Inside Arts

• She has impressed Austin critics for years. Now choreographer Kathy Dunn Hamrick has done the same to the New Yorkers. After Hamrick's performance at Manhattan's Performance Space 122 last month, Erika Kinetz of The New York Times wrote 'And yet, there rises from the messy tumult of half-formed dances, bad lyrics, gender-bending charm and awkward pauses, the occasional flash of beauty and inspiration. ... Kathy Dunn Hamrick, a choreographer from Austin, made a sweet dance full of lilting jumps and the simple pleasures of moving.' -- Jeanne Claire van Ryzin

• Austin choreographer Allison Orr will return to Venice in September to work on 'Venice Dance,' a new work with photographer Hal Eastman. The project includes and exhibit of photographs that intergrate dance with many things Venice especially the city's light, water, architecture, bridges, canals, gondolas and glassmaking. Orr presented 'The Gondola Project,' a dance featuring 8 gondoliers and their gondolas in 2003 and again in 2004. -- J.C.v.R.

• Two Austin-related playwrights are represented in 'Divine Fire,' an anthology of eight plays inspired by the Greeks and published from Back Stage Books. Ruth E. Margraff, a sometime teacher at the University of Texas and frequent collaborator with Austin theater groups, is representd by 'The Elektra Fugues,' while Charles L. Mee, a darling of our town's critics and producers, wrote the incisive introduction and includes his script, 'True Love.' . . . On the book front, husband-and-wife UT teachers Suzan Zeder (playwriting) and Jim Hancock (movement) have produced 'Spaces of Creation' for Heinemann Drama. Zeder remains among the most widely produced Austin-based playwright. -- Michael Barnes

•Austin Museum of Art's matching summer exhibits of photographer Annie Leibovitz and painter Charles Mary Kubricht attracted its third-highest average daily attendance (327), not near the draw of the Andy Warhol show (488) that benefited from heavy media rotation by Time Warner Cable, but close to the museum's Andy Goldsworthy sleeper (345). A total of more than 20,000 visitors caught this year's double feature. -- M.B.

• News from the State Theater: 'Welcome to Arroyo's' by Kris Diaz, which premieres in April at the State, recently concluded an eight-performance workshop run on New York's Theatre Row as part of the Summer Play Festival. The director was Jaime Castaneda, a UT directing student, who will also direct the State's production. ... 'Greater Tuna' star Jaston Williams completed a two-week gig of 'I'm Not Lying,' his autobiographical onehander that premiered at the State, at the Villa resort in Palm Springs. 'The pool was hotter than the air, and the air was 115 degrees,' reports director Scott Kanoff. 'But there were audiences. The stage was outdoors. Jaston nearly collapsed from heat exhaustion after the first performance and was too sick to finish the weekend. He recuperated in Los Angeles and returned for the second weekend, which he says went very well. Evidently, the management provided outdoor cold air blowers for the stage.'

• Martin Burke, the elfin actor advertised as the lead in Zachary Scott Theatre's revival of 'Shear Madness,' has dropped out of the production, the company reports, for personal reasons. Espie Randolph, who played Mareb in 'Aida,' will play Tony, the flamboyant hairdresser made locally famous by the late Boyd Vance in Zach's original edition. -- M.B.