Austin Theatre

As noted in last week's look at 2005 in review, Austin arts groups kept getting the attention of the national arts scene. Now, here we are just weeks into 2006, and the trend continues with three theatrical productions making a splash in New York.

• Rob Nash's Holy Cross Sucks!, which was well received in its off-Broadway debut last September, made the No. 10 spot in critic David Cote's list of the best shows of 2005 in the year-in-review issue of Time Out New York.

• Playwright Kirk Lynn had a chance to workshop his new play, Major Bang, Or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Dirty Bomb (A Suspense Comedy With Magic), with New York's Foundry Theatre last fall, and this month the company is giving the two-hander about terrorism a full production at St. Ann's Warehouse, 38 Water St., in Brooklyn. Better yet, the prestigious Public Theater has included the show as one of 14 productions in its 2006 Under the Radar Festival, spotlighting contemporary theatre from around the world. To find out more, or just to get a load of the Foundry's way-cool Web site for the show – complete with online magic trick, interactive quiz, and video – visit www.majorbangshow.com.

• Salvage Vanguard Theater is gearing up to take its retro radio adventure serial The Intergalactic Nemesis on a national tour, and it's making a run to New York this month to present the show as a way of drumming up interest in the tour and a possible off-Broadway production. Lee Eddy, Jason Newman, Mike D'Alonzo, Shannon McCormick, and LB Deyo, plus Foley masters Etta Sanders and Buzz Moran, will take New York forward into the past on Saturday, Jan. 21, 2pm, at the Bowery Poetry Club, 308 Bowery. But before they blast off for parts East, the company will give Austin another taste of the fun. One night only: Wednesday, Jan. 18, 8pm, at the Hideout, 617 Congress. For more information, call 474-SVT-6 or visit www.salvagevanguard.org or www.bowerypoetry.com.