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Arts Sep 20, 2018
The cast and crew of “Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead,” in rehearsals. - Courtesy photo / A Noise Within
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The cast and crew of “Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead,” in rehearsals. – Courtesy photo / A Noise Within
Arriving at their death is promised to be an “absolute hoot”
A Noise Within (ANW), the acclaimed classical repertory theatre, presents Tom Stoppard’s “Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead,” the Tony Award-winning play that first brought Stoppard to the attention of an international audience – a position he has held in the half century since its premiere in 1967. ANW Producing Artistic Director Geoff Elliott directs. “Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead” performs from Oct. 7 to Nov. 18.
Hamlet is turned topsy-turvy in this brilliant comedy that thrusts Shakespeare’s two minor characters to the frontlines with no rules except one: they are destined to die. Trapped in a universe where the flip of a coin always comes up heads and pirates can pop-up anytime, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern engage in a battle of wits to try to escape their fate and make sense of a senseless world.
This is not the first time that Stoppard’s sharp wit and comedic genius has come to A Noise Within’s stage. Arcadia received an LA Times Critic’s Choice as well as widespread critical and audience acclaim in ANW’s 25th anniversary season. Geoff Elliott is thrilled to be directing another one of Stoppard’s works. Elliott says, “I fell in love with Stoppard the first time I read Arcadia. I could not put it down. It was the same with ‘Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead.’”
Elliott continues, “The play is a metaphor for our lives, from the time we’re born until we die. The experience Rosencrantz and Guildenstern go through is really what we all go through. The play is dealing with life—which is a heavy description, but keep in mind, it’s hilarious. Although it ends in their deaths, as we know from the title, getting there is an absolute hoot. At the end, it’s not so much sad as it is mysterious: a true and incredibly crafted work of genius.”
A Noise Within is not the only institution to recognize Stoppard’s intellectual ingenuity this year. The United States Academic Decathlon has chosen “Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead” as the selected literature for their 2018-19 curriculum with the theme “The 1960s: A Transformational Decade.” The nationwide program is focusing 40 percent of its entire literature curriculum on this play.
Clive Barnes, reviewing the play in 1967 in The New York Times, said, “Rosencrantz and Guildenstern is a very funny play … a most remarkable and thrilling play. In one bound, Mr. Stoppard is asking to be considered among the finest English speaking writers of our stage, for this is a work of fascinating distinction. It has the dust of thought about it and the particles glitter exactingly in the theatrical air.”
Elliott believes the thoughts provoked by Stoppard have an almost magical effect on the audience. “Stoppard is such a genius that he is able to help us feel as though we are smarter than we probably are. By the end of watching a production of his, you really feel as though you understand these concepts and why they are important to our lives.”
Tickets for Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, starting at $25, are available online at anoisewithin.org and by phone by calling (626) 356-3121.
