Zeus in Therapy by Douglass Stott Parker, Tutto Theatre at the Rollins Theatre, Long Center, August 16 - 25, 2013

(Tutto Theatre)

by Michael Meigs

Tutto Theatre's Zeus in Therapy by the late UT classics professor Douglass Stott Parker is dazzling, and at times, as his brilliant wordplay coincides with the gesturing and capering of the astonishing Greek chorus, it is simply stunning.

'Stunning' is a word thrown about lightly in the casual talk of our day. But I mean it literally. The brilliance, complexity and sheer entertainment value of this staging and this cast is sufficient to blow your circuits, if you're trying to absorb everything this production is offering you.

Perhaps only literature geeks and poetry lovers stand in danger of that. You may be happy simply to settle back in your seat in the Rollins Theatre and ride with this lengthy evening on any of its several levels.

Set design by Chris Cox

Most of us have at least a rudimentary recall of Greek mythology, perhaps from storybooks in middle school. You can enjoy the revelation of the stories of this quirky, cranky bunch of deities: Zeus himself, the all-powerful principal god with that rampant lust; Hera his demanding wife and sister ("wifster"); the Titans who pre-dated the Greek gods and old Cronus, Zeus's father; trident-brandishing Neptune and hammer-swinging Hephaestus; Dionysus, god of wine, born from the thigh of Zeus; cup-bearer Ganymede; the incarnations of all the lovely maidens who gave Zeus's life its zest; and a vast additional number of mortals and immortals.

Read more at AustinLiveTheatre.com . . . .

ZEUS IN THERAPY by Douglass Stott Parker, Tutto Theatre at Rollins Theatre, Long Center, August 18 - 25, 2013

presents
Zeus in Therapy
by Douglass Stott Parker
directed by Gary Jaffe
August 16 - 25, 2013
Rollins Theatre, Long Center, 701 Riverside at South First, Austin, TX - click for map

Tutto Theatre Company proudly announces the world premiere of Zeus in Therapy, an original theatrical experience adapted from the unpublished poetry of Douglass Stott Parker by the company, and directed by Gary Jaffe. 

When a god has questions, you know those really big questions…life or death…slave or free…savagery or civilization…fair or cloudy…her or her sister…, where does he go? And will there be cashews?

A long-time Austin resident, Parker was an improvisational jazz trombonist, a renowned translator of ancient comedy, an explorer of fictitious landscapes, and a profess of ancient languages and creativity at UT-Austin. He is best known for his work in Greek and Roman comedy, particularly his translations of Aristophanes’ plays Lysistrata (1964), The Wasps (1962), and The Congresswomen (1967). His Lysistrata has had over two hundred productions and is currently the translation published in the Signet Classics series. His The Congresswomen (Ecclesiazusae) was among the Finalists for The National Book Award in the category of Translation in 1968.

In 1979, he began writing Zeus in Therapy, a cycle of 52 poems which imagines Zeus on the therapist’s couch. Parker did not ‘finish’ it, though he stopped writing in about 1993, and left it unpublished during his lifetime. Every new poem in the cycle was shared both on his office door and with his classes on a weekly basis for some 25 years. Parker’s poetry is whimsical and profound, cosmic and quotidian, thoughtful and irreverent, but always heartfelt and true. Our translation of Zeus in Therapy into a theatrical experience will bring the power of his words to an even larger audience.

In our adaptation, a diverse ensemble of eleven performers play Zeus, giving Parker’s words a dynamic range of expression. Beginning with the classic binary image of therapy: therapist in chair, patient on couch, we expand as Zeus’s fracturing mind becomes a multitude of bodies and voices. As Parker’s words reverberate, and as actors scramble about the stage to perform the various travails of his life, we come to understand that Zeus, just like the rest of us, finds himself overwhelmed by expectations. 

The production features the award-winning acting talents of Aaron D. Alexander, Karen Alvarado, John Austin, Suzanne Balling, Joe Hartman, Court Hoang, Chris Humphrey, Annamarie Kasper, Julie Linnard, Nathan Osburn, and Justin Scalise; with Scenic Design by Justin Cox; Lighting Design by Natalie George; Costume and Hair & Make-Up Design by Austin M. Rausch; Choreography by Lynn Raridon; Video Design by Kakii Keenan; and Music by Chris Humphrey & Court Hoang.

Zeus in Therapy runs August 16th through 25th at the Rollins Studio Theater in The Long Center for the Performing Arts. Tickets available via The Long Center for the Performing Arts.

In the last six years, Tutto’s seven most recent productions: The Twelfth Labor (Summer 2012), The Alien Baby Play (Winter 2012), The Dudleys!: A Family Game (Spring 2011), I Witness (Summer 2010), Murder Ballad Murder Mystery (Fall 2009), Black Snow (Summer 2009), and Ophelia (Fall 2008) together have collected 64 nominations, garnered 27 awards, and appeared on 11 annual top listings from local media.


Founded in 2002, Tutto Theatre Company set out to elevate cross-disciplinary communication in the Austin artistic community. In 2008, we fused to our original purpose the artistic ambition to enhance, imaginatively, the expanding arts community in Austin. Imagination is the engine of the impossible, and ours is an Impossible Theatre. Embracing the theatre—a realm where impossibilities interpenetrate—we access the deeper meaning that lies beneath human experience. We create a space to carve into the unexpected, to dissect its viscera, and to lay bare its provocative sinews in ever more impossible ways. Ours is a theatre of dreams and of fantasies, of memory and of nostalgia, of desire and of disorientation, of imagination and of contradiction, an arena where the mundane grapples with the sublime. Thus, we commit tutto (everything) to the exploration of new forms and of new works that inscribe their fearful symmetries and incalculable geometries within our hearts, minds, and bodies.


We feel a profound responsibility both to new and timeless theatre. Our work, therefore, consists in: (1) producing experiences of high-quality both small and large; (2) developing new work and production opportunities for up-and-coming playwrights; and (3) helping our community to nurture its place as a world-class arts destination, providing local educational opportunities, and bringing artists from around the world to develop their work in our city. Thus we defy the grim reality of theatre making in the 21st century, declaring: Everything is possible in this our Impossible Theatre!

This project is funded and supported in part by the City of Austin through the Cultural Arts Division believing an investment in the Arts is an investment in Austin’s future.

(Click to go to the AustinLiveTheatre front page)

Video: Austin Live Theatre Talks with leads Suzanne Balling and Scot Friedman about 'The Happy Couple' (Last Act Theatre Company, May 8 - 25, 2013)

Austin Live Theatre talks to leads Suzanne Balling and Scot Friedman about the upcoming

production of

The Happy Couple

by James Venhaus

May 8-25, 2013, Wednesdays - Saturdays at 8:00 p.m.

The White House Ranch, 3410 E. Pennsylvania Ave. (click for map)

To celebrate their anniversary, Michael and Mary Elizabeth visit the first home they ever lived in together. But the visit takes an unexpected turn when they discover a group of squatters living in the house. Last Act Theatre Company is proud to present this moving story about what happens when circumstances force people to face the reality of their situations. See what truths bubble to the surface when two different worlds collide!

Tickets available via BuyPlayTix

Video: Austin Live Theatre Talks with James Venhaus, Author of 'The Happy Couple' (Last Act Theatre Company, May 8 - 25, 2013)

Austin Live Theatre talks to playwright James Venaus about the upcoming
 

production of

The Happy Couple

by James Venhaus

May 8-25, 2013, Wednesdays - Saturdays at 8:00 p.m.

The White House Ranch, 3410 E. Pennsylvania Ave. (click for map)

To celebrate their anniversary, Michael and Mary Elizabeth visit the first home they ever lived in together. But the visit takes an unexpected turn when they discover a group of squatters living in the house. Last Act Theatre Company is proud to present this moving story about what happens when circumstances force people to face the reality of their situations. See what truths bubble to the surface when two different worlds collide!

Tickets available via BuyPlayTix

Extra: Derek Vandi's rehearsal week 1 blog entry with photo, April 7

Lady Windermere's Fan by Oscar Wilde, Austin Playhouse, March 15 - April 7, 2013

 
by Michael Meigs

Oscar Wilde wrote and proclaimed almost to tedious extent about aestheticism in his early career as writer, lecturer and journalist, and he was so well known for his extravagance and opinions that Gilbert & Sullivan had caricatured him in their 1881 operetta Patience. Wilde wrote a couple of dramatic tragedies in the 1880s that came to nothing, and in 1891 he wrote Salomé, in French. The Lord Chamberlain put a stop to Sara Bernhardt's plan to stage in London on the grounds that Biblical characters should not be depicted onstage.


In summer of 1891 on holiday in the north country Wilde sat down and produced the first of four society plays that were produced in London in the first half of the 1890's. Lady Windermere's Fan was the first of these, and it was a huge success, almost certainly because he endowed his characters with the wit, epigrams and repartee for which he himself was famous. These are scenes and domestic dilemmas of the idle rich, most of whom produce nothing but words. Wilde gleefully undermines the very society that lionized him. His stereotypes as are vivid as those who later populated P.G. Wodehouse's novels and they're equally, mindlessly devoted to their status quo as the 1%, but any one of them would serve as a charming dinner companion for a whole evening.




The structure of Lady Windermere's Fan is that of the "well-made play" typical of 19th century drama, in which a a dramatic plot is driven by secrets that are described and gradually brought to light, often through the device of a letter or object that reveals hidden information. This is a plot turn as old as the theatre itself, of course, and no doubt those London audiences in evening clothes were agreeably pleased when the sweet young Lady Windermere's fan, a present from her husband of two years, turns up in the private quarters of the sleekly caddish Lord Darlington. 


 Wilde artfully turns the discovery into an opportunity for the outsider, Mrs. Erling of dubious past, to intervene and cover for the ingénue. His clever turn is that the play does not end in the expected revelation; instead, there are two mirrored secrets that are successfully covered up and an identity that is revealed to the audience but not to the character most closely concerned by it.

Read more at AustinLiveTheatre.com . . . .

LADY WINDERMERE'S FAN by Oscar Wilde, Austin Playhouse, March 15 - April 7, 2013

[Austin Playhouse, temporary facility at Highland Mall, 6001 Airport Blvd - click for map]


presents

(Click to go to the AustinLiveTheatre front page)

Upcoming: Medea by Euripides, with Suzanne Balling, City Theatre, June 7 - July 1

The City Theatre

presents

Medea

by Euripides

with Suzanne Balling

directed by Karen Sneed

June 7 – July 1, Thursdays – Saturdays 8:00 p.m. Sundays 5:30 p.m.
The City Theatre. 3823 Airport Blvd. 78757 – east corner of Airport Blvd. and 38 ½ Street. (click for map)

General Seating $15. Guaranteed Front/2nd Row Reserved $25.
Students $12. Thursday all seats $10. Group discounts are available.
Reservations 512-524-2870 or info@citytheatreaustin.org

The City Theatre Company turns up the heat to present Euripides’ famous Greek tale, Medea. In this masterly written drama of passion, suffering and the sensitivity of injured love are strongly drawn, until they culminate in the awful deed of vengeance. The production is directed by Karen Sneed and plays June 7 – July 1, Thursday – Saturday 8 p.m. Sunday 5:30 p.m.
"I'll teach these people not to laugh at me. What's stopping me? I've nothing to live for." - Medea

Alone; Medea is the ancient Greek tragedy based upon the myth of Jason and Medea and first produced in 431 BC. The plot centers on the barbarian protagonist as she finds her position in the Greek world threatened, and the revenge she takes against her husband, for whom she sacrificed everything.

Medea unleashes a vengeance on her enemies, making both assassins and victims of all those around her. Euripides produced Medea at the City Dionysian festival along with the lost plays Philoctetes, Dictys and the satyr play Theristai. So much like today’s writers, Euripides made a splendid effort to maintain the place of drama in the spiritual life of the society by modifying its interests, topics and themes in the sense which his own generation required. Heroic persons could still excite interest if they were made more real, - if, in them, the passions and sorrows of every-day life were portrayed with greater vividness and directness. In that, Euripides became the virtual founder of the romantic drama and he continued to write well-known works including Electra, The Bacchae and The Trojan Women.  Read more on Euripides.

Featuring one of the most powerful female roles in the history of drama, Medea is an intense story fuelled by passion, hatred and deadly rage. Heroic yet deadly, sympathetic yet appalling, Medea’s barbaric actions will stir your emotions as you find yourself irresistibly drawn into the nightmare world of this spectacularly vengeful woman. Award-winning Austin actress Suzanne Balling leads the cast in the role of Medea, who will stop at nothing to repay Jason for the ultimate betrayal of his family and the woman he promised to love forever.  

Joining her in the starring roles are Robert Lee Berry (Creon), Trevor Bissell (Jason) and Terri Lynne Hudson (Nurse). Also featured are Lauren Hayes, Leigh Hegedus, Craig Kanne, Becky Musser, Rachel Redig, Molly Sapp, Andreas Stein, Don Sneed, John Redig, James Holder, Bethany Bissell and Brooklyn Bissell. The production is directed by Karen Sneed (CTC’s The Imaginary Invalid) and is choreographed by Courtney Poole, with costume design by Kendi Erickson and set design by Andy Berkovsky.
The City Theatre Company is an Austin-based not for profit arts organization and is sponsored in part by the Austin Creative Alliance, the Austin Cultural Arts Division and the AMD Foundation. Founded in 2006, the company has been recognized by the Austin Critics Table Awards, the B. Iden Payne Awards and was twice voted “Best Theatre Company” by Austin- American Statesman’s Austin 360. CTC is dedicated in providing quality theatre experience and entertainment for Austin artists and its community.

Burn This by Lanford Wilson, 7 Towers Theatre Company, December 2 - 18

For this intimate, powerful urban drama the setting is superb: a balcony-level studio downtown with a kitchen, a vantage point from which one could study passing vehicles, lines of close-parked cars, and pedestrians hurrying to music venues nearby. It's a "studio" in every sense of the word: with the addition of a minimum of furniture it represents a New York loft. Situated in the Ballet Austin building at 501 West Third Street, it's an appropriate practice space for the principal character Anna, a dancer aspiring to take on choreography. She says nothing in the opening moments, wrapped in music and apparently lost in an inner world , moving in a deliberate, expressive non-dance, settling on the beanbag chair and pillows right at our feet.

And it's a studio almost in the cinema sense. The 7 Towers Theatre Company performs close up for a limited audience seated on perhaps twenty hard folding chairs along the perimeter of the room. The action is so close before you and the faces are so near that you could be sitting in the darkness before the big screen -- except that these people are real and immediate, and they are using this studio in which you're no more than hovering eyes and consciousness.

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

Video 3: Burn This by Lanford Wilson, 7 Towers Theatre Company, December 2 - 18

Found on-line:

Posted by

for

Burn This

by Lanford Wilson

December 2 - 18

City View Terrace, Ballet Austin, 501 W. 3rd Street (click for map)

BURN THIS - "Anna" (Suzanne Balling) from Matt Latham on Vimeo.

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

Funding Appeal: Burn This by Lanford Wilson, 7 Towers Theatre Company, Austin, December 2 - 18

Received directly:

7 Towers Theatre Company

appeals for for $2000 in funding via

for

Burn This

by Lanford Wilson

December 2 - 18

City View Terrace, Ballet Austin, 501 W. 3rd Street (click for map)

As of October 25, $1250 has been pledged; 25 days remain

The Project

Our first full season kicks off with a production of Lanford Wilson’s Burn This, December 2-18. The play is an often funny, often heartbreaking look into the human soul after a tragic loss. It deals with the aftermath of a dancer’s death for his roommate, a struggling New York choreographer, and his brother, a hard-edged restaurant manager from New Jersey. Burn This is a play that speaks to the realities of living in a less than ideal world, and finding moments of beauty within it. It’s about the artist’s place within the community. To that end, we’re producing Burn This in the City View Terrace at Ballet Austin. This non-traditional space allows us connection to the larger Austin arts community as well as to the downtown business community that surrounds both our production space and the lives of the characters in the play.

What We Need & What You Get

We need your help to get this first production off the ground! Besides production rights ($600+) and production space ($1000+), we need to provide costumes, set pieces to turn Ballet Austin's space into a New York loft, advertising/marketing costs and stipends for our professionally trained artistic and production teams. (Sadly, we'll never be able to afford to pay these fantastically talented people what they're worth, but you can help us to at least show some appreciation for the time, effort, and passion they've given us!) For your help, we'd love to give you some perks (see the sidebar), and an engaging, thought-provoking night of theatre!

Click 'Read more' for further information or go to the Indiegogo page . . . .

The Guys by Anne Nelson, Flash Productions at City Theatre, September 10 & 11

The attack on the World Trade Center towers was variously recalled and commemorated around town last week in schools, churches, lodges, assemblies and official ceremonies. The tone varied, according to the sentiments and the level of extrovert patriotism of those involved. The Austin Statesman ran a distasteful series of "Where were you then?" articles, as if any random individual's reaction to the flagrantly mediatized events could validate the nation's shock and anger. The Gilbert and Sullivan Society did a rousing Sunday afternoon musicale of patriotic song, vivid enough to bring a mist to the eyes of this Federal pensioner, followed by a celebration of New York city with amusingly post-fitted G&S pieces.

The theatre folk had their own commemoration, thanks to two of my favorite Austin actors, their director Gabe Smith, and the City Theatre. I attended that Saturday afternoon. The house was not full but it was strongly sympathetic to the undertaking; looking around me, I recognized faces of live theatre performers from across the town. The Guys, sponsored by the virtually anonymous Flash Productions of director Gabe Smith and Ashley Edwards, was offered only for two weekend matinees, a thoughtful scheduling that made it possible for Austin performers to attend.

Fittingly enough, the set was simple, in fact, almost bare -- a simple living room set before a screen, with the detritus of City Theatre's ongoing production of Hair visible at the depths of the stage. One could seek out ironies in that -- the two very different visions of New York City and the wider nation, set almost 35 years apart -- but no one in the audience was trying to be so clever.

Read more at AustinLiveTheatre.com . . . .

Upcoming: The Guys by Anne Nelson , City Theatre, September 10 - 11

Found on-line:

Flash Productions

presents

The Guys

by Anne Nelson
with Suzanne Balling and Scot Friedman
directed by Gabe Smith
presented at The City Theatre, 3823 Airport Road (click for map)
September 10-September 11, 2011, 2 p.m.

September 11, 2001. 10 years ago. A day we will never forget.

Nick, a fire captain, and Joan, a writer, come together in the aftermath of 9/11 to create remembrances of the firefighters who gave their lives. Both touching and uplifting, 'The Guys' is a timeless drama about the healing power of human connection.

A portion of the proceeds from this production will be donated to the Austin Fire Fighters Outreach Fund. www.austinfirefightersfund.org

Upcoming: The Guys by Anne Nelson , City Theatre, September 10 - 11

Found on-line:

Flash Productions

presents

The Guys

by Anne Nelson
with Suzanne Balling and Scot Friedman
directed by Gabe Smith
presented at The City Theatre, 3823 Airport Road (click for map)
September 10-September 11, 2011, 2 p.m.

September 11, 2001. 10 years ago. A day we will never forget.

Nick, a fire captain, and Joan, a writer, come together in the aftermath of 9/11 to create remembrances of the firefighters who gave their lives. Both touching and uplifting, 'The Guys' is a timeless drama about the healing power of human connection.

A portion of the proceeds from this production will be donated to the Austin Fire Fighters Outreach Fund. www.austinfirefightersfund.org

Images by Andy Berkovsky for The Imaginary Invalid, July 21 - August 4

Images provided by Andy Berkovsky, Artistic Director of the City Theatre for

The Imaginary Invalid

by Molière

directed by Karen Sneed

July 21 - August 14

Thursday – Saturday 8:00 p.m. Sunday 5:30 p.m.
The City Theatre. 3823 Airport Blvd, behind the Shell station (click for map)
Tickets $15 - $20. Guaranteed Front/2nd Row Reserved $25.
Students $12. Thursday all seats $10. Group discounts are available.
Reservations 512-524-2870 or info@citytheatreaustin.org

Directed by Karen Sneed and featuring Richard Craig,Suzanne Balling, Alexandra Russo, Mick D’Arcy, Laura Cannon, Scot Friedman, Kirk Kelso, Cason Longley, Mario Silva, Kate Clark, Robert Frazier, Brian Brown, Ariel Atlas, Danielle Ruth, Elena Weinberg and Jessica Smith.

Click to view additional images at AustinLiveTheatre.com . . .

The Imaginary Invalid by Molière, City Theatre, July 21 - August 14

The 85-seat house at the City Theatre was agreeably full on the opening Friday of Karen Sneed's staging of Molière's The Imaginary Invalid. A full house of attentive spectators is always a boost to the cast. Amusement is amplified and reactions build. The natural curiosity of the audience becomes rapport with actors and characters. Comedy, by provoking shared laughter, binds the members of each evening's audience indefinably, in a fashion that differs from night to nigh

That positive crowd effect may have been linked to the fact that 16 actors inhabit this farce, portraying 31 characters. The City Theatre deserves to enjoy a setting similar to that initial "family and friends" effect for the upcoming three weekends of its run.

Effective stage comedies snare us with quirks and jokes, then elaborate and build the fun with absurdities and unexpected turns of plot. That's Molière's method here. Grumpy, stingy hypochondriac Argan bemoans his miseries and the pile of bills from physicians and pharmacists for hair-raising and trouser-dropping treatments, directed mostly via the opening of his lower colon. (During our years abroad we discovered to our discomfort that contemporary French medicine retains an affection for just that therapeutic channel.)

Argan initially rails out loud to himself and at his irreverent serving girl Toinette. We then see him exercise his arbitrary petty tyrannies over his marriageble daughter Angélique, at the same time that he's a witless dupe of his gold-digging young wife and a procession of quacks. Just about everyone onstage is intriguing against everyone else, and we the audience have the cheerful feelling that we're at least two steps ahead of each of them.

Read more at AustinLiveTheatre.com . . . .

Upcoming: The Imaginary Invalid, City Theatre, July 21 - August 14

Found on-line:

presents

The Imaginary Invalid

by Molière

directed by Karen Sneed

July 21 - August 14
Thursday – Saturday 8:00 p.m. Sunday 5:30 p.m.
The City Theatre. 3823 Airport Blvd, behind the Shell station (click for map)
Tickets $15 - $20. Guaranteed Front/2nd Row Reserved $25.
Students $12. Thursday all seats $10. Group discounts are available.
Reservations 512-524-2870 or info@citytheatreaustin.org

Quick-tongued, lively, fast-paced Moliere at his best. A merry-go-round of misplaced desires and hidden agendas in this fresh new take on skewering of the health care crisis. In this hilarious satire on the world of medicine the the wealthy, yet housebound hypochondriac Argan has every disease in the book and will go to any length to marry his daughter off to a doctor, Of course, she has other ideas. Lurking around are quacks only too happy to (mis)treat him, a money-grubbing wife and servants longing to carry on his miseries. A narcotic cocktail of romantic triangles, double entendres and mistaken identities ensues, promising to leave you gasping, giggling and possibly…in stitches.

Directed by Karen Sneed and featuring Richard Craig,Suzanne Balling, Alexandra Russo, Mick D’Arcy, Laura Cannon, Scot Friedman, Kirk Kelso, Cason Longley, Mario Silva, Kate Clark, Robert Frazier, Brian Brown, Ariel Atlas, Danielle Ruth, Elena Weinberg and Jessica Smith

Images by Kimberley Mead: Lear, Vortex Repertory, May 20 - June 18

Images by Kimberley Mead:

presents

Lear

by William Shakespeare in a new adaptation by Rudy Ramirez

starring Jennifer Underwood

directed by Rudy Ramirez

May 20 - June 18

Thursdays - Sundays at 8 p.m.

Vortex Repertory, 2307 Manor Rd. (click for map)

(Jennifer Coy as Regan, Suzanne Balling as Cordelia)

In an age when women hold more power and in a time when the media turns the private into the public a mother divides her empire among her daughters. As her world crumbles and her family turns its back on her, can she face the storm and find love, forgiveness, and peace? A Celtic legend made into a Renaissance masterpiece, The VORTEX now re-imagines William Shakespeare's King Lear as a female leader for the modern world, where globalization blurs the line between governments and corporations and names like Clinton, Palin, Thatcher, Stewart, Wintour, and Winfrey have inspired admiration, contempt and controversy. Jennifer Underwood leads a cast of Austin's finest actors in a story of gender and power, family and business, compassion and betrayal.

Click to view additional images by Kimberley Mead at AustinLiveTheatre.com. . . .

Upcoming: Lear by WIlliam Shakespeare with Jennifer Underwood, Vortex Repertory, May 20 - June 18

Found on-line:

presents

Lear

by William Shakespeare

starring Jennifer Underwood

directed by Rudy Ramirez

May 20 - June 18

Thursdays - Sundays at 8 p.m.

Vortex Repertory, 2307 Manor Rd. (click for map)

In an age when women hold more power and in a time when the media turns the private into the public a mother divides her empire among her daughters. As her world crumbles and her family turns its back on her, can she face the storm and find love, forgiveness, and peace? A Celtic legend made into a Renaissance masterpiece, The VORTEX now re-imagines William Shakespeare's King Lear as a female leader for the modern world, where globalization blurs the line between governments and corporations and names like Clinton, Palin, Thatcher, Stewart, Wintour, and Winfrey have inspired admiration, contempt and controversy. Jennifer Underwood leads a cast of Austin's finest actors in a story of gender and power, family and business, compassion and betrayal.

Produced by VORTEX Repertory Company. Adapted from Shakespeare and Directed by Rudy Ramirez. Scenic Design by Ann Marie Gordon, Lighting Design by Jason Amato, Video Design by Sergio R. Samayoa, Costume Design by Pam Fletcher Friday. Stage Management by Tamara L. Farley.

Starring Jennifer Underwood as Lear with Suzanne Balling as Cordelia, David Boss as France/Ensemble, Jennifer Coy as Regan, Mick D'arcy as Gloucester, Trey Deason as Oswald, Joseph Garlock as Burgundy/ Ensemble, Micah Goodding as Edmund, Shannon Grounds as The Fool, Chelsea Manasseri as The Doctor/Ensemble, Toby Minor as Albany, Mindy Rast as Curan/Ensemble, Laura Ray as Lear's Gentlewoman/ Ensemble, Andrea Smith as Goneril, Tom Truss as Cornwall, Amelia Turner as Edda, and Julianna Elizabeth Wright as Kent.

VORTEX Repertory Company is funded and supported in part by the City of Austin through the Cultural Arts Division, by the Texas Commission on the Arts, and by a and an award from the National Endowment for the Arts, which believes that a great nation deserves great art.

Humble Boy, Different Stages at the City Theatre, January 7 - 29

Tom Stephan is a revelation in Different Stages' Humble Boy by Charlotte Jones, playing through the end of the month at the City Theatre.

In Austin Shakespeare's production of The Tempest last September he was a dismayed and battered King Alonso of Naples, cast ashore in the opening scene and awkwardly penitent in Act V. Here, as Felix Humble, the title character of Jones' sardonic social comedy, Stephan is vividly alive, so inventive and subtle of gesture and emotion that one can hardly take one's eyes from him. That's a greater achievement that you might at first suppose, for he plays against the redoubtable Jennifer Underwood, one of Austin's most sharply etched character actresses.

The opening scene, played motionless in the half dark for what seemed an eternity, gave us a bulky figure standing like a great lump in the back yard, next to the stacked supers of a beehive gone mad. An erratic flickering emanated from the hive as the audience was battered with the Trans Siberian Orchestra's manic version of Rimsky-Korsakov's Flight of the Bumblebee.

Only after the last discordant rock 'n' roll flourish did the lights rise to introduce into some semblance of stage reality. Stephan stood there, revealed as Felix Humble.

Read more at AustinLiveTheatre.com . . . .

A Midsummer Night's Dream, Baron's Men at the Curtain Theatre, September 24 - October 16

You've got only one weekend remaining of this delight, and the Baron's Men have even added a Thursday performance. Don't hesitate!

A Midsummer Night's Dream may well be Shakespeare's most familiar comedy. In his review of Austin theatre for the World Theatre Day celebration last April Robert Faires noted it as one of those plays that "circle round again and again like pop songs in heavy rotation." You have to admit it: he's right. The Tex-Arts youth program did the show ten days before his remarks, then Austin Shakespeare did it in Zilker Park with 1960's style pop music and just a couple of weeks ago the four traveling Actors from the London Stage did it at UT and out at Winedale. So we probably all know the text.

But this is not like watching re-runs of "I Dream of Jeannie." The familiar text is a springboard. The company of the Baron's Men bring that text to sparkling life in every aspect of their production.

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