UPDATED: The Classic Stage Company has released complete casting for its upcoming off-Broadway revival of Bertolt Brecht’s Caucasian Chalk Circle. Joining the previously announced Christopher Lloyd as Judge Azdak, are Tony Award nominees Elizabeth A. Davis (Once) as Grusha and Mary Testa (Queen of the Mist) as the Governor’s Wife. Also joining the cast are Broadway veterans Tom Riis Farrell (Coram Boy) as The Corporal/Shuva/Fat Prince, Alex Hurt (Cat on a Hot Tin Roof) as Simon, and Jason Babinksy (Ghost the Musical) as Yusek, as well as Deb Radloff (Dance Dance Revolution) in the role of Farmer’s Wife/Aniko/Cook.
The production’s design team will feature sets by Tony Straiges, costumes by Anita Yavich, lighting by Justin Townsend, and sound by Matt Kraus. Ralph Manheim will now provide translation in place of James and Tania Stern, as was previously reported. Terri K. Kohler serves as stage manager.
Performances are scheduled to begin on May 3 with an official opening night set for May 30. The production’s limited engagement will run through June 9.
December 12, 2012 – Emmy and Drama Desk Award winner Christopher Lloyd may not be heading back to the future, but he’s definitely heading back to the stage.
The chameleon-like actor, whose many notable film and television roles have included Reverend Jim Ignatowski on Taxi, Emmett “Doc” Brown in Back to the Future, and Fester in The Addams Family, will return to his stage roots this spring as Judge Azdak in Classic Stage Company‘s production of Bertolt Brecht’s The Caucasian Chalk Circle. CSC Artistic Director Brian Kulick will direct the revival, which begins performances on May 2 and features a translation by James and Tania Stern, lyrics by poet W.H. Auden, and new music by Tony Award winner Duncan Sheik (Spring Awakening). Additional casting and creative team will be announced shortly.
Written in 1944, The Caucasian Chalk Circle had its first professional production at the Hedgerow Theatre in Philadelphia under the direction of translator Eric Bentley. It is considered one of Brecht’s most important plays, a list that also includes Mother Courage and Her Children, The Good Person of Szechwan, The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui, The Threepenny Opera, and Galileo, which Kulick helmed last season at CSC.
Lloyd last appeared on the New York stage as Dalton Trumbo in Trumbo: Red White and Blacklisted. His Broadway credits include Morning’s at Seven, Happy End, and Red, White and Maddox, and his off-Broadway credits include the title role of Peter Handke’s Kaspar, for which he received an Obie and Drama Desk Award, Pozzo in CSC’s production of Waiting for Godot, and Malvolio in the 2002 Shakespeare in the Park production of Twelfth Night.
Click here for more information and tickets to The Caucasian Chalk Circle.
