Grrr...

Welcome to a deliberately antagonistic This Week in Theatre, inspired by St. Nicholas – Hyde Park Theatre's one-man show about a theatre critic who hangs out with vampires. Not so subtle, and starring HPT’s Artistic Tour de Force, Ken Webster – a man who’s reportedly tumultuous relationship with local critics befits his role in said production. (Not that we’ve ever had any run-ins with Ken. Ever. Not even one time.) We say this to you, Mr. Webster: vampires? We’re vampires? Whatever. You’re a vampire! We hope your show sucks!

(We are, of course, completely and totally joking – so put away the pitchforks, townspeople. Ken is in the Austin Arts Hall of Fame for a reason, and we wish his production all the best.)

And we hope the rest of you suck, too! Like you, Salvage Vanguard Theatre, producing Intergalactic Nemesis, your enormously popular radio play that’s about to tour the country. You may be our Austinist Pick of the Week because we completely loved this production before, and we may be jumping up and down excited that an Austin fringe theatre company is playing Hogg Auditorium, but you’re still just a bunch of nerds with hilariously funny foley sound effects and refreshingly ridiculous foreign accents. Whatever. (For more info: go here.)

Oh yeah, and if that wasn’t enough, there’s a major dance happening this month. Great. It’s called Hot September Flurries – like it ever snows in September. Christ. Who wants to see all of Austin’s best fringe choreographers crammed into three weekends of action-packed dance mayhem? Ok, admittedly, we do. (This week you can see Andrea Ariel and Amy Cone’s solo work, awesome!) Really, if you’re into Austin dance, this is the month you live for – anyone who’s anyone in the fringe scene is showing work. It’s well worth your while, so go here for more info.

The Broadway production of Hairspray is in town. We’ll leave that one where it lay.

And lastly, Renaissance Austin Theatre Company brings us A Moon For the Misbegotten – one of Eugene O’Neil’s many inspired theatrical creations. However, we’re pretty sure O’Neil wasn’t alive during the Renaissance, which makes this company a bunch of liars. (Not really. Plus, the production stars Lorella Loftus who we’ve seen before and enjoyed!) Misbegotten opens Friday at the Dougherty Arts Center. Get yer info right here.

For everything still running from previous weekends, check out last week’s TWIT.

*Photo of Melissa Rentrop and Amanda Butterfield in We Are Normal, Cha Cha Chaaa, taken by Dennis Fagan.