Garage Theatre Group's BALD SOPRANO to Play at FDU's Becton Theatre, 4/21 - 5/8

By: Apr. 21, 2011
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A simple dinner party devolves into hilarious chaos and linguistic acrobatics in Eugene Ionesco's comic masterpiece The Bald Soprano. The cutting-edge Garage Theatre Group concludes its 17th season with a new translation of Ionesco's absurdist triumph. The Bald Soprano will play April 21 through May 8 at the Becton Theatre on the Campus of Fairleigh Dickinson University, 960 River Road in Teaneck.

In the hysterically funny Bald Soprano, Mr. and Mrs. Smith invite Mr. and Mrs. Martin over for a cheerful dinner. Polite dinner conversation turns to confusion, and an escalating battle on nonsense ensues. Simultaneously comic and profound, The Bald Soprano is a play that breaks all the rules, a perfect antidote for the world as it is today.

This new translation of Romanian-born Ionesco's comic masterpiece is by Garage Theatre Group's Artistic Director Michael Bias, who is also directing the production. "It's hard to imagine a better play to end our 17th season," says Bias, who has also written and directed Summer of Love, Billie (with Gail Lou) and More Than a Soap Opera (with Ray Davies).

"In many ways, the past 17 years have been a walk through the history of the absurd," says Bias. "We've produced plays by Beckett, Genet, Durang and Lee Blessing among many other experimental playwrights. Garage's challenge now is to create an Ionesco production that catches up with his revolutionary text, and captures his delightful sense of humor - what a welcome challenge that is!"

While trying to learn English, Ionesco noticed the absurdity of the dialogues in the textbook he was studying-characters would inform one another of facts they already knew perfectly well. Ionesco took these strange seeds of dialogue, and worked them into an entire play-or anti-play-without traditional story or conflict, but with an unerring sense of the absurd that created a comic masterpiece.

The Bald Soprano is the play that launched the legendary career of Eugene Ionesco, often dubbed "Father of the Theater of the Absurd." In plays including The Lesson, Rhinoceros, and Exit the King, he honed his own anarchic form of comedy, rejecting the logical plot and character development of traditional drama-and in doing so laid the foundation for playwrights including Harold Pinter and Tom Stoppard.

The cast of The Bald Soprano features the return of a quartet of Garage Theatre veterans returning to the stage. Melanie Bell (Mrs. Smith) appeared most recently in Garage's production of The Wind In the Willows, as did Andrew Danish (Mr. Martin). Ryan Scott (The Fire Captain) appeared earlier this year as Billy Bishop in Billy Bishop Goes to War and before that as Chico and Harpo Marx in The False Servant. Amanda Yachechack (Mary, the Maid) grew up at the Garage, playing the parts of Maria In West Side Story, Chava in Fiddler on the Roof and many others.

Making their Garage debuts in The Bald Soprano are Megan McDermott (Mrs. Martin) and Brendan Walsh (Mr. Smith). McDermott's credits include Three Sisters, The Importance of Being Earnest, and Spring Awakening. Walsh has appeared in The Au Pair Man, Wait Until Dark and Vincent, as well as being seen regularly on TV's One Life to Live.

As with every Main Stage production at The Garage, The Bald Soprano will feature post-performance "talk backs" among the cast and audience. "These talkbacks should be fascinating-for the audience and for us," says Bias. "The Bald Soprano is such a strange, complex piece, we're really looking forward to hearing the audience reaction."

As part of its continuing commitment to making theatre available to all, Garage is offering several special opportunities to see The Bald Soprano:

• The Sunday, April 23 performance is "Pay What You Can Day" for any tickets available at the door.

• Thursday nights are Community Nights. Tickets are half price to residents of Teaneck, Bergenfield, Englewood, Hackensack and Bogota, and to members of the Farleigh Dickenson faculty and staff.

• Student Rush is available for all performances. At curtain time, any unsold tickets will be made available for $15 to anyone with a valid student ID.

A special Wednesday matinee at 2:00pm April 27th has been added for this production. All tickets for this performance are only $25.00

• The Bald Soprano will be performed Thursdays through Saturdays at 8 pm and Sundays at 3 pm. Tickets are $37 ($32 for students and seniors). Tickets are available by phone at (201) 569-7710 and online at www.garagetheatre.org

 



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