Beckett Shorts

By Samuel Beckett

The University of Redlands Theatre Arts Department presents An Evening of Beckett Shorts, five short plays by Pulitzer Prize winning novelist and playwright Samuel Beckett. Known as an existential vaudevillian, Beckett's plays study human frustration and patience with the pursuit of some higher purpose, finding humor in our most constrained circumstances.

Best known for his longer plays--Waiting for Godot, Endgame, Krapps Last Tape and Happy Days--Beckett also wrote over 20 short plays. Some of these short plays are only 35 seconds in length, yet all of them pack a fascinating theatrical wallop. If you can imagine two women and a man buried in urns up to their necks judging past infidelities, or a pair of suspended lips desperately speaking to avoid disappearance altogether, you begin to glimpse Beckett's unique theatrical world.

These works render a kind of "articulate speechlessness" about the human condition and its uncertain place in existence. These plays are less about something and are purely something in and of their selves. The famous Irish playwright, Brendan Behan, said, "I don't know what Beckett's plays are about, but I know I like them. I don't know what a swim in the ocean is about, but I know I like the rush of water over me."

Nov. 19-22

Director Chris Beach
Scenic Designer Snezana Petrovic
Costume Designer Nephelie Andonyadis
Lighting Designer Trevor Norton
Sound Designer Heather Ingram
Guest Designer Renee Azenaro
Technical Designer Daniel Cork
Stage Manager Tessa Randall
Assistant Stage Manager Rebecca Spira

 

Breath:

No Actors 

Come and Go:
Flo Kathleen McCarthy
Vi Valerie Williams
Ru Michaela Petrovich

 

Play:
W1 Allison Swift
W2 Casey Greenberg
M Jacob Froman

 

Footfalls:
V Valerie Williams
M Kelly Odor

 

Not I:
Mouth Michaela Petrovich
Auditor Daniel Strasberger