Ann Pittman's Austin Theatre Favorites in 2013

From her blog aNNpITTMAN, posted January 12:

Top Ten Twenty-Thirteen Theatre

Ann Pittman (via Blogspot)

Everyone has their favorites. And everyone's weighing in (Chronicle critics: AdamRoberts, Robert Faires ... a cat).

Of course, I have my own opinions :)

So here's my credential-free pick for Austin's Top Ten 2013 Theatre Experiences (p.s. I don't include national tours or shows I was in on this list... tours obvs. aren't Austin, and despite my first girl-on-girl kiss this year, its probably biased to nominate performances I was a part of). Of the over twenty shows I saw this year, here's some moments, people and experiences that I loved (in no particular order)...

1. Barbara Chisholm in Fixing King John. This was a fun, smart show by the Rude Mechs, and pulling her hair out in the middle of it was a brilliant Barbara Chisholm.

2. The amazing set of Nursery Crimes (the DAC has never been better utilized) and the supporting characters trio of Travis Bedard, Bobby DiPasquale, and Heath Thompson. Kudos to Last Act's Will Snider for some great choices.

3. Ryan Crowder's big fat crocodile tears (in addition to the rest of his performance) in Penfold Theatre's Red.

4. Martin Burke's final monologue in Harvey. Lovely.

5. Kristi Brawner in general. From Sally in Reefer Madness to Lucy in Charlie Brown, she is quickly becoming Austin's most versatile 20 Something (sorry guys, she's taken).

6. HPT's Ken Webster as Thom Pain. Again.

7. Mad Beat Hip & Gone. I cannot understand why this didn't get more critical attention. Whatev. You guys, it was great. And those lightbulbs...

8. The Drawbridge/Gangplank lowering and raising set piece thing in Austin Playhouse's Man of La Mancha. Awesome and daunting. Broke up the play and the mood perfectly appropriately.

9. Little Shop of Horrors' colorful costumes at Zilker Park.

10. ZACH's A Christmas Story set. You'll shoot your eye out.

AND what I really, really wanted to see (which might have influenced the above list), but, alas, life had other exciting adventures...

1. Mical Trejo in Teatro Vivo's Confessions of a Mexpatriate

2. And Then There Were None by Austin Playhouse

3. Tongues (in the swimming pool!) by Theatre at the J

4. Fat Pig by Theatre En Bloc

So there you have it! Of the Austin theatre events I saw, these were the most super-duper. Maybe next year I'll be brave enough to give you The Worst Of... who knows! In the meantime, here's looking forward to more great, funny, meaningful, important, silly theatre in the heart of Texas in 2014!

Adam Roberts' 10 Favorites for Austin Theatre in 2013

Top 10 Dramatic Turns of 2013

A look back at some of the year's most gripping performances

By Adam Roberts, Fri., Jan. 3, 2014

Jill Blackwood in 'Les Miserables,' Zach Theatre (photo: Kirk R. Tuck)

In reverse chronological order:

1) THE COMPANY OF 'LET IT BE CHRISTMAS' (World Vision & Gateway Church) The performers heralded Christ's birth with rafter-shaking vocals that soared on high.

2) THE COMPANY OF 'BLOOD WEDDING' (Mary Moody Northen Theatre) The air of rural Spain poured forth from the ensemble in a riveting production of Lorca's drama.

3) JILL BLACKWOOD IN 'LES MISERABLES' (Zach Theatre) As Fantine, Blackwood dreamed her dream center stage in arresting fashion.

4/5) RACHEL MCGINNIS MEISSNER AND LAURA ARTESI IN 'A STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE' (City Theatre Company) Meissner's striking turn as Blanche provided both realism and magic, and Artesi delivered a stellar Stella.

6/7) MICHAEL STUART AND BENJAMIN SUMMERS IN 'A WALK IN THE WOODS' (Street Corner Arts) Summers' Honeyman was visceral and searing, and Stuart's Botvinnik drew one in to such a degree that it was difficult to glance away.

8) THE COMPANY OF 'TWELVE ANGRY MEN' (City Theatre Company) From 1 to 12, each juror contributed his own heft to this wonderfully weighty production.

9) THE COMPANY OF 'BEAUTY IS THE BEST PRIEST: SHORT PLAYS OF THE HAR­LEM RENAISSANCE' (Austin Commun­ity College Department of Drama) Like a living museum inside a more traditional one, the company granted new insight into a world of literature with which I'd had little acquaintance.

10) JACOB TRUSSELL IN 'OTHER DESERT CITIES' (Austin Playhouse) Trussell's turn as Trip was as captivating and multilayered as it was realistic and honest.

Robert Faires' 15 Favorites in 2013 Austin Theatre, Austin Chronicle

Top 10 Reasons I Stayed in Love With Theatre in 2013


Austin thespians played for keeps, with boundless commitment and imagination, in the year's most memorable theatre


By Robert Faires, Fri., Jan. 3, 2014


1) 'SLIP RIVER' (UT Dept. of Theatre & Dance/Cohen New Works Festival) Spiriting its audience beneath the Payne Theatre, past clotheslines and through butcher-paper forests, feeding it cornbread muffins, and leaving it onstage in a festive dance party, this exhilaratingly theatrical mash-up of 19th century novels and modern pop – its orphan hero chases freedom along an "underground railroad" run by Beyoncé! – packed more imagination, adventure, and wit into half an hour than most plays do in three times that.


2) 'RICHARD III' (Texas State University Dept. of Theatre & Dance) The Bard's diabolical monarch as Third World despot, with Eugene Lee channeling Idi Amin in his brutal grasp for the crown. The entire cast seemed caught in Richard's fearsome grip, and chilling images of mayhem from director Chuck Ney kept us in dread throughout. 

3) 'I AM THE MACHINE GUNNER' (Breaking String Theatre) Lives during wartime – a mob thug in modern Moscow and a soldier on the front lines of World War II – rendered in harrowing detail by playwright Yury Klavdiev and conjured with hallucinatory power by Joey Hood, fluidly sliding between past and present while maintaining a white-hot intensity.


4) 'THERE IS A HAPPINESS THAT MORNING IS' (Capital T Theatre) Who knew that fusty old mystic William Blake could inspire such carnal passion, such hilarity, and such theatrical bliss? A rapturous union of script, director, and actors, teeming with intelligence and craft.


5) 'THE POISON SQUAD' (The Duplicates) This inquiry into the origins of food-safety testing proved, for epicures of performance, a feast – steeped in ingenuity and collaborative energy, and liberally seasoned with playfulness.


6) 'WATCH ME FALL' (Action Hero/Fusebox Festival) The British team's cheap-theatre replays of daredevil stunts (e.g., a bike jumping over bottles of fizzing Coke) were a hoot, but seeded within them were disturbing images that also dared us to confront our cultural lust for danger and mob mentality.


7) 'THE EDGE OF PEACE' (UT Dept. of Theatre & Dance) Suzan Zeder's valedictory effort at UT wove threads from her 30 years of playwriting into a deeply felt drama of community, growing up, and moving on. A fitting farewell to her Mother Hicks characters and the year's most artfully crafted script.


8) 'TRU'/'THIS WONDERFUL LIFE' (Zach Theatre) Two solo shows, both performed in the cozy Whisenhunt, both by actors of prodigious gifts giving themselves over completely to their subjects: Jaston Williams to Truman Capote, his portrait deepened by time and made even more poignant; Martin Burke to It's a Wonderful Life, embodying the film's characters with rare honesty and embracing its message with sincerity.


9) 'ADAM SULTAN' (Physical Plant) We all died at the hands of playwrights Steve Moore and Zeb West in this extraordinary meditation on mortality and community. It imagined one man's efforts to memorialize Austin's theatre artists as they pass over time and did so with humor and grace.


10) 'ORDINARY PEEPHOLE: THE SONGS OF DICK PRICE' (Rubber Repertory) A night around the old piano in the living room – literally, as an exuberant ensemble escorted us through a batch of this local songwriter's most personal tunes as we sat in a Hyde Park living room. Sheer delight.


Honorable Mentions:


'THE BOOK OF MORMON' (Broadway in Austin/Texas Performing Arts)

'QUALITIES OF STARLIGHT' (Vortex Repertory Company)

'HOLIER THAN THOU' (Poison Apple Initiative)

'REEFER MADNESS' (Doctuh Mistuh Productions)

'BUTT KAPINSKI: WE ARE THE DARK' (Deanna Fleysher/Institution Theater)

Elizabeth Cobbe's Favorite Theatre Sets for 2013, Austin Chronicle

Top 10 Theatrical Sets of 2013, to a Cat

The year's scenic designs proved especially appealing to the feline theatregoer

By Elizabeth Cobbe, Fri., Jan. 3, 2014

(uncredited photo via Austin Chronicle)

1) 'THE AMAZING ACRO-CATS' The performing cats wandered freely through the audience, making the whole theatre their set.


2) 'THE HEAD' (Connor Hopkins for Trouble Puppet Theater) The staging area provided levels upon levels, with intricate, handmade puppets for kitty to maul if she became bored.


3) '33 VARIATIONS' (Cliff Simon for Zach Theatre) How was there not a cat lurking in those cavernous archives?


4) 'NOISES OFF' (Patrick Crowley for Austin Playhouse) Disregard the slamming doors, if you can, and relish in the many hiding places for actors and felines alike.


5) 'FIXING KING JOHN' (Thomas Graves, Madge Darlington for Rude Mechanicals) Platforms rigged for actors and audience made ideal scratching posts.


6) 'INTIMATE APPAREL' (Jocelyn Pettway for UT Department of Theatre & Dance) Several detailed scenes existed together onstage, with beautiful fabrics waiting to be peed on and shredded.


7) 'RED' (David Utley for Penfold Theatre Company) A thoughtful, realistic treatment of Mark Rothko's art studio provided hiding spaces and paint cans in abundance.


8) 'FAT PIG' (Patrick and Holly Crowley for Theatre en Bloc) Shifting platforms are great entertainment, provided you don't catch your tail in the rails.


9) 'MAD BEAT HIP & GONE' (Michael Raiford for Zach Theatre) Dark lighting made the catwalks all the more appealing to a true cat.


10) 'DIAL "M" FOR MURDER' (Ian Loveall for UT Department of Theatre & Dance) Nothing like a fancy English parlor with fine furniture if you're looking to shed.

Wayne Alan Brenner's Favorites in 2013, Austin Chronicle

Brenner's portmanteau of 13 items includes 6 from locally produced Austin theatre:

 

Top 10 Creative Things I Lucked Into in 2013

Remembering the year thick with superlative works of art onstage and in galleries

By Wayne Alan Brenner, Fri., Jan. 3, 2014

Katherine Catmull (photo: Capital T Theatre)

1) Joked with my editor that the first nine slots of this list would repeat 'THERE IS A HAPPINESS THAT MORNING IS' (Capital T Theatre). That brilliant Mickle Maher comedy, about the consequences of two William Blake-enamored professors engaging in glorious copulation on the campus lawn in view of their students, was by far the best thing I experienced in a year thick with superlative works of art. Directed by Mark Pickell, the script was embodied by three actors – Jason Phelps, Katherine Catmull, and Ken Webster, already among the best in town – working at the height of their knock-you-over abilities.

. . . .

4) FRONTERAFEST is another multipartite perennial that keeps on giving, and one of the best Short Fringe things it gave was Kyle John Schmidt's "The Blissful Orphans," featuring Curtis Luciani, Bob Jones, and friends in a fractured fairy tale that surpassed anything Rocky & Bullwinkle ever attempted.

. . .

6) Using Jason Liebrecht as a hinge to open a door between two theatre productions: Martin McDonagh's 'THE LIEUTENANT OF INISHMORE' (Capital T Theatre), brought to Grand Guignol life with Liebrecht chewing the scenery as an Irish terrorist who's out to slaughter whoever killed his beloved pet cat Wee Thomas; and 'FIXING KING JOHN' (Rude Mechanicals), Kirk Lynn's Deadwood-esque upgrade of Shakespeare, in which that same Liebrecht played the brave, hotheaded, sometimes near-colicky, and relentlessly besieged monarch contending with a cast of (mostly doomed) characters equal to his fierce talents.

7) Speaking of stagework, can somebody raid a sports paradigm and confer MVP status on actor MOLLY KARRASCH? I mean, Jesus, Slowgirl, Gruesome Playground Injuries, Tragedy: a tragedy, Dulcey and Roxy at City Hall – the woman's got range and a half.

8) Steve Moore and 'ADAM SULTAN' (Physical Plant) gave the Austin theatre scene an intimate view of itself with this heartfelt hall of mirrors, casting community stalwart Adam Sultan in the title role as a man who spends the increasingly lonely decades of his life commemorating all his creative friends who die as the years go by.

9) 'THE HEAD' (Trouble Puppet Theatre) was the semi-autobiographical apotheosis of everything that Connor Hopkins' strange and splendid company has done before, with so many disparate parts effectively orchestrated to show how ineffectively orchestrated a human can be when desire confounds sense and recreational drugs complicate the situation we call being alive.

Read full article at the Austin Chronicle on-line. . . .

(*) San Antonio Current Theatre Reviewers Pick Top 5 for 2013

San Antonio

 

5 Top Local Plays and Musicals This Year 

By Joy-Marie Scott December 29, 2013

Paige Blend, Roy Bumgarner, Twyla Lamont in Roads Courageous (photo: Siggi Ragnar)

We asked our theater critics, Thomas Jenkins and Steven G. Kellman, for their top picks from the theater scene in 2013. Beyond the productions, Jenkins also noted the considerable movement—both physical and conceptual—at some of the city’s top companies, which started this year and will continue into 2014.


“The Playhouse mounted its first original main stage musical in recent memory—Roads Courageous—while populating its Cellar with recent New York hits (Red, Wittenberg),” said Jenkins, “and big changes are afoot at three of the city’s most established theaters: the Jump-Start and the Classic Theatre have found new homes—in Beacon Hill and the Deco District, respectively—while the AtticRep joins the new Tobin Center as its resident theater company in 2014.”


Click each image below for comments from a reviewer and link to the review in the San Antonio Current. 

A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams, Klose/Seal Productions
(photo: Siggi Ragnar)

Sam Mandelbaum as Hamlet in Wittenberg by David G. Davalos, Playhouse San Antonio
(photo: Siggi Ragnar)

(link to Steven G. Kellerman's review)

The Book of Mormon touring company

The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, adapted by Sophia Bolles, Overtime Theatre
(photo: Siggi Ragnar)

Hellcab by Will Kern, Attic Rep at Trinity University
(photo: Siggi Ragnar)

Steel Magnolias by Robert Harling, City Theatre, November 22 - December 22, 2013

by Dr. David Glen Robinson

Chinquapin Parish comes to the City. 

(citytheatreaustin.org)

To the City Theatre, that is, in the form of Robert Harling’s superbly written modern classic, Steel Magnolias. Theatre fans cannot see this masterpiece frequently enough; they must review it often to catch the fast-flying wicked barbs, double entendres, bon mots, and just plain corny jokes that fill its two hours and ten minutes. It feels like about one hour because laughter makes one lose all track of time. City Theatre’s holiday offering is highly recommended.

The story is about the small group of women who frequent Truvy’s Beauty Salon, get their hair done and share their lives. It is a high comedy with an underlying tragedy. The stories related by the customers in the styling chairs depict small town northern Louisiana culture, accurately in this reviewer’s experience. Further, it is a Christmas play, as part of the first act takes place at Christmastime, which at Truvy’s sees even keener and sharper humor related to the season, all without causing anyone to review their sense of the sacred and profane. Have I said this play is superbly written?

This strong material and the expectations of audiences for it set a high mark for any production, and the City Theatre production meets all the expectations for it. It's yet another glowing success for City Theatre.

The cast is well matched. Under the leadership of Samantha Brewer as Truvy, the cast shares the tidal shifts of intensity and emotion that sweep through their many stories. Director Berkovsky deserves credit for the exciting pace and its timing, that key element of comedy. The players did not miss a beat, as far as the audience could detect, quite a feat on any opening night, when butterflies and jitters are inevitable. If Best Ensemble Performance in a Comedy is a category to be taken seriously, then the cast of Steel Magnolias certainly deserves a nomination for a B. Iden Payne award from the Austin theatre community.

The set was believable and authentic, and it conveyed a sense of warmth and familiarity from the first moment Berkovsky did the production design and Jennifer Cunningham did scenic painting.

A special credit goes to Val Frazee for hair design, super important in a play about beauticians and their customers. The wig work was especially spectacular.

The costume design by Rosalie Oliveri was most impressive, conveying both the idiosyncrasies and class-conscious wealth of northern Louisiana. Styling and prop design, usually credited on the program, were missing from the credits.

Steel Magnolias teaches us the age-old verity that friendship is a value that sustains us throughout our lives. On a deeper levelis the truth that friendship, simple friendship among neighbors and families, is perhaps the highest form of love. It gives much and demands everything and in the end provides strength beyond imagining. The play program carries a quote from Shakespeare that says it best: “I count myself in nothing else so happy as in a soul rememb’ring my good friends.”

Make Steel Magnolias your new holiday play. It runs at City Theatre at Airport Rd and 38 1/2 Street on the east side until December 22^nd.

You're A Good Man, Charlie Brown, Wimberley Players, November 15 - December 8, 2013

by Michael Meigs


As fresh as the ink of the morning paper on a bright fall day, the Wimberley Players' staging of You're A Good Man, Charlie Brown is big, bold and beautiful. And so is the cast; director Jim Lindsay has handpicked some of the most attractive talent from the region.

Did you know that this musical by Clark Gesner is approaching its 50th birthday? You'd never know it from this production. The original version was done in 1967, and in 1998 performers using the revised script presented in this Wimberley production took two Tony awards. And Charlie Brown himself, if he weren't ageless, would be almost ready to qualify for Social Security, for Charles Schultz's first four-panel strip featuring him was published on October 2, 1950.

Ryley Wilson (photo: Leanne Brawner Photography)

A musical for six players, presented as a series of lively songs and skits featuring some of the most memorable tropes and plights of the Peanuts gang, the work is a favorite of high schools and amateur groups. Director Lindsay chose to expand the cast by two women to to calibrate the choreography, so Wimberley's augmented edition includes both that little red-headed girl (the fetching Lindsay Katherine Powell) and Kate Clark (Frieda, a fine singer and captain of the dance ensemble).

Schultz drew the comic strip for fifty years, so that tiny community of primary schoolers has a rich and diverse history of incident. The situations onstage are instantly recognizable and bring smiles to faces in the audience. 

 Ryley Wilson in the title role has Charlie's yellow shirt with the zig-zag, a fugitive kite, and that mild, yearning and baffled presence. Kristi Brawner as Lucy van Pelt is adorably heedless, loud and self-certain -- comically capturing childish speech and emphasis with her frequent prolongation of initial consonants ("You're a Buh-LOCKHEAD!")

Part of the pleasure of seeing mature but young actors in these roles is the irony of age difference: grown men are returned to the tentative innocents they once were, while the actresses giving Schultz's girls their endearing brashness are at the same time very attractive young women.

Click to read more at AustinLiveTheatre. . . .

Video Promo: It's A Wonderful Life Radio Play, Penfold Theatre, Round Rock, December 5 - 22, 2013

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