Reviews for Classic Theatre of San Antonio Performances
Review: Born Yesterday by Classic Theatre of San Antonio
by Kurt Gardner
Published on May 03, 2016
In this time capsule Hayley Burnside delivers a convincing transition from a gum-snapping, happy-go-lucky chorus girl to a deep thinker who’s growing a conscience.
A crowd-pleasing hit when it opened on Broadway in 1946, Garson Kanin’s Born Yesterday now plays like an interesting time capsule of the attitudes and mores of the postwar era. That said, the production now playing at San Antonio’s Classic Theatre has been so well-cast — and is performed so engagingly — that it breathes new life into the occasionally heavy-handed piece. Corrupt junk dealer Harry Block (Greg Hinojosa) arrives in Washington with his mistress, Billie …
Review: A Wolverine Walks into a Bar by Classic Theatre of San Antonio
by Kurt Gardner
Published on April 04, 2016
The content is mostly Texas-centric with some good-natured gibes aimed particularly at the Alamo City. A Luby’s cafeteria joke? Genius.
Actor/playwright Jaston Williams, whose most immediately recognizable contribution to the world of theater is as co-star and co-creator of 1982’s Greater Tuna, took the stage of the Classic Theatre last Friday night with the world premiere of his new performance piece, A Wolverine Walks Into a Bar. Introducing the show, Williams explained that Wolverine was still a work in progress, with further segments to be added. If the audience’s response to the 70-minute show …
Review: The Seagull by Classic Theatre of San Antonio
by Kurt Gardner
Published on February 15, 2016
Director Allan S. Ross works with a fine ensemble cast to bring Chekhov’s prose to life, and the results are superb.
The characters in Russian dramatist Anton Chekhov’s The Seagull should be familiar to theatergoers, even those who haven’t seen the actual play itself. Among other works, Christopher Durang’s 2012 comedy, Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike (presented by the Classic Theatre last year) incorporates themes from Chekhov’s play, and Donald Margulies’s 2014 comedy The Country House also riffs on the piece. So how does a straight-on presentation of this century-old play hold up for contemporary audiences? In the Classic …
Review: Death of a Salesman by The Classic Theatre of San Antonio
by Michael Meigs
Published on February 12, 2014
Surely it was inevitable that San Antonio's ambitious Classic Theatre would eventually take on Miller's Death of a Salesman. No serious survey of twentieth-century American drama could overlook Miller's deeply felt examination of Willy Loman. An ordinary man, Willy suffers as his life spirit and life blood ebb away under the confusions of a more complex society and the changing concept of what it takes to be a 'winner' in America. Willy struggles to make the …
Review: Hedda Gabler by Classic Theatre of San Antonio
by Michael Meigs
Published on May 20, 2011
Asia Ciaravino is haunting in the title role. That quiet, watchful oval face is almost unblinking, She has the unconscious beauty of a woman who little cares whether others look at her or not.
Mr. and Mrs. George Tesman return to Norway after six months of honeymoon in Europe. In their absence family friend Judge Brack has arranged the purchase of a city mansion at great expense and furnished it lavishly. Ibsen's Hedda Gabler opens on the morning after their arrival at the new residence and a new domestic life. Allan S. Ross designed this set with meticulous detail. The audience has the time to study the heavy furniture, carpets, …
Review: She Stoops to Conquer by The Classic Theatre of San Antonio
by Michael Meigs
Published on October 28, 2009
Ross and his cast set a fine rhythm to this, assisted by wry asides to the audience and the comic convention of having props proffered promptly over the screen at rear by an unseen hand.
She Stoops to Conquer, approaching its last weekend in San Antonio, is elegant, witty, and stylish. Director Allan S. Ross recreates the conventions of the 18th century English theatre, including the use of a nearly bare stage, a painted partition at the rear, and the actors' respectful but self confident acknowledgment of the ladies and gentlemen of the public.Goldsmith's work is a clever comedy of manners in which the men are all self-important bumblers of …