For Immediate Release:
The Catastrophic Theatre
presents:
Endgame
by Samuel Beckett
February 17 – March 3, 2012
Wednesdays – Saturdays, 8 p.m.
DiverseWorks Artspace
The Catastrophic Theatre proudly presents Samuel Beckett's timeless avant-garde classic Endgame, running Wednesdays through Saturdays, February 17 – March 3, at DiverseWorks Artspace.
Of Beckett, Catastrophic Artistic Director Jason Nodler says, "No other writer has more profoundly influenced the course of contemporary drama and dramatic writing than Samuel Beckett. Nearly every year there is a new 'next Beckett' but never is the designation really apt for there will never be another Samuel Beckett. From Edward Albee to Harold Pinter to Tom Stoppard to Sarah Kane, Beckett has been cited again and again as the writer that most influenced their work. Beckett changed the game. Virtually none of the plays I have produced would have existed but for him and but for him I sincerely doubt I'd be working in theatre at all. He is our Shakespeare."
Will Eno, commonly regarded to be one of the fresher playwrights today, was asked when Beckett's plays would become irrelevant. He answered, "When people stop dying."
And yet Beckett, whose public debut came less than 60 years ago, is among the least produced of contemporary writers. Often relegated to university classes and productions, his work is commonly misunderstood to be heady, tedious, gray, or merely bizarre. Even the most well-intentioned producers often miss the vital comedy in his work.
This is consistent with commonly held misunderstandings about the movement which he inadvertently led, as The Theatre of the Absurd is often regarded as representing an absurd approach to theatre, a series of 'weird plays,' rather than a reflection of the post-war philosophy that the human experience is itself absurd.
Endgame, for all the unhappiness the characters experience in their local situation, is in many ways a comedy. Or rather, with the line that Beckett said was the spine of the play, "Nothing is funnier than unhappiness," it marries comedy and tragedy in a way that no writer before or since has so successfully managed to do.
Beckett loved the geniuses of lowbrow comedy, the vaudevillians. He admired no performer more than he did Buster Keaton or Charlie Chaplin. And his work has no more in common with the nihilism of Nietzsche than it does the hilarious laments of Chekhov's Yepikhodov, a character we laugh at for all the ways in which he falls down.
With characteristically wicked humor, when asked which of his plays he liked best, Beckett said: "I suppose of all my plays I dislike Endgame the least." Nodler and Catastrophic like it best, for without it there would be no Catastrophic Theatre. Without Endgame we would have so little mechanism for laughing at life's absurdities, and the nothingness which is such a common theme in Beckett's plays would be that much more grievous.
Jason Nodler will direct a cast of Greg Dean (Hamm), Troy Schulze (Clov), Joel Orr (Nagg) and Mikelle Johnson (Nell). Dean, Schulze and Johnson are Catastrophic company members. Orr is Artistic Director of Houston's Bobbindoctrin Puppet Theatre.
The most recent Houston production of Beckett's tragicomic masterwork was produced by Nodler's Infernal Bridegroom Productions in 1995. It was the second play directed by Nodler and it featured the first of his many collaborations with Greg Dean (Hamm) and Jim Parsons (Clov). Aaron Krohn appeared as Nagg and Catastrophic Associate Director Tamarie Cooper played Nell. The production was the first of IBP's to be reviewed by the daily paper of record, The Houston Chronicle, and the review ran under the headline "Endgame ends up as Beckett at its best." The production was followed by IBP productions of Beckett's Waiting for Godot (also featuring Dean) and Happy Days (with Cooper in the seminal role of Winnie), each directed by Nodler.
When asked to reprise his role in Endgame, Dean remarked, "Splendid. I've had 16 more years experience in dying."
Nodler and Orr previously collaborated on the IBP/Bobbindoctrin co-productions of Maria Irene Fornes' The Danube and Orr's original work The Noblest of Drugs.
In the director's own words, "My best friend hanged himself when I was thirteen years old. The following year I discovered Samuel Beckett. What else should I have to say about it?"
Details
Endgame
by Samuel Beckett
Wednesdays through Saturdays
February 17, 18, 22, 23, 24, 25, 29, March 1, 2, 3
All performances begin at 8pm
Performances will be held at DiverseWorks Artspace
1117 East Frwy.
Houston, TX 77002
Tickets:
Opening night February 17: $50
(includes buffet dinner, open bar, and party with the cast)
All other performances: Pay-what-you-can
Tickets may be purchased online at catastrophictheatre.com
Or by phone at 713-522-2723
Creative Team:
Director: Jason Nodler
Scenic Design: Laura Fine Hawkes
Lighting Design: John Smetak
Costume Design: Kelly Switzer
Properties Design: Greg Dean
Cast:
Hamm: Greg Dean
Clov: Troy Schulze
Nagg: Joel Orr
Nell: Mikelle Johnson
Contact:
The Catastrophic Theatre
info@catastrophictheatre.com
713-522-2723
Jason Nodler, Artistic Director
jason.nodler@catastrophictheatre.com
713-522-2723×2
Kirk Markley, Managing Director
kirk.markley@catastrophictheatre.com
713-522-2723×3