Some ways of being close to someone you've never been particularly close to. "Tales Of Mere Existence" By Levni Yilmaz R.O.T.... [continue]

Oh say can you see Francis Scott Key sitting on a picnic blanket nursing a michelada on the velvet green meadows of Auditorium Shores tonight as the Texas National Guard Salute Battery's 70 millimeter cannons (!) keep time with the Austin Symphony and a fireworks display to rival the decadent aerial ordinance of the Hunan Dynasty explodes overhead? We can. ... [continue]

Come to the Midnight Special variety show at Coldtowne Theatre for Austin comedy savant Fred Bothwell, but stay for the show. Over the course of the hour, there is much to enjoy, from a gong show (which you, too, can win!), to improv, to musical goodness. ... [continue]

Playwright Martin McDonagh loves making fun of America’s fascination with Ireland, and people in Austin love producing and attending his plays about Ireland—wherein he makes fun of America’s fascination with Ireland. O, the irony. But this city’s latest production of McDonagh’s work, The Beauty Queen of Leenane, staged by Renaissance Austin Theatre and the VORTEX Repertory Company, isn’t likely to end this vicious cycle. ... [continue]