Review: Animales Nocturnos by Teatro Espacio, Austin

by Michael Meigs
Published on August 20, 2026

Juan Mayorga's exploration of anomie and search for meaning and affection in an eerie urban setting. Insightful, elegantly presented, haunting. In Spanish with projected English translations.

Performed in Spanish, with English-language translations projected at stage rear Shadows dominate. An almost nonexistent structure of thin steel rods encloses vacant cubes deep in the stage, suggesting two living spaces side by side. Minimal furnishings, mostly of metal. Like cages. At night. Director Ana Laura De Santiago’s design achieves the same effect for Spanish playwright Juan Mayorga’s Animales Nocturnos as do the photos, posts, and program images by Andrea De Santiago and Néstor Daniel …

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Review: La Muerte Alegre by Teatro Espacio Agua Viva

by Michael Meigs
Published on October 26, 2015

With its graceful charm and commedia dell'arte framework this 1908 Russian fantasy done in Spanish offers a sly admonitory message for the Día de los Muertos.

Most Anglos are put off by the Day of the Dead holiday. Skeletons, graves, and altars? Popular American culture has had little problem celebrating zombies, Frankenstein and Dracula, but those fantasy folk are at a comfortable distance from us. Anglo America prefers to keep death hygenic, remote and out of sight. Mexico's Catholic and indigenous traditions look both death and family square in the face. Unlike the French traditional practice of simply visiting cemetaries on …

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