Celebrating 30 years in Austin theater, Ken Webster flies solo in "House"

Perfecting the art of trenchant, witty, compact plays

By Jeanne Claire van Ryzin
AMERICAN-STATESMAN ARTS WRITER
Thursday, April 30, 2009

You would think that in 30 years of doing something a person might have a few memorable low points.

Not Ken Webster. Currently celebrating three decades in Austin's theater scene, the 51-year-old producer/director/actor seems to recall only one true low point: the first half of the 1990s, when he had to take a day job to make ends meet and went to work in what is arguably the other kind of theater: politics. For a few years, Webster was a political consultant, advising — or should that be directing? — candidates on making effective public appearances.

The high point of 30 years in Austin theater? 'Meeting my wife Katherine (Catmull),' Webster says. Webster first met Catmull, an actress, in 1984 when he directed her in a play that was staged at the now-defunct club Liberty Lunch.

To celebrate the more than 100 shows he's had a hand in, Webster is re-mounting one his favorites: 'House,' a darkly comic one-man show by Canadian playwright Daniel MacIvor. Webster has performed 'House' twice before, and it's the play he's most commonly asked to re-stage. Perhaps it's because over 30 years Webster has created a singular niche for himself: He is Austin's purveyor of trenchant, dark, jewel-like comedies — acerbic, modern, witty, compact plays that reveal modern foibles and follies yet still manifest plenty of humanity. Plays such as 'Sex, Drugs and Rock N' Roll,' 'Thom Pain' and 'The Pillowman,' which sold out an extended seven-week run.

'House' finds Victor — a furious, frustrated and failing man — recounting his life's winding tale and his odd theories of life and love.

'He's angry, but he's vulnerable. He can be really sweet or really mean,' says Webster, who introduced Austin to several of MacIvor's dark comedies.

It's a story, Webster says, that's ultimately 'the poetry of the ordinary.'

Since assuming the artistic directorship of Hyde Park Theatre in 2001, Webster, a native of Port Arthur who grew up in Houston, has perfected presenting that theatrical poetry of the ordinary, cultivating a loyal audience that regularly accounts for sold-out performances in the quirky Central Austin theater space that's been carved out of a former post office.

In 2006, Webster was inducted into the Austin Arts Hall of Fame. And though that would seem like a long way from when Webster started in 1979 performing in whatever play he could, wherever he could, it's really not.

Sure, he gets small roles in locally filmed movie and film productions — among them, 'Waking Life,' 'Friday Night Lights' and the upcoming movie starring Claire Danes, 'Temple Grandin' — but Webster also remembers when a dearth of acting opportunities spurred him on to produce and direct just so he and other Austin actors could have work. (A bit of trivia: Webster's first foray into directing — 'Little Murders' by Jules Feiffer at the long-gone Fifth Street Playhouse — had a teenage Mary Louise Parker in a minor role when the actress had a very brief time in Austin.)

Theater is good to Webster now, partly because he is very busy creating opportunities for actors — triangulating actor and new script and audience together.

Sounds simple enough, even ordinary. But it only transcends into the poetry of the ordinary.

jvanryzin@statesman.com; 445-3699

'House'

When: 8 p.m. Thursdays-Saturdays through May 30

Where:Hyde Park Theatre, 511 W. 43rd St.

Cost: $18 ($16 for students and seniors), Thursdays pay-what-you-can

Information: 479-7529, www.hydeparktheatre.org

Hyde Park Theatre Fundraiser: Celebration of Ken Webster

When: 9:30 p.m. May 30

Cost: $15-$50 (sliding scale)