Trap Door Host Post-Show Discusssion With CHASTE Director, Playwright & Cast, 5/22

Trap Door Theatre (1655 W. Cortland Ave.) will be hosting a post show discussion with Playwright Ken Prestininzi, Director Kate Hendrickson and the cast of CHASTE on Saturday May 22nd, moderated by the Chicago Tribune's Kerry Reid. The cast include Antonio Brunetti, John Kahara, Sara Tolan Mee, and Tiffany Joy Ross. 

CHASTE is the third in a series of Prestininzi plays (all premiered at Trap Door under Hendrickson's direction) taking inspiration from the lives of German-speaking thinkers and artists: Franz Kafka in AmeriKafka, Rainer Maria Rilke & Paula Modersohn-Becker in Beholder, and now Friedrich Nietzsche in Chaste.

In 1882 Paul Ree introduced his friend Nietzsche to a young Russian woman named Lou Salome (a novelist, essayist, and thinker who would later become a muse and colleague to both Rilke and Freud). The three formed a plan to live together as a chaste trio dedicated to a life of the mind. Calling up and distorting this history, CHASTE wildly imagines what would have happened if they had realized their dream. In this chaste ménage a trios, Nietzsche bets the triumph of his will against the incomparable desires of a virginal girl. Despite their promises to bring out the most brilliant in each other, a primal battle for love and domination begins. Their unchecked ambition and reckless intimacy surprises all three. Pygmalion never had it so bad, nor Red Riding Hood so good, as they do in this perverse comedy of their own devising.

The Saturday, May 22nd show begins at 8 p.m. and the discussion with the playwright, director, and cast will follow.

CHASTE Runs Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays at 8 p.m. until June 19, 2010. Admission is $20 with a 2-for-1 special on Thursdays. For more information and reservations, call 773-384-0494 or visit the website at www.trapdoortheatre.com.