Review: REVIEW: SELF PORTRAITS - Bottle Alley Theatre Wows With Wonderful Work

Bottle Alley Theatre prides itself on being a DIY theatre company, and they do it incredibly well. For their current production, SELF PORTRAITS, the company has a couple of tables laden with props, a couple of folding chairs, two tall stools, a canvas backdrop, and a small space for the actors to work.

Theatre can, and often does in Austin, happen in the strangest places. The venue really doesn't matter when you have stellar creative forces and an iron will to make art. Mix in actors and voilà, you have two hours of exciting entertainment that will leave your mind reeling. Sounds easy? It's not. These extraordinary performers construct the human experience within the walls of their small warehouse venue and spin truth with virtually none of the trappings of what we normally associate with theatre. Nothing is more difficult than making such a production look easy.

SELF PORTRAITS is a devised performance where the company curates thirty different stories from their own lives. Each story is then given a number and a rather intriguing title listed in the program. The audience is invited to shout out numbers from one to thirty and that story is taken from the garland of numbers written in various styles on colorful construction paper and hung on the upstage curtain. The order of performance is completely random, the scenes are anything but random. We see broad comedy next to heartrending truths spoken in hushed voices. The common thread? Truth in all its humor, beauty and tragedy.

The company is incredible, every performer a gem. The cast includes: Audria Choudhury, Cassandra DeFrietas, Julius Alums, Molly Lyons, Rai Gonzalez, ​Sharlaina Lowry and Sonika Butani. All these unbelievably talented actors are masterfully directed by Chris Fontanes. Under his direction the entire evening has a spontaneous feel with a deftly professional polish. As much as I'd love to mention specific actors and scenes it would completely spoil the journey of self discovery that is SELF PORTRAITS. So I shall refrain from mentioning specifics, suffice it to say that each performer portrays the width and depth of human emotion incomparably. Usually shows presented in this particular format are by nature uneven, some scenes get short shrift in the chaos of thirty separate stories. But nothing could be farther from the truth. Bottle Alley Theatre has pulled off something truly remarkable. While some scenes are hysterically funny, others touch the audience's hearts and a few reach in, grab your soul and give it a good shake.

I wholeheartedly recommend SELF PORTRAITS. Please go and experience this incredible performance with actors more than equal to the task. You won't find anything else like it in any of Austin's dwindling formal theatre spaces. Please note the 7:00 PM curtain time. Please also note a warning strobe lighting used for one scene.

SELF PORTRAITS

Directed by Chris Fontanes

Bottle Alley Theatre

All The Sudden, 906 Koerner Ln, Austin, TX

April 7 - 16th at 7:00 pm

Running Time: 2 hours with no intermission (audience members are encouraged to come and go at their own convenience)

Tickets: $15

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