Woodlawn Theatre's Into the Woods, A Must See!

There are very valid reasons why Stephen Sondheim’s classic Into the Woods isn't presented more in local theater circles across the country..  First and foremost, San Antonio has never been a big Sondheim town, sadly to say.  Sondheim’s music and lyrics are for the thinking person, and while shows like Evita and even the classical crossover Sweeney Todd draw good houses, most of his library of hit musicals go not produced.  Another reason, is the difficulty in finding accomplished singers and actors that must lyrically spit out the rapid fire dialogue while still leaving room for vocal expression.  Lastly, the very few productions of Into the Woods produced in San Antonio in the past 20 years will always be compared to the almost flawless Alamo City Theatre’s production, under the direction of legendary director Jerry Pollock.

That being said, The Woodlawn Theatre’s production is superb.  Once again, director Greg Hinojosa has raised the bar of musical theater in San Antonio by staging a fast-paced, well sung, sharply executed production.

The musical intertwines the plots of several Brothers Grimm fairy tales and follows them to explore the consequences of the characters' wishes and quests. The characters are taken from Grimm and other fairy tale adaptations such as “Little Red Riding Hood”, “Jack and the Beanstalk”, “Rapunzel” and “Cinderella”. The musical is tied together by an original story involving a baker and his wife and their quest to begin a family, and their interaction with a Witch and her curse on them.

The Baker (Ben Scharff) and his Wife (Amanda Golden) lead the ensemble of characters with strong vocal interpretations of each song and a very believable relationship.  Golden’s last few moments in the show are some of the finest in all of theatre, sung with beauty and caring.  Certainly Jack (Trevor Chauvin), is the most hilarious role in the show.  His perfect comical timing made every moment on stage a delight.  His Mother (Rebecca Trinidad) again shows her veteran experience and bright soprano in building much of the sympathy for her son, who is stealing from the giants at the top of his beanstalk.  The role of the princes were both wonderfully arrogant and cowardly selfish as they search, find and very quickly tire of their female conquests.  Cinderella’s Prince/Wolf (Joseph Urick), an excellent actor, delivered his comedy wonderfully, but lacked the same quality in his singing pitch, which went from sharp to extremely off key in his devilishly seductive duet with Little Red (Carlye Gossen).  Strangely enough, his voice was right on for the Agony duets with the other Prince (Travis Trevino).  Trevino was an exceptional comic force and a great part of this memorable supporting ensemble.   Cinderella (Melissa Zarb-Cousin) played the role with great sensitivity and comedy.  She displayed a rich instrument, with strong presence in the higher soprano voice.  It was a great pleasure to hear some of the best of our city’s vocal talent, none more gifted than The Witch (Megan DeYoung).  The entire story revolved around The Witch and she must possess a heightened dramatic quality to her acting, a powerful darkly hued voice and a comic flair to pull of the ensemble scenes.  De Young was explosive, and accented her performance with some of the finest most beautifully sung pieces in the show.  The rest of the cast all did great jobs, rounded out by Rachel Pena as Rapunzel and Darren Dalton playing the role of Narrator. 

The set, designed by Kurt Wehner and Benjamin Grabill was gorgeous, utilizing three separate sectional pieces downstage of a lush forest of greenery, trees and objects that cast spooky shadows during the performance.   Matt Smith’s lighting design was effective and attractive.  Kudos to Music Director Darrin Newhardt for both conducting a very clean, up tempo musical score and keeping the diction as precise as it was.  This is usually one of the most important factors in producing a Sondheim masterpiece.  There were times when the music could have taken a small breath to give the one-lined comedy zingers a chance, but on whole it made a lively, brisk take on what is already a fast show.

Into the Woods plays until March 16.  A Must See!  www.woodlawntheatre.org

Pennington's Buddy Holly Story impresses at the Cameo

Let me start off running. All the actors on stage played their own instruments, and they were really good musicians and actors, which gave great credibility and realism to the performances. Not only was the Buddy Holly band, The Crickets superb, with special mention of bassist Tony Gloria, and Apollo Sax Player Billy Ray Sheppard, but also the back up singers looked good, performed well and were well-choreographed in their dance moves. Stewart Mann who played Buddy Holly was perfectly Holly - where do these incredible talents come from? Thad Payne did a good Big Bopper and Ernest Sauceda did a fine Richie Valens. Other actors were supportive and did their parts well. Sounds like a good show -does it not? And it is!

Now to the nitty gritty. The set design had good points and some clever elements - such as the giant size juke box selection lists, but felt a little incomplete. A lot of musical equipment needed to be moved quickly around the stage, and it was handled very well during well-planned transitions. The costumes were good and well-conceived. The sound was excellent - amazing, because of the many performers being accompanied by the live rock music. That really made me happy. I don't like going to a performance and listening to garbled or overly-loud sound. The three projection screens were helpful in guiding the audience to the historical events happening on stage. In some places the video was very creative and professionally-done, made to look vintage. In one place they overused a snowfall graphic video, but that was the only let down. The lighting did not have much finesse, with people on the edges of the stage sometimes standing in the dark.

During the First Act, you discover the early years of Buddy Holly and what made Buddy who he was. In with all the great live music performances of Holly's early songs was one weak sequence of recorded Holly songs, where the stage went dark as the performers turned their back to the audience. All in my party felt that it was a low energy spot in the show. Someone actually felt that it was a lighting glitch at first. We felt that the performers should have performed those songs. I don't know why they didn't. Was it the writing of the show or a local directorial decision?

Act Two was a home run - it was longer than Act One and great fun from start to finish with wonderful performances by the 16 musicians and singers on stage. You have to experience Act Two - it contains the last live performance of Buddy Holly, The Big Bopper and Richie Valens - and you feel like you are really there - the excitement just ripples through the audience. I want to go back and see the show at least one more time for the euphoria of reliving that rock concert.

Buddy Holly did not have the sloppy looseness and obvious karaoke tracks of some recent musical shows in town, and for that I am truly grateful. Local theater production companies don't have the gigantic budgets of Broadway road shows at the Majestic, and that has to be understood by the local audiences. But a small budget does not have to translate into a cheap-looking, poor sounding, sloppy show. If Jonathan Pennington keeps doing exciting productions like Buddy, and even tweeks some weak spots in his shows before they open, then Pennington Productions at their new home in the Cameo Theatre could be one of the premier places to have fun in San Antonio theater. Go see Buddy: The Buddy Holly Story.   www.cameocenter.com

UTSA Lyric Opera scores big with HMS Pinafore

I ventured out of my lair this nice cool evening to see UTSA Lyric Opera's new production of the old standard, Gilbert & Sullivan's HMS Pinafore, at the downtown Buena Vista Theatre. One of the most famous of all G & S operettas, the music is a trunk full of clever melodies and very funny lyrics.  The production was a great success in most areas, a surprise in others and a complete shock in one. 

The shock came at first sight of the excellent set design and construction, by Ricky Holdman and Stephen Montalvo.  William McCrary, Director of HMS and the Lyric Opera, has now broken through the cost barriers of past pedestrian sets and has earned a highly desirable visual impact to accompany a finely staged direction.  McCrary has a great craft of keeping the pace of the opera always moving at a good pace, never letting a moment last longer than it should.  This is a sign of a great opera director.  His comedic approach balances the fine line of British humor that can at times be a little outdated and hard to understand.

The vocalists all had great success.  A mostly undergraduate cast, the vocalists all gave promising performances with standouts that included Trey Hoadley as Sir Joseph Porter, KCB, Geo Flores as Ralph Rackstraw and Taylor Vollmer playing the role of Josephine.  Rachel Pena played the somewhat difficult, and comedic role of Buttercup.  Her voice was a dark textured mezzo with a very nice range of effective stage movement and acting.  Playing the part of the crazed hunchbacked shipmate Dick Deadeye was Christian Silliker.  He was constant in his comedy and characterization throughout the opera, and sang effectively during his solos.  All he needed was a parrot on his shoulder.  Daniel Watson as Captain Cocoran, was charming, dislaying the best voice of the show.  A big fella, his attention to his choreography and a gracefulness usually found in top rate chorus dancers made his role come to life whenever he was on stage.  The chorus all did a decent job with diction needing a little more rehearsal.  English is such an unforgivng language to sing. 

The choreography, by Michelle Pietri, was lively and took full use of the downtown UTSA stage.  With the exception of one late lighting cue, Chris Muenchow did a very good job at lighting the show.  Okay, the big surprise of the night came from below the stage.  With only seven instruments, Music Director Robert Brewer led a compact and exciting ensemble that did not handicap the production because of size.  Beautiful violin solos by Saul Romero and precise entrances on the percussion by Sarek Gutierrez, this was a team effort all around and everyone should be applauded and praised, especially Dr. McCrary.

The Phantom now takes off his white bloodied glove and points to everyone who says they love and care for the artform of opera but then doesn't attend the opera's when they are presented. What is this telling the opera students on the stage?  Come on SA, let's get out to see the final show on Sunday at 3:00pm. 

Tickets: $15 general admission; $10 students with ID/military with ID/seniors 55+; $8 groups of ten or more (choose $10 option and discount will be applied) No free admission.

Rocky Horror Show stuns at the Woodlawn Theatre

From the moment one walks into the Woodlawn Theatre, they are instantly surrounded by a wonderfully fresh decor, including a fully lit marque and a business professionalism that has continued to escape the theater scene for many years.  From the friendly bar staff to the enthusiastic concessionaire, the Woodlawn Theatre, under the artistic direction of Greg Hinojosa, has leaped further and faster than one could ever hope.

The musical child of a cult classic movie movie like The Rocky Horror Show better be slick and professional with an entertainment factor that can hit the audience between the eyes, happily Hinojosa's direction provided all of this and more.  His direction was comical and racy all at once.  This is definetely a rated R show with many sexual scenes and strong language throughout.  The cast is led by a winner of RuPaul's Drag Race, Sharon Needles, as the mad transexual scientist.  She did a great job with delivering a frightening character while still leaving room for a sensitive portrayal of the character.  The musical does not require great voices, just singers that can handle the somewhat acrobatic staging and choreography, though there were a few vocal stand outs.  Isidoro Medina III exudes a lush baritone quality while playing the role Brad.  Melissa Zarb-Cousin also gave a nice vocal presentation in her hilarious role of Janet.  It was difficult to hear much of the sung dialogue due to an opening night glitch with sound balances between the vocals and the excellent band led by Hector Serna.  In fact, the small rock band was almost flawless throughout the show.

Certainly Kevin Murray and Dave Cortez shine bright as the Narrator and Dr. Scott, respectively.  Two of our city's kings of comedy felt right at home in this production.  There were no weak spots anywhere in the cast.  The biggest compliment might be attributed to the incredible production value of the show, especially the "Broadway" quality of the set and special effects, designed by Kurt Wehner and Benjamin Grabill.  Also, the lighting design was a major element in the success of the musical, truly turning the musical into a rock concert atmosphere at times.  Costume design was cleverly crafted by Greg Hinojosa, with plenty of sexy, tight fitting, leather clad garments that stayed exciting and consistent throughout the performance. 

This is certainly a high energy production with good professional elements. A wild ride into the dark side of a cult classic.  If you have seen Rocky Horror at the movies, this is a must see.  If you have not, come with an open mind of acceptance and the will to have a little naughty fun. The Rocky Horror Show will run through October 27 at the Woodlawntheatre.com, 210-267-8388.