Theatre-First Presents Harold Pinter's OLD TIMES Opening April 4, 2009

TheatreFIRST today announces it will present Harold Pinter's gripping and mysterious "Old Times", featuring one of the Bay Area's foremost actors, L. Peter Callender as Deeley, at the Gaia Arts Center in Berkeley in April.

TheatreFIRST, which was forced to suspend its 2008-9 season when it lost its space in downtown Oakland and negotiations for a new location fell through, is back in action. The East Bay's foremost presenter of British drama in intimate settings will stage one of Pinter's most acclaimed yet rarely seen masterworks, Old Times, at Berkeley's Gaia Arts Center, opening April 4, 2009. Fresh from his triumphant performance at Marin Theatre Company in My Children! My Africa!, L. Peter Callender, who won a Bay Area Critics Circle Award in 2007 for his performance in TheatreFIRST's World Music, will play the role of Deeley.

Old Times is perhaps Pinter's most intriguing work. When Kate invites Anna, her old roommate, to come visit for the weekend, the stage is set for a trip down Memory Lane. But Memory Lane turns into a minefield as Anna, Kate, and husband Deeley stumble over events and recollections from a past that is shrouded in mystery, sexual tension, and danger. What could have been pleasantly nostalgic becomes an exploration of the thrill, the mystery and the destructive force of desire.

Open to wide interpretation, it has received acclaimed productions in London, New York and elsewhere since its lauded premiere at the Aldwych Theatre on June 1, 1971, under the direction of Peter Hall. More locally, in 1985 Pinter himself played Deeley in a touring production that played the Henry Fonda Theater in Los Angeles. The following quotes will possibly give a sense of the malleability and elusiveness of the play:

The desire for verification is understandable but cannot always be satisfied. There are no hard distinctions between what is real and what is unreal, nor between what is true and what is false. - Harold Pinter

[Old Times] is about two things. One is the capriciousness of memory, making now its merciful deletions and now its consoling additions, like an artist constantly rearranging the landscape before him. The other is jealousy in its most insidious form, not of a tangible rival but of the beloved's intangible past...The work is extraordinarily tense and extraordinarily compact. It is also extraordinarily funny. - Francis King, Sunday Telegraph, 1985.

Old Times is playwriting of the highest order, and one of the masterpieces that won Pinter the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2005. This is the first major production of Old Times in the Bay Area for many years, and the first to celebrate Pinter's work since his death in December last year. The production will also feature the work of rising Bay Area stars Susannah Martin (director), Julia McNeal and Zehra Berkman, all newcomers to TheatreFIRST.

TheatreFIRST expects to announce soon the appointment of a new Artistic Director, who will take the helm prior to the 2009-10 season. Meanwhile, the search goes on for a permanent home for the company in downtown Oakland.

Featuring: L. Peter Callender*, Julia McNeal* and Zehra Berkman.
(*Members, Actors' Equity Association)

Dates and location:
Gaia Arts Center
2120 Allston Way (at Shattuck), Berkeley
Preview: Thursday, April 2nd - 8pm
(Note: no performance, Friday, April 3rd.)
Opening: Saturday, April 4th - 8pm -
Run: Wednesday - Saturday 8pm, through April 18th.
Location is wheelchair accessible.

Ticket prices: Wednesday, Thursday $23; Friday, Saturday $28; Preview $10
Under 25's: Always half price.
Seniors, students, TBA members: $3 discount
Pay what you can: Wednesday, April 8th.

Box Office: 1-800-838-3006 or BrownPaperTickets.com
Information: www.theatrefirst.com or 510 436 5085