The Gin game
July 2008
American actor and theater director, Stephan Turner, brings another raw-emotional, vibrant stage play from the theaters of New York and Chicago to the studio theater at the Kad Theater, Chiang Mai.
The Gate Theater, founded by Stephan Turner, will open the 2008 season with a rendition of "The Gin Game" by D. L. Coburn. The 2 Act, 2 character drama will be presented to audiences throughout the wet months beginning Friday, June 13th with additional performances scheduled each Friday and Saturday afterwards with the exception of the weekend of July 4th, when we will perform on Saturday and Sunday July 5th and 6th. The show closes on July 12th.
For 2008, the Gate Theater Group will be performing in the 7th floor Studio Theater, inside Kad Suan Kaew Shopping Mall a, change from the previous AUA venue. Doors open at 7:00 pm for each performance with curtain at 7:30.
Suggested donation 300 Bt.
"We were very successful with our first production, "The Dodo Bird" which had two performance runs, before and after the Christmas holiday season." Stephan said recently. "Now, we're ready to attempt a full season of theater much in the same practice as theater groups in the U.Sand England do. We plan to provide performances of 3 different dramas this year, with 10 –12 performances each, which should take us up to December and we would like to top it off with a Christmas piece that should be fun to watch."
"The Gin Game" is a two-act,four-scene play about a woman in her twilight years, Fonsia Dorsey, who enters a "home for the aged" and is for a while, saved from melancholy by the crusty charm of Weller Martin. The sardonic Weller cajoles Fonsia into playing a series of gin games on the home's sunlit porch. As they seemingly become close companions, much is revealed about their respective regret-filled lives -- to the steady shuffling and playing of cards. Their mutual need for solace is momentarily satisfied, until Weller's pent-up rage, and Fonsia's subtle needling, build to a terrible confrontation.
The author, D. L. Coburn, was born in Baltimore, Maryland,in 1938. He came to prominence in 1977 with The Gin Game, which was his first play. The Gin Game ran on Broadway for 516 performances and subsequently toured the nation with its original cast of Hume Cronyn and Jessica Tandy to sold-outhouses in Los Angeles, Chicago,Boston, Philadelphia and a half-dozen other cities before touring in England and Russia.It has since had productions in virtually every country of the western world,including France, Germany, Italy, Greece, Belgium, the Netherlands, Austria,Romania, Israel, Hungary, Brazil, Chile, Argentina and South Africa, as well as heralded productions in Australia, Japan and China. In 1978 the play garnered four Tony nominations and was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for drama. It was also made into a film starring Dick Van Dyke and Mary Tyler Moore.
Plays Mr. Coburn has written since The Gin Game include Bluewater Cottage (1979), Guy (1983), Noble Adjustment (1985), Return to Blue Fin (1991), Fear of Darkness (1995), Firebrand (1997) and The Cause (1998). Additionally, he has written television pilots for CBS and ABC and several screenplays, including Flights of Angels (1987), A Virgin Year (1991) and Legal Access (1994).
The Gate Theater, founded by Stephan Turner, will open the 2008 season with a rendition of "The Gin Game" by D. L. Coburn. The 2 Act, 2 character drama will be presented to audiences throughout the wet months beginning Friday, June 13th with additional performances scheduled each Friday and Saturday afterwards with the exception of the weekend of July 4th, when we will perform on Saturday and Sunday July 5th and 6th. The show closes on July 12th.
For 2008, the Gate Theater Group will be performing in the 7th floor Studio Theater, inside Kad Suan Kaew Shopping Mall a, change from the previous AUA venue. Doors open at 7:00 pm for each performance with curtain at 7:30.
Suggested donation 300 Bt.
"We were very successful with our first production, "The Dodo Bird" which had two performance runs, before and after the Christmas holiday season." Stephan said recently. "Now, we're ready to attempt a full season of theater much in the same practice as theater groups in the U.Sand England do. We plan to provide performances of 3 different dramas this year, with 10 –12 performances each, which should take us up to December and we would like to top it off with a Christmas piece that should be fun to watch."
"The Gin Game" is a two-act,four-scene play about a woman in her twilight years, Fonsia Dorsey, who enters a "home for the aged" and is for a while, saved from melancholy by the crusty charm of Weller Martin. The sardonic Weller cajoles Fonsia into playing a series of gin games on the home's sunlit porch. As they seemingly become close companions, much is revealed about their respective regret-filled lives -- to the steady shuffling and playing of cards. Their mutual need for solace is momentarily satisfied, until Weller's pent-up rage, and Fonsia's subtle needling, build to a terrible confrontation.
The author, D. L. Coburn, was born in Baltimore, Maryland,in 1938. He came to prominence in 1977 with The Gin Game, which was his first play. The Gin Game ran on Broadway for 516 performances and subsequently toured the nation with its original cast of Hume Cronyn and Jessica Tandy to sold-outhouses in Los Angeles, Chicago,Boston, Philadelphia and a half-dozen other cities before touring in England and Russia.It has since had productions in virtually every country of the western world,including France, Germany, Italy, Greece, Belgium, the Netherlands, Austria,Romania, Israel, Hungary, Brazil, Chile, Argentina and South Africa, as well as heralded productions in Australia, Japan and China. In 1978 the play garnered four Tony nominations and was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for drama. It was also made into a film starring Dick Van Dyke and Mary Tyler Moore.
Plays Mr. Coburn has written since The Gin Game include Bluewater Cottage (1979), Guy (1983), Noble Adjustment (1985), Return to Blue Fin (1991), Fear of Darkness (1995), Firebrand (1997) and The Cause (1998). Additionally, he has written television pilots for CBS and ABC and several screenplays, including Flights of Angels (1987), A Virgin Year (1991) and Legal Access (1994).