Arts Alive San Antonio

By JASMINA WELLINGHOFF, Editor

This is the time of the year when arts organizations announce their upcoming seasons, and the Public Theater of San Antonio has a promising one. It’s also the first full season selected by new executive artistic director, Claudia de Vasco, who relocated from California to take the helm of the Public in September 2021.

At the time, we interviewed her about her new role at the Public, San Antonio’s largest thespian entity, housed in the historic San Pedro Playhouse.

 “Two things attracted me to the San Antonio position,” she told us. “First, this position is a hybrid role of artistic and executive director. I have a range of experiences that are needed in both roles, so this was a unique opportunity to combine the expertise I have gained over the years, doing the things I call my home base. I have been in theater since I was a little girl. The other thing that attracted me was that the position was in Texas. I am from Texas, and now that I am a mother of two young children, I wanted to be closer to my family.”

After the somewhat unpredictable 2021-22 season, it finally looks like clear sailing ahead.

So, how did she go about choosing the 2022-23 season?”

“This season was a bit challenging because I had to choose it pretty early in my tenure here,” she said.
“With the licensing companies we cannot license a show more than 18 months ahead, but if you wait too long and there’s another production of the play in your region, and they think it’s too close to yours, they will deny the license. And, of course, if it’s on Broadway, they will deny it. So, I stepped in last September, and I knew I had to have the season picked ASAP because we cannot have auditions until it’s approved by the union and the dates are announced, and that cannot happen unless the licensing deal is in place.”

She further explained that after coming here, she first wanted to get to know the San Antonio community, look at the history of the Public’s productions and try to merge her vision for the company with community expectation.

“I wanted to try to keep the programming that loyal patrons want to see while also introducing some new ideas.”

As she went about meeting people and thinking about the new seasons, shows started coming to mind, including a theme. “I decided to build the season around a theme rather than choose just random shows,” she noted. The chosen theme “Worlds to Change and Worlds to Win”, comes from Stephen Sondheim’s musical “Merrily We Roll Along.” The idea behind the theme is to convey that “This is a new time now; it’s post COVID, there’s a new leader and we are going to try some new things.”

The season opener is the Texas premiere of “American Mariachi,” (Sept. 9 – Oct.2, 2022)a show that De Vasco described as “sweeping the nation with great success.” The musical breaks with tradition by focusing on two girls who create a female mariachi band, and, also, by introducing mariachi music to the American theater stage. It was relatively easy to cast the show here, in San Antonio, with many mariachi musicians living here, though the professional band players could not commit to the fairly long theatrical run. One of the female mariachis on stage will be the artistic director’s sister from Houston. De Vasco herself used to sing and play the violin.

This will be followed by “A Beautiful Day in November on the Banks of the Greatest of the Great Lakes” by Kate Benson.( Oct.14 – Nov. 2, 2022) This one, sounds really different from what you may expect from a ThanksgivingDay family comedy. One writer said “It stretches the limits of theatrical imagination,” while another called it “an innovative piece of theater… that will leave you breathless as it disassembles the time-tested genre of family play.” The family members are seen on a playing court with an announcer high above and two commentators who call the action as they see it. (It sure piqued our interest.)

But the next one is the time-honored “A Christmas Carol,” (Nov.25-Dec. 18, 2022) complete with the three ghosts who visit the old curmudgeon who doesn’t care about the happiness and comfort of others.

In January, it’s “Nina Simone: Four Women (Jan. 20-Feb.12, 2023). The show’s action starts on January 16, 1963, the day after the bombing of the 16^th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama. Using the framework of Nina Simone’s songs, the play focuses on four women “suffering self-hatred due to the different hues of their skins.” Healing and transformation follow. Ah, the power of music!

Then comes “Fabulous Monsters” by Diana Burbano (Feb. 24-March 19, 2023) the story of two female, Latina punk-rockers. The show will feature original music by the San Antonio-based Chicana punk rock band, Fea, specifically commissioned for this production.

 The Pajama Game sounds comfortably familiar. (March 31- April 23, 2023). It premiered back in 1954 on Broadway, with choreography by Bob Fosse, who became one of the best-known choreographers of stage and screen. The story focuses on workers in a pajama factory and their rapport with bosses and each other.

The season closes in the summer of 2023 with the dancing musical, “Footloose,” (June 9- July 2, 2023) and “Merrily We Roll Along,” with music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim(Aug. 4-Aug. 27, 2023). The story of the latter begins in the present and moves backwards, tracing the lives of three men back to their youth when they looked forward to a bright future.

Looking closer at these selections, one can notice that several explore the societal changes, like “American Mariachi” and “Fabulous Monsters” – acceptance of women in those musical genres – but De Vasco aims at more than that.

“I also want to introduce changes in the way we approach theater,” she said. “Like in “Merrily We Roll Along,” for instance. The structure of telling the story is changed by starting at the end. Also, in the “A Beautiful Day…” the story is about a family dinner told like a sports game.”

So, what is she most looking forward to?

“I am really excited about ‘Fabulous Monsters’ since we are helping develop it. It’s going to have a life beyond our production, with music that we commissioned. San Antonio has a history in punk music and we got a punk band to write the music. The playwright liked it a lot. She collaborated with them.”
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All performances take place at the San Pedro Playhouse, 800 W. Ashby, 78212; for season subscriptions and tickets call 210-733-7258 or go to www.thepublicsa.org/tickets/subscriptions/