Matthew Broderick, Wallace Shawn Set for This Week's THEATER TALK

Beginning February 24 on Thirteen, WLIW/21, CUNY TV* and WNYE/25
THEATER TALK guests playwright/actor Wallace Shawn, actor Matthew Broderick, and director Scott Elliott discuss the New York City premiere of Shawn's play Evening at THE TALK House, a production of The New Group now at the Pershing Square Signature Theatre. Described on the show as a "chilling" work set in a dystopian world where theater has died out, the play unfolds at a reunion of people who worked together on a theatrical production 10 years earlier. Some of the guests have risen in stature; some have fallen. Acting in his own play, Shawn portrays the character that has "sunk the lowest," and Broderick, according to co-host Susan Haskins, provides a "funny, effervescent, and dark performance" as a character who has done very well and has a "wonderful disdain" for those who have not succeeded. Although the play was written a few years ago and produced in 2015 in London, Shawn agrees with Haskins and Michael Riedel of the New York Post that "it's a very appropriate play for the moment of Trump's ascendancy," adding, "But Trump didn't come from nowhere."

Shawn shares how exposure to the work of O'Neill, Ionesco and Beckett had a profound effect on him when he was an aspiring writer in his teens. Although he claims he has not been "well-liked" as a playwright, he is bemused by a coterie of fans, who have never seen his plays, but ask for his autograph because of his work as a "B-list actor" in films (like Clueless and Toy Story). The guests also talk about theater today, commenting on the fortuitous spillover effect of Broadway hits and marketing onto smaller plays and theater companies like Elliott's New Group.

The Evening at THE TALK House edition of THEATER TALK premieres in the New York City metropolitan area Friday, February 24 (2017) on PBS station Thirteen/WNET at 2 AM (early Saturday morning; time change this week only) and repeats there on Sunday 2/26 at 11:30 AM; it re-airs on CUNY TV* Saturday 2/25 at 8:30 PM, Sunday 2/26 at 12:30 PM, and Monday 2/27 at 7:30 AM, 1:30 PM, and 7:30 PM; and also airs on WLIW/21 on Monday 2/27 at 5:30 PM and on NYCLife on Thursday 3/2 at 11 PM.

THEATER TALK is jointly produced by the not-for-profits Theater Talk Productions and CUNY TV. The program is taped in the Himan Brown TV and Radio Studios at The City University of New York (CUNY) TV in Manhattan, and is distributed to 100+ participating public television stations nationwide. THEATER TALK is made possible in part by The New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, The CUNY TV Foundation, and The Friends of THEATER TALK.

*CUNY TV, the City University of New York television station, is broadcast in the NYC metropolitan area on digital Ch. 25.3 and cablecast in the city's five boroughs on Ch. 75 (Time Warner & Optimum Brooklyn), Ch. 77 (RCN), and Ch. 30 (Verizon FiOS). THEATER TALK episodes are available online anytime at www.cuny.tv and www.theatertalk.org

Image courtesy Theater Talk Prod. Inc. & CUNY TV