(*) Roar! Festival of Staged Plays, Atta Girl Productions at Gemini Ink, October 4 - 13, 2013

Join Atta Girl and Gemini Ink in San Antonio

for two weeks of genre bending staged readings of contemporary plays from throughout the U.S.

513 S. Presa, evenings at 8 p.m. -- click for map

Suggested donation $10.00

OCTOBER 4--Plumbing by Rebecca Kirschbaum
A preacher's son decides to have a sex change operation.

OCTOBER 5--Beware of Tigers by Ben Tremillo
Romance and multiple personality disorder come together for a sweet and sour ending.

OCTOBER 6--MATINEE (3 p.m.)
Confessions of a Mexpatriate by Raul Garza.
Raul Garza guides us through the misadventures of his travels as a Chicano through Mexico.

Sunday, by Janie Sauceda

Janie Sauceda beautifully renders growing up in San Antonio.

OCTOBER 10--You Wouldn't Expect by Marilynn Barner Anselmi
A young woman battles the North Carolina Eugenics board, which performed forced sterilizations until 2003.

OCTOBER 11, 2013--Under the Plastic Stars by Alisha M. Patterson
This fairy tale for adults re-imagines Peter Pan by placing the classic tale into modern day.

OCTOBER 12--Seeking Flight by Joan Broadman
Monty and Enzi are two African Grey Parrots who plot their escape from a research lab. Based on a true story.

OCTOBER 13--MATINEE (3 p.m.)
Bulto by Jorge Piña
Celebrate San Antonio's teatro padrino--Jorge Piña, with a special reading of his latest play Bulto.

The Entrepeneurs by Clyde James Aragon
What if all of the great Latino poets started a greeting card company?

Video: Mical Trejo in 'Confessions of a Mexpatriate' by Raul Garza, Teatro Vivo at the SVT, August 8 - 24, 2013

Posted by JoAnn Carreon Reyes for the

presentation of

Confessions of a Mexpatriate

by Raul Garza

directed by Ken Webster

August 8 - 24, 2013

Salvage Vanguard Theatre, 2803 Manor Rd.

CONFESSIONS OF A MEXPATRIATE by Raul Garza, Teatro Vivo at Salvage VanguardTheatre, August 8 - 24, 2013

presents

directed by Ken Webster

featuring Mical Trejo

Teatro Vivo at Salvage Vanguard Theatre, 2803 Manor Rd., - click for map

Walk a Mile in His Zapatos.

Confessions of a Mexpatriate Debuts at Salvage Vanguard Theater Aug. 8-24

New Teatro Vivo production from playwright Raul Garza, directed by Ken Webster,

Portrays struggle of straddling two homelands

Teatro Vivo presents Confessions of a Mexpatriate, an original one-man performance. Mexpatriate depicts the misadventures of a man who embarks on a journey across Mexico in search of his life’s meaning, and in a discovery of what it truly means to be Mexican-American.

Mexpatriate takes the audience on the adventure of one heavily-American-media-saturated man, embarking on a passage across Mexico, in which he comes to embrace the beauty of the culture and what Mexico means to Mexican-Americans. A memory and a fantasy, scary and welcoming … these are just a few of the aspects of this comedic look at a soul-searching experience. Mexpatriate is portrayed by actor Mical Trejo and is directed by Ken Webster. Both Trejo and Webster are award-winning theater artists.

“We want the audience to view the struggles, discoveries and beauty that come with being Mexican-American in both the U.S. and Mexico,” says JoAnn Reyes, executive director of Teatro Vivo. “Confessions of a Mexpatriate offers exactly that.”

Mexpatriate runs Aug. 8-24, Thursday-Saturday, 8 p.m. at the Salvage Vanguard Theater, 2803 Manor Road
Austin, 78722. Admission is $15 for students and seniors; general admission is $20. Thursday performances are “pay as you wish.”

The opening night gala event, Noche Oaxaqueña — A Taste of Oaxaca is Saturday, Aug. 10. The 6-8 p.m. reception includes Oaxacan-inspired hors d’oeuvres and drinks, followed by the 8 p.m. performance of the play. Tickets for opening night reception and show are $40 per person.

For tickets and information about all performances visit teatrovivo.org

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

About Raul Garza: Raul Garza’s first full-length play, “Fantasmaville,” received the 2007 National Latino Playwriting Award. As a writer for Austin’s Latino Comedy Project, Raul contributed to numerous stage and touring shows. When not writing plays, Raul teaches yoga, fills up on pop culture and serves as co-founder and creative director of TKO Advertising. He received his degree in Advertising from The University of Texas at Austin. Raul is an adjunct professor of Communications at St. Edward’s University. Raul wrote Confessions of a Mexpatriate during a writing residency at Arquetopia in Oaxaca, Mexico, fall 2012. 

About Teatro Vivo: Teatro Vivo (Spanish for “live theater”) has produced more than 25 bilingual plays since JoAnn Reyes and Rupert Reyes founded the company in 2000. For more information visit teatrovivo.org or contact JoAnn Reyes for information, images and interviews: 512-413-6791 or joannreyes@yahoo.com.

Facebook: teatrovivoaustintx

Twitter: @teatrovivotx

(Click to go to the AustinLiveTheatre front page)

Video for Upcoming: Cura by Raul Garza, Teatro Vivo at the Salvage Vanguard, September 13 - 29

presents

Cura

by Raul Garza

Sept 13 - 29 Thurs. - Sat., 8 p.m.
Thursdays are "pay what you wish" nights
Salvage Vanguard Theatre, 2803 Manor Rd 78722 (click for map)

Tickets for Cura are $15 general admission or $20 reserved seating plus service fees, available Now at

Cura explores what happens when faith is tested to its limits. In a small Texas border town in 1938, a humble, defeated woman of faith, Amparo, encounters both spiritual hope and crisis in a young man who may or may not be the legendary Curandero/Saint, El Niño Fidencio. The Spanish word "cura" means both "cure" and "priest."

Raul Garza's first full-length play Fantasmaville received the 2007 National Latino Playwriting Award. As a writer for Austin's Latino Comedy Project, Raul contributed to numerous stage and touring shows. When not writing plays, Raul teaches yoga, fills up on pop culture and serves as co-founder and creative director of TKO Advertising. He has been recognized for creative excellence by industry publications including Advertising Age, and by the American Associations of Advertising Agencies. Raul received his degree in Advertising from The University of Texas at Austin, and his Masters in Liberal Arts at St. Edwards University. Raul is an adjunct professor of Communications at St. Edward's University, teaching integrated campaigns courses.

About Teatro Vivo: Teatro Vivo (Spanish for "live theater") has produced more than 20 bilingual plays since JoAnn Reyes and Rupert Reyes founded the company in 2000. Contact JoAnn Reyes at Teatro Vivo for more information, images and playwright interviews: 512-413-6791 or joannreyes@yahoo.com

Used for video soundtrack: David Garza "I Know (LP Version)" available on AmazonMP3, iTunes

Upcoming: Cura by Raul Garza, Teatro Vivo at the Salvage Vanguard, September 13 - 29

CURA by Raul Garza, Teatro Vivo at the Salvage Vanguard Theatre, 2803 Manor Rd., September 13 - 29

Click for additional information at Teatro Vivo on Facebook

(Click to return to the AustinLiveTheatre front page)

Auditions for Teatro Vivo, July 18 and 19

Teatro Vivo Auditions Weds. July 18 & Thurs. July 19, 6:30 – 9:00 PM, Community Engagement Center, 1009 E. 11th Austin 78702 (click for map)
Auditions are for two upcoming productions: Cura by Raul Garza, September 2012 at Salvage Vanguard Theater and Cuento Navideño, Bah Humbug in the Barrio by Rupert Reyes, December 2012 at Rollins Theater at the Long Center

Parts are available for men and women ages 20-50+ and for children ages 8 – 12. Knowledge of Spanish for some roles is a plus but not required. Actors should prepare a comedic and/or dramatic monologue. Each monologue should be no more than 1- 2 min. in length. Actors may be asked to do a cold read from a script.

Auditions are by appointment. Email JoAnn at joannreyes@yahoo.com or 512 413-6791. Bring a headshot or photo. You may also bring a resume – optional.

Upcoming: Latino New Play Festival, Teatro Vivo at Emma S. Barrientos Mexican-American Cultural Center, April 5 - 7

Found on-line:

presents

The Latino New Play Festival 2012

3 Evenings, 3 new Latino plays:

Rosalia by Arthur Marroquin

Thursday April 5, 8 pm

Cura by Raul Garza

Friday April 6, 8 pm

Guapa by Caridad Svich

Saturday April 7, 8 pm

Emma S. Barrientos Mexican-American Cultural Center, 600 River Street (click for map)

Tickets to be available through

Teatro Vivo in collaboration with the Emma S. Barrientos Mexican American Cultural Center and ScriptWorks presents a groundbreaking theater event for Texas and the Southwest, bringing together playwrights and audience members in rich conversation about three new workshop productions, each running just one night. The productions invite insight into the Latino aesthetic and experience and celebrate the power of the human experience.

These workshop-style presentations are lively readings with props and movement on stage, riding the fence between staged reading and full-out production. After each workshop, the playwright and audience will participate in moderated talk back sessions so attendees can provide feedback to the playwrights. Though the productions have Latino roots, they explore cross-cultural age-old themes and modern dilemmas that will surprise, challenge, engage and push the dramatic envelope for audience members accustomed to one-way conversations at the theater.

KUT Video: Dos Pocitos by Raul Garza, Teatro Vivo, August 18 - September 3

Found on-line, KUT coverage on Michael Lee's Arts Eclectic of Teatro Vivo's Dos Pocitos by Raul Garza, playing at the Salvage Vanguard, August 18 - September 3:

[Apple users: can't see the video? Click to see it on Youtube.com]

Upcoming: Dos Pocitos by Raul Gaza, Teatrro Vivo at The Salvage Vanguard Theatre, August 18 - September 3

Found on-line:

Teatro Vivo presents

Dos Pocitos

by Raul Garza

Saints & Sinners in a Border Wasteland

August 18 - September 3, Thursdays - Saturdays at 8 p.m.

Salvage Vanguard Theatre, 2803 Manor Road (click for map)

Tickets: $15, $20, or $25; Thursdays are"Pay What you Wish" nights

Tickets will be available on-line at Brown Paper Tickets

It’s 2026 in “Texaco” – the ungoverned, lawless territory formerly known as South Texas. Here a few struggling residents remain, constantly embattled with drug cartels, military and occasional interlopers. With a nod to the past, and an eye to the future, Dos Pocitos is a comedy about this place, and the place it represents for all Latinos.

Click to read ALT report of the staged reading of Dos Pocitos at the Latino New Play Festival in APril

Latino New Play Festival, Teatro Vivo at the Mexican-American Cultural Center, April 21 - 23

The three Austin playwrights showcased at the Autin Latino New Play Festival last week could not have had a gentler or more supportive audience. Organizers Rupert Reyes and Joanne Carrion-Reyes founded their Teatro Vivo about ten years ago, producing appealing, comic pieces, usually written by Rupert and featuring him.

Just the way that Austin has branded itself as the home of "live music," the Reyes' theatre group is known for its "live theatre." "Teatro vivo" can also mean "lively theatre," and their productions have always been that. They reach out to the Tejano community, that large and increasing population of this town whose first language is English but who have close, family familiarity with the Spanish-language community, principally of Mexican connection.

These were staged readings in the recently inaugurated "black box" theatre on the south end of the Emma S. Barrientos Mexican-American Cultural Center. Rupert or Joanne prepped the expectant audiences, explaining that the festival was designed to assist playwrights by putting their works of imagination before live audiences for the first time. Actors carried their scripts with them and moved across minimalist sets. Decoration and costuming existed mostly in the minds of the audiences. Both of the longer pieces used an on-stage reader to deliver the authors' stage directions and descriptions of silently mimed action.

Teatro Vivo has produced full-length works by two of the three writers. Erica Saenz' piece for the festival, Lightning Strikes, comes a year after their production of another family comedy Keeping Track a year ago at the Salvage Vanguard Theatre, and Raul Garza's Dos Pocitos follows a fine production of his Fantasmaville at the Long Center's Rollins Theatre in November, 2008.

The three pieces workshopped by a recognizable regulars from Teatro Vivo differed in form and subject matter. Saenz' s Lightning Strikes examines three households in "the Valley" -- the Rio Grande valley at the southernmost tip of Texas. Roxanne Schroeder-Arce's one-act play Mariachi Girl focuses on the yearnings of an 8-to-10 year old girl to sing the mariachi music of her father and grandfather. Garza's Dos Pocitos posits a hypothetical future in which the United States has de-accessioned an area of southern Texas, leaving it to drug runners, roving bands and the few stubborn Tejanos who refused to move to safer areas of the state.

Read more at AustinLiveTheatre.com . . . .

Upcoming: New Latino Play Festival, Teatro Vivo at the Mexican-American Cultural Center, April 21-23

Received directly and explored on-line:

Teatro Vivo

presents

The Austin Latino New Play Festival/
Festival Latino de Nuevas Obras Teatrales de Austin

in collaboration with
the Emma S. Barrientos Mexican American Cultural Center and ScriptWorks

April 21-23, 8 p.m. • Admission is free • Reservations Suggested

Click to Reserve/Contribute via Brown Paper Tickets

Thursday, April 21 Lightning Strikes by Erica Saenz
Friday, April 22 Mariachi Girl by Roxanne Schroeder-Arce
Saturday, April 23 Dos Pocitos by Raul Garza

An invitation from Teatro Vivo artistic director Rupert Reyes:

[Apple users: can't see the video? Click to go to YouTube]

These workshop-style presentations are lively readings with props and movement on stage, riding the fence between staged reading and full-out production. After each production the playwright and audience will participate in moderated talk-back sessions so attendees can provide feedback to the playwrights. Though the productions have Latino roots, they explore cross-cultural age-old themes and modern dilemmas that will surprise, challenge, engage and push the dramatic envelope for audience members accustomed to one-way conversations at the theater.

Click to view more information at AustinLiveTheatre.com about the plays and the playwrights

Auditions: Austin Latino New Play Festival, Teatro Vivo, February 28 & March 1

Found on-line:

announces auditions!

The Austin Latino New Play Festival

February 28 and March 1 6pm- 9pm

The Emma S. Barrientos Mexican American Cultural Center 600 River Street Austin, TX 78701

The Festival!

Teatro Vivo in conjunction with the Emma S. Barrientos Mexican American Cultural Center and Script Works will present the Austin Latino New Play Festival April 21-23. 2011 This first annual festival will showcase three new plays (one per evening) by Austin playwrights, Raul Garza (Dos Pocitos), Erica Saenz (Blue Lightning Strikes) and Roxanne Schroeder-Arce (Mariachi Girl) in a workshop production format.

The Audition!

Parts are available for men and women ages 18-80+ and one role for an 8 -12 year old girl who can sing for Mariachi Girl, a musical for young audiences. Knowledge of Spanish for some roles is a plus but not required. Actors should prepare a comedic and a dramatic monologue. Each monologue should be 1-2 min. in length. Mariachi Girl will require auditioning actors to prepare a 1 minute acapella song.

Auditions are by appointment only. Email JoAnn at joannreyes@yahoo.com or call 512 413-6791. Upon request a preview script of each production can be emailed prior the audition.

Other Important Info for Actors!

The Austin Latino New Play Festival will take place at the new black box theatre at the MACC. Each play will be presented in a workshop production format. This format is much more active and rehearsed than a regular play reading. The three separate casts of each production will have a 3-week rehearsal period with a director and work in conjunction with the playwright and dramaturge to develop the workshop production. The festival will be free to the community. There is no compensation for these workshop productions. Actors selected for this project will be considered for Teatro Vivo’s future main stage productions.

Fantasmaville, Teatro Vivo at Rollins Theatre, November 5 - 16

Raul Garza’s Fantasmaville won last year’s Latin Playwrights award even before it had been produced.

I’ve been anticipating the show for months, because I read the play last August. In fact, I auditioned for the “cranky old man” role of Akers, which seemed to be the best fit for my age, if not for my temperament.

"Fantasmaville" ("Haunted City") is here. Garza sets it in east Austin, complete with references to César Chavez Avenue, local schools, Capital Metro, Wheatsville Co-op, and even to a recent project to establish a dog park.

As I read the script I was charmed by the magical realism of the piece, in which an enigmatic spirit in the shape of a gigantic raccoon has been watching over the middle-aged party lady Flor, frequenter of beer halls who hasn’t lost a single dice game in the past 18 years.

And by the humor -- Flor’s daughter Celeste is an ambitious, underemployed idealist who, without informing her husband, jumps at the chance to offer foster care – only to discover that their new ward is in fact the cheeky local paperboy, Joaquín.

The chorus for this confusion is a pair of muddle-brained beer drinking buddies, Gustavo (Donato Rodríguez III) and Freddy (Rupert Reyes), operating on the principle in Tecate veritas.

Teatro Vivo has given the piece a beautiful production in the Rollins Theatre at the Long Center. The scene looks bleak when you arrive – a couple of couches and a bed, no more – but the panels behind each of these furnishings transform into video screens. With a click of the back projectors the scene switches from a bus in motion across an animé landscape to a living room to the interior of a tavern. Actors still have to tote a bit of furniture between scenes from time to time, and the faint glow of the screens silhouettes such moves – in fact, after one beloved character collapses and dies under a magical hex, that actor then has to scuttle backstage across that dimly glowing background. But such minor visual giveaways can certainly be forgiven.

Patricia Arredondo as the prancing, partying Flor has great gusto and a pack of juicy put-downs for some of the other dubious ladies of the neighborhood. Arredondo may just be herself, for her blurb in the program could accurately be applied to the character: “Patricia Arredondo is a versatile and energetic actor, delivering performances that teem with physicality, comedy and sheer reckless abandon. . . She is every bit as crazy as she looks.”

As I watched the action unwind, I realized that this is not, in fact, a happy story at all. The real protagonists of this play, Flor’s daughter Celeste (Karinna Pérez) and her Anglo husband Martin (Chase Wooldridge) are in serious conflict both with one another and within themselves.

In the opening scene on the bus Martin tells us a rambling story about middle school, twenty-two years ago, when he turned his back on his Tejano friends because they weren't “cool.” He is still looking for one of them, to re-establish that contact.

Celeste is angry at her irresponsible mother, frustrated with the lack of political engagement of her Latino neighbors, and unsuccessful in her search for full time work. Celeste tells the phlegmatic, pragmatic social worker Sonia that since she can’t get a real job, she is thinking of starting a family.


But Celeste never voices that desire to her husband Martin. Never. She speaks harshly to him, rejects his bumbling efforts to reason with her or console her, and insists on being left alone. Not even in a final, maybe hopeful scene on the bus do we hear a word of reconciliation between them -- earlier, Sonia coached Martin to put his arm around the despairing Celeste, but the gap between them persists.

Akers, the scrawny, resentful white man on the block is so spiteful and dismissive of "mojados and the rest of those people," including specifically Celeste, that he goads Martin into punching him out. David Blackwell in this role has a reptilian stillness and flat Texas accent that makes him scarily real -- all the more so when we learn of the cross-cultural scarring that made him that way.

Garza works to balance the two visions of Latino experience -- the magical, imaginative celebration of pleasures on one hand, and the tight-lipped lower-middle-class dealing with daily difficulties, on the other. But the melding of those two traditions is a brittle and not entirely successful one. Garza gives Celeste insight and information, but he has to resort to the "deus ex machina" of the raccoon spirit accompanied by a visitor from the afterworld to do so. The scene is entertaining, but we are not convinced that it provides any lasting spiritual solace to Celeste.

Erica Saenz as Sonia the friend and social worker is a solid, sympathetic presence, and Mario Ramírez as the newspaper boy Joaquín gives us a portrait of a Tejano who is disadvantaged but confident about his own abilities and future. They are the middle ground, really, representing Latinos who have faced economic and social realities and applied themselves to capture the possibilities.

In the end, Fantasmaville is a gentle, insistent admonition to the audience that real people populate east Austin. This is no brownface comic show; it is a reminder that while cultural differences persist, Tejanos face the same dilemmas as the rest of us.

Fantasmaville page on Facebook, including performance photos

Click for Jeanne Claire van Ryzin's pre-opening piece in the Statesman's XL, November 6

Click for thoughtful review in Austin Chronicle of November 13 by Avimaan Syam

Click for review by Joey Seiler on Austin Chronicle website

Click for review on Decider.com and interview with playwright Raul Garza

KUT "Arts Eclectic" audio feature (2 minutes)

KUT audio feature "A Funny Take on Gentrification," including dialogue from Fantasmaville, commented by Julie Moody, with interviews (4 minutes)