CAUCASIAN CHALK CIRCLE Closes in San Francisco, 3/14

THE CAUCASIAN CHALK CIRCLE, directed by Tony Award-winning director John Doyle, will play its final show on March 14 at The American Conservatory Theatre in San Francisco. 

Visionary director John Doyle (Sweeney Todd, Company on Broadway) returns to A.C.T. to stage a spectacular new interpretation of Brecht's masterpiece of hope, humanity, and justice. Featuring Doyle's signature theatricality and original music from acclaimed avant-garde composer Nathaniel Stookey (The Composer Is Dead, Junkestra), this must-see production finds an intrepid company of actors creating the play from the rubble of a war-torn society. Objects turn into set pieces, discarded articles of clothing become costumes, and shrapnel is transformed into musical instruments. In this brand-new translation, THE CAUCASIAN CHALK CIRCLE soars with humor, romance, unexpected plot twists, and high-stakes intensity.

The production features a new score by acclaimed San Francisco composer Nathaniel Stookey (The Composer Is Dead and upcoming Junkestra with the San Francisco Symphony). As with Stookey's earlier work, the score incorporates objects scavenged from the San Francisco Dump alongside more conventional instruments and voices. And as in Doyle's extraordinary rethinking of Sweeney Todd, the entire score is performed by the cast. THE CAUCASIAN CHALK CIRCLE plays February 18-March 14, 2010, at the American Conservatory Theater (415 Geary Street, San Francisco). Opening night is Wednesday, February 24, 2010, at 8 p.m. Tickets-starting at $10-are available by calling A.C.T. Ticket Services at 415.749.2228 or at www.act-sf.org.

The production stays true to Brecht's style, doing away with theatrical artifice and inviting the audience to become active participants in the telling of the story. Doyle sets his production in an abandoned, dilapidated theater in a war-torn environment. The nine performers, all playing multiple roles, transform the space, finding costumes, script pages, and objects to create the play. The visual look of the piece is inspired by a series of photos from wars of the last century, with the costumes evoking a wide variety of time periods and locales, from the Spanish Civil War to the Vietnam War to the war in Iraq. In this eclectic atmosphere, the nine performers will have a life and story unto themselves, along with the characters they play in service of the story. Doyle, who is no stranger to working in this style, quips: "It has often been said that my working style is ‘Brechtian'-never by me, I might add. I am interested in communicating the story simply and directly as Brecht has, and hopefully with something of his sense of ‘theater.' Brecht said to his audience, ‘Imagine,' and that's what we are asking our audience to do. It is this unlocking of the imagination that gets humans through dark times of violence and war. In this way, the production will not be about a remote place. It will be about what is fair, what is law, and what is true."

Artistic Director Carey Perloff is excited to share yet another Brecht masterpiece with the A.C.T. audience, especially as conceived by a master artist such as Doyle: "After having such an amazing experience with Sweeney Todd, John Doyle was eager to return to A.C.T., and I was thrilled about the opportunity to have this inventive and imaginative artist and great collaborator back in our midst. Brecht has long been a favorite of A.C.T. audiences, who came in record numbers to see both The Threepenny Opera and Happy End as reimagined by our core acting company. Doyle's passion for this wartime story of injustice and hope brings a contemporary immediacy to THE CAUCASIAN CHALK CIRCLE, and I think this will be a revelatory and moving production."

A.C.T. is located at 415 Geary Street San Francisco, CA 94102.

For more information visit www.act-sf.org.

Photo Credit: Walter McBride/Retna Ltd.