What the Butler Saw
by Joe Orton
May 10 - 27, 2007
Starring: *Randal Berger, *Matt Guidry, Erik Hoover,
*Joel Liestman, *Carolyn Pool and Sara Richardson
Directed by: *David Allen Baker, Jr.
What the Butler Saw is one of the most ludicrous
comedies of all time. Joe Orton doesn’t let anyone
off the hook in this scathing send-up of that ubiquitous British
export, the “bedroom farce.”
Slamming doors, flying undergarments, mistaken identity … Welcome
to Dr. Prentice's lunatic asylum, where everyone is mad, and
none more so than the doctors.
Libidos run rampant in this breakneck farce about licensed
insanity. The plot of What the Butler Saw contains
enough twists and turns, mishaps and changes of fortune, coincidences
and lunatic logic to furnish three or four conventional comedies.
Be prepared for an irreverent poke at stuffy institutions
and our perceptions of madness. Hailed as a classic every bit
as good as Oscar Wilde's The Importance of Being Earnest.
*member, Actors' Equity
Someone Who'll Watch Over
Me
by Frank McGuinness
March 8 - 25, 2007
Starring: *Allen Baker, *Randal Berger & *Zach Curtis
Directed by: *Matt Guidry
Based on the real life experiences of Irish journalist Brian
Keenan, Someone Who’ll Watch Over Me is a startlingly
beautiful play that tells the story of three men (an Irish
journalist, a British academic and an American doctor) who
have been taken hostage by militants in the middle east.
Written in 1992, the play is still painfully relevant today
as it explores the issues of violence and unrest in the world
and brings to light the effects on the human condition.
With wit and cunning and boundless imagination the three men
are forced to overcome their own cultural differences and prejudices
and discover a way to hold each other up in the face of an
uncertain fate. This poignant, frightening story is truly a
play for our time.
*member, Actors' Equity
Waiting
for Godot
by Samuel Beckett
November 30 - December 17, 2006
This presentation of "Godot" marked
the first show of the first full production season for the
Burning House Group. Audiences and critics alike applauded
this unique staging...
"...there's a real sense of intent here. When Guidry delivers Vladimir's line, "No,
don't protest, we are bored to death, there's no denying it," he turns to
the audience with a leer to deliver the devastating addendum: Good.
One can't decide whether to laugh or shiver."
From the press release:
Beckett’s absurd masterpiece on the modern human condition
is tackled, kicked, picked up and then dusted off in BHG’s
new staging. At the intersection of hope and hopelessness,
Estragon and Vladimir wait for the elusive “Godot”.
One of the most poignant and humorous allegories of our time, Waiting
For Godot finds inspiration in the vaudevillian traditions
of Laurel and Hardy, Abbott and Costello and the Marx Bros.
Vladimir and Estragon pass their time amusing themselves
with gallows humor, religious allusions and clown tricks.
Don’t miss this chance to stand on the side of the road,
waiting, with the two of the most famous tramps since Charlie
Chaplin.
Someone
Who'll Watch Over Me
March/April, 2006, Pioneer Place on
Fifth, St. Cloud MN
Inspired by the real-life experiences
of former hostages Brian Keenan and John McCarthy, "Someone Who'll Watch Over Me" gives
a very moving account of three men – an Irish journalist,
an American doctor, and a British academic, taken hostage in
Beirut and locked together in a cell in the Middle East. The
prisoners struggle to maintain their sanity, humanity, and
hope in a setting devoid of all three. Inherent to this story
of captivity are the strength of the human spirit to survive
and the capacity of imagination to set us free. They learn
that humor is their surest weapon against their captors and
the safest armor to protect them. At the end of the play, they
are capable of standing together and alone.
"Someone Who'll Watch Over Me" received a Tony Nomination
when it opened on Broadway in 1992. Thirteen years later, its
subject matter is still painfully relevant, as we recall the
plight of many prisoners in our own recent overseas involvements.
"Someone Who'll Watch Over Me" was performed at
Pioneer Place on Fifth in St. Cloud, MN. Please see their website for
more information: Pioneer
Place on Fifth
We thank those hearty
souls who trekked to St. Cloud to see this timely production
of suffering and hope.
No One Will Be Immune
May, 2005, Bryant-Lake Bowl
After 8 critically acclaimed productions, the company came
to the stage of Bryant-Lake Bowl for the first time with a
cabaret evening of rarely seen short plays by David Mamet.
At once perplexing and mesmerizing, these plays took us on
a journey with two men, in various forms, conversing about
indescribable things: alien encounters, the Ant-Christ, Tesla,
and death.
Ooops! You're President
2002
Minnesota Fringe Festival
What
would you do if you suddenly became President? Mess it up royally,
if you’re Bosco Berber. Slapstick and politics collide
before your very eyes! This production ran as part of the 2002
Minnesota Fringe Festival.
Say What You Mean
August,
2001
Say What
You Mean ran at the Loring Playhouse in Minneapolis, Minnesota,
August 3-11, 2001. In this show, BHG explored the dank recesses
of the political mind and what issues forth. BHG brought to
the stage a boisterous new work exploring political language
and posturing throughout American history.
WhirRLigig: Life and PERspecTIve 101
January, 2000
WhirRLigig:
Life and PERspecTIve 101 first played at the Loring Playhouse
in Minneapolis, Minnesota, January 9-31, 2000. This movement
theatre work used live music (created and performed by Jeff
Toffler), voice, video and raw physical choreography to explore
the nature of physics, parallel dimensions and time itself.
Drawing inspiration from the mind of Stephen Hawking, chaos
theory and the influence of religion and language on basic
thought, WhirRLigig created audio/visual images that drew the
viewer into a perceptual world of physics.
The Bremen Town Musicians
December,
1997
The Bremen Town Musicians ran at The Pillsbury House Theater
in December 1997, and was the company's foray into an alternative
holiday production.
Knock Knock
August-September,
1997
Knock Knock, BHG's most successful production, was performed
to sold out crowds at the Pillsbury House Theater during August
and September of 1997.
Gulf War
September, 1996
This Joyce Carol
Oates one-act was the first BHG production to run at the Pillsbury
House Theater, in September of 1996. It was a disturbing look
into a young married couples' suburban lifestyle. A lingering
quote states... "A deep bond is
no less real because it has no substance".
Fireball Set
1995
This production contained BHG's first original piece,
and was a headlong dive into the movement theatre style. Performed
at the Margolis-Brown Movement Theatre Center in 1995, it was
an evening of three widely varied pieces; an unsettling version
of Little Red Riding Hood, an original piece called "Uncertain
Barriers", and Heiner Muller's Hamletmachine.
Or, What You Will: Twelfth Night
1994
This was BHG's first production, and was performed in 1994
at Spacespace, a warehouse in downtown Minneapolis. While the
audience sat on brocade couches and recliners, BHG dueled with
a generator that would randomly turn on at various moments
during the show. Directed by Christopher Bayes, this production
established BHG as a company that was willing to take an audience
to extreme limits. |
