece while living in Spain, perhaps spurred to re-examine her own cultural traditions.

Read more at AustinLiveTheatre.com . . . .

Upcoming: Murder Ballad Murder Mystery, Vortex Repertory, October 23 - November 7

UPDATE: Click for ALT review, October 26

UPDATE: Lisa Scheps on KOOP-FM writes on the website for Offstage and On The Air: "Today my guests were all from Tutto Theatre Company's production, Murder Ballad Murder Mystery playing October 23 - November 7 at The Vortex (click here for tickets). We had Tutto Artistic Director and Director of the show, Dustin Wills; playwright, lyricist, and performer Elizabeth Doss; Composer and performer, Mark Stewart and performer Kelly Bland. It was a fun show and most of the music was played live in the studio." Click here to listen. (30 mins)

Found on-line:

Vortex Repertory Company and Tutto Theatre Company
present the world premiere production of

Murder Ballad Murder Mystery

by Elizabeth Doss
Directed by Dustin Wills
Oct.23-Nov.07, 2009

Murder Ballad Murder Mystery unearths a host of dank and dirty bayou bandits whose names once marauded headlines, wanted posters, and LP sleeves. Watch these corpses whittle out new murder tools to make mincemeat of fair maidens and turn your sweetest dream into your worst nightmare. This psychedelic bluegrass symphonic romp through the swamp spins infamous southern-gothic tales of torture and true crime into a circus massacre of whodunits. A blast from the past straight up from the grave. Get caught at the crossroads, October 23rd at The Vortex. Halloween Drink Specials. Costumes welcome.

Read more at AustinLiveTheatre.com . . . .

I ♥ Walmart , Capital T Theatre at Hyde Park Theatre, August 13 - 29

UPDATE: Free on-line video streaming of sold-out final performance, August 29, 8 p.m. CDT http://qik.com/capitalt

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 a laugh. Those of us who haunt the Hyde Park Theatre probably spend more time in the bars and the music venues than at the stage, and we might prefer improv comedy or even, on an unplanned evening, late night television or the Alamo Drafthouse. Capital T's pre-show projections of mostly anti-Walmart skits from the Internet directly echoes the Alamo Drafthouse's pre-film warmups. The Capital T crowd is eager to laugh at the incongruities of this American life.

And laugh we did! Mark Sheibmeir gave us a bouncy, funny satire as an imaginary trainer for Walmart greeters, those losers at the front door, and Mason Stewart did a wonderful, grinning, assured turn in bombast as the marketing man with a new vision for the company: the holy of holies, literally, for us American consumers. Those two bits by Mark Pickell and Larry Hill respectively framed the first half and left us ready for more.

Read more at AustinLiveTheatre.com . . . .

Upcoming: I ♥ Walmart, Capital T Theatre at Hyde Park Theatre, August 13 - 29

Click for ALT review, August 26

UPDATE: Review by Sean Fuentes at AustinTheatreReview.com, August 26

UPDATE: Review by Ryan E. Johnson at Examiner.com, August 18

Received directly from Capital T Theatre:

Cap T presents a new original play

I ♥ Walmart

which runs August 13th-29th at Hyde Park Theatre. This collaborative original work conceived by Mark Pickell and Carrie Klypchak examines the people who love Wal-Mart and the people who love to hate Walmart.

The show is being launched just in time to celebrate Northcross Mall’s conversion into an “upscale” two story Pantheon of 24-hour consumerism. :(

Comprised from the writings of more than a dozen playwrights across the US including former local favorite Jim Fritzler (of Nebraska now), it is guaranteed to spark a conversation or two.

Starring B Iden Payne and Austin Critics Table winners and nominees
Kelli Bland,Travis Dean, Mark Pickell, Mark Scheibmeir, Mason Stewart & Ben Wolfe,

and introducing
Mateo Barrera, Molly Fonseca, Carrie Klypchak, Joey LePage, & Miriam Shoemaker

Tickets Sliding Scale at the Door $15-$25
Buy online:





or call 479-PLAY

Upcoming: Fundraiser for Faster Than The Speed of Light, May 3

Post by "Austin Actress," April 28:

I’m in a brand new show. A musical at that. Playing a dominatrix henchwoman cult member. Obviously, not your average musical. This one is dark and clubby, and not written by musical theatre people. Instead it has been in development for three years by local musician/performance artists Stanley Roy and Jeremy Roye (geniuses), and directed by the uber-talented Kelli Bland. Part of the reason that I haven’t been posting much lately is that I am in rehearsals after work almost every day, dancing my ass off. I love the music in this show. I know you will too. And you’ll have a chance to hear some of it this weekend. We are staging this without a company all on our own, and we are having a glorious FUNd Raiser this Sunday at Salvage Vanguard to try to raise some more much needed revenue.

Faster Than the Speed of Light! The Fundraiser is here this Sunday!!!

Salvage Vanguard Theater

2803 Manor Road

6PM-10PM

FREE BOOZE AND FOOD!!!

Hosted by Rebecca Havemeyer!

Sneak Preview of songs from the original sci-fi musical, Faster Than the Speed of Light!

Ariel dance by Nicole Whiteside (Blue Lapis Lights)!

Dance trio, Little Stolen Moments!

Door Prizes!

French lounge act, Le Sexy!

Heart breakers, Hello Lovers!

Disco dance after-party with Dj Bill and Mos Jef!!! (post 10pm)

5 - 20 $

See clips of the performers and a more complete listing of all the fun here. Come out, come out, it will be fun and it’ll be good to see you.