BOZEMAN ACTORS THEATRE
The
work of Eugene O’Neill, arguably the greatest American playwright of all time,
is lighting up the stage in Bozeman. But the performance history of “A Moon for
the Misbegotten,” O’Neill’s last play, was anything but straightforward on its
way here.
O’Neill completed the play in
1943, seven years after he won the Nobel Prize in Literature and before illness
forced him to stop writing. The original production in 1947, staged in
Columbus, Ohio, was poorly done and a commercial flop, and O’Neill never saw it
produced on Broadway before his death in 1953.
Attempts
in New York during the next 20 years never gained traction, and it wasn’t until
a revival on Broadway in 1973, starring Colleen Dewhurst and Jason Robards,
that the play finally achieved its reputation as a masterpiece of the American
theater. The New York Times proclaimed it to be “one of the great plays of the
20th century.”
Now
in its 10th season, Bozeman Actors Theatre thinks the time is right—and “Moon”
the ideal play—to present O’Neill to its audience for the first time, according
to director Mark Kuntz.
“Eugene
O’Neill is as big as it gets in the American theater,” Kuntz said. “We really
wanted to accept the challenge of staging one of his monumental plays and it’s
a work with so many rewards for the artists and the audience, too. In rehearsal
we’ve really explored the great depths of this play and figured out all this
can be.”
Kuntz
assembled what he calls “the ideal cast” of BAT veterans Kari Doll, Daniel
Erickson, Colton Swibold and Colter Langan, along with newcomer Mike Hesford
from Boulder, Montana. One pleasant surprise for the actors has been the play’s
humor, which complements its serious and tragic sides.
“This
Irish-American father and daughter are a force to be reckoned with,” Kuntz said.
“Audiences are going to love those lighthearted moments.”
“A
Moon for the Misbegotten” is the third play in Bozeman Actors Theatre’s 2018-2019
season, dedicated to its late cofounder Dee Dee Van Zyl, who passed away last
year. Shows in the Crawford Theater at the Emerson Center for the Arts and
Culture will run March 1 and 2 beginning promptly at 7 p.m. All ages are
welcome, but parental guidance is suggested due to some adult situations.
Tickets
can be bought at the door, but visit bozemanactorstheatre.org for more
information and to purchase tickets in advance.