Recent Reviews
Review: The Grapes of Wrath by Zach Theatre
by Michael Meigs
Published on March 16, 2009
The story is gripping. In the theatre it is unburdened by the grim omniscience of Steinbeck's overlay and so allows us to identify with the Joad family and to hope for them even as they pass under the millstone of history.
A brooding orange light dominates the empty central space at the Zach Theatre's Kleberg Stage. A haze roils fitfully against a panorama of emptiness. A man in overalls, wearing a slouch cap and heavy work boots, holds a saw between his knees. He gently applies a bow to it, bends the saw, and an eerie, keening melody begins The Grapes of Wrath. John Steinbeck's story follows the Joad family from the 1930s Oklahoma Dustbowl, driven by …
Review: Flu Season by Austin Community College
by Michael Meigs
Published on March 12, 2009
It took a while, but I finally found the word that describes Will Eno's Flu Season, produced February 27- March 8 by Austin Community College. That word is "aggravating."
It took a while, but I finally found the word that describes Will Eno's Flu Season, produced February 27- March 8 by Austin Community College.That word is "aggravating."Maybe y'all don't use it here in Texas, but I heard it regularly from my mother, who came from a small town in Georgia. "Aggravating" describes behavior that is egotistical, rudely mischievous and intentionally provocative. Since she raised six sons, my Mom had occasion to use that word fairly …
Review: Cuentos y Risas, one-acts by Rupert Reyes
by Michael Meigs
Published on March 10, 2009
Teatro Vivo is always fun, and this evening of two one-act plays is no exception. Both were written by the group's artistic director Rupert Reyes.
Teatro Vivo is always fun, and this evening of two one-act plays is no exception. Both were written by the group's artistic director Rupert Reyes. The opening piece, Two Souls and A Promise, was presented for the first time last August as one of several short pieces. At that time I commented, in part, "With 2 Souls and A Promise, veteran Rupert Reyes offers us a meditation that starts in whimsy and finishes with reflections …
Review: The Idiot by University of Texas Theatre & Dance
by Michael Meigs
Published on March 06, 2009
The playwright's work is made easier by the luminiscent acting of Tom Truss as Myshkin. Truss shows us a man who is simple yet exceedingly complex -- a man whose emotions war openly in his face.
Scott Kanoff's transformation of Dostoyevski's novel gives us a luminous experience, a comedy of manners of the 19th century Russian aristocracy tracked and threatened by deep and pernicious evil.The Thursday night performance was sold out. The largely undergraduate audience around the wide thrust space of the Brockett Theatre fastened on every word throughout, even though the piece runs a full three hours, including its 15-minute intermission.Prince Lev Nikolaevich Myshkin is returning to Moscow from Switzerland, where …
Review: God's Man in Texas by The Georgetown Palace Theatre
by Michael Meigs
Published on March 03, 2009
Andy Brown represents for us all those thousands who are faithful clients of this huge enterprise. We identify with him as we see him hesitate, apprehensive about this new development, about these new people, and about the uncertainty of Gottschall's reaction to unwelcome news.
With her decision to stage God's Man in Texas at the Georgetown Palace Theatre, artistic director Mary Ellen Butler has taken a risk. She acknowledges in the program that she has waited seven years to put it on -- "as the Palace grew . . . in depth of audience, attendance, and actor availability."The Palace is now a highly successful non-profit venture, depending on a local audience including a big percentage of retirees -- folks you might assume …
Review: Fences by The City Theatre Company
by Michael Meigs
Published on March 01, 2009
This father-son relationship is as tense and dangerous as a live wire. The casting here is superb and the duo scenes are riveting.
The City Theatre production of August Wilson's Fences is powerful, intelligent, deep, universal and fully realized. It is by far the most impressive modern drama staged to date in this Austin theatre season. This is theatre not to be missed.The year is 1957, but it could be any time in history. The place is a black neighborhood in Pittsburgh, like that in which August Wilson grew up, but it could be any close-knit community. August Wilson has …