The Coronation Theater — Attraction in Houston

I love and have been doing improv myself for years, every city I visit I like to check out their improv. It was a pretty small space, as soon as you walk in you’re in it. The staff were great and friendly and had a variety of drinks and snacks. With that being said this is just my personal opinion! Please check it out for yourself as it is a different and fun experience from your usual “night out” activities + you are supporting local comedy.

It was a small cast of 6 people total. Given how small the space was they were not good at projecting their voices at all. You couldn’t hear much from the back. They did an Armando-like Format which involves a monologists telling a personal story and then the cast improvised scenes inspired from that monologue. Their edits were kinda funky in my opinion, they do a weird little hand gesture. I would suggest to whoever runs the improv program to find better edit methods to make them seem cleaner and smoother. Not a whole lot of scene painting and object work, most of the time they were just having conversational scenes. I would’ve loved to have seen more emotion and reaction. There was one long haired blonde shorter woman that was hilarious!!

The comedy itself had its good moments here and there. The later show involved a drinking game which felt very chaotic for most of it, the format itself felt like we were intruding on someone else’s beer pong party. There were two comic guys that saved the whole thing. With all that being said they have only been around for one year, every theater starts off a little rough in the beginning before they find that sweet spot. I hope they continue to level...

I want to preface this by saying that I think this review is more reflective of the specific cast that I attended this Saturday night, 8/12/23, and not a reflection of Coronation Theater as a whole. I did speak to the host of this show after this and expressed these concerns, which he also responded very well too. As an intersectional feminist, I feel a moral responsibility to leave this review. While I laughed a lot and generally had a great time with my boyfriend, I was taken aback by the lack of significant racial and gender diversity in the cast, and several instances of internalized misogyny, on behalf of the women and the men that performed tonight. First, I noticed that the men took up substantially more space in the show than the woman. Yes, they were outnumbered, but the men in the cast did not make much room for the 2 women that were present. The women in the cast were oftentimes talked over, and roles diminished by specifically the larger white men in the cast (internalized misogyny). Then, when the women did in fact have a chance to play a role, more often than not, they casted themselves in stereotypical subordinate, gender-conforming roles such as mothers, inconsiderate leaders, and girls that were looking to hoop with men (also internalized misogyny). Nonetheless, I am looking forward to when this theater posts their lineup on their instagram so I can attend a more representative, balanced, and less white male heteronormative improv show. I will definitely be back here because of how well my criticism was received by the host of the show (hence the 3 stars) and I'll probably follow up from...

At the soft opening of The Coronation Theater two months ago I was surprised to see that almost all seats were taken. A tad nervous initially, I wasn't quite certain about what to expect. But my husband and I returned home after a rather pleasant experience at this Improv evening. Each of the groups that performed seemed pretty confident, even when some strange storylines were thrown at them from the audience. They also have a neat bar where you can hangout after the party. The founder, Saurabh Pande, seemed rather cool, and to us it felt like he's been doing these improvs for quite a while. I'm wondering if they will need a bigger space so they can add more seating. There was adequate parking space. Four stars (and not five) is because some of the humor was lost on me (not necessarily a reflection on them). We do believe this theater will be a success and is here to stay....