LA Theatre Works (LATW) is celebrating its 40th anniversary season this year and will open next week by paying homage to the great Welsh poet Dylan Thomas on the 100th anniversary of his birth. LATW will record his immortal “play for voices” Under Milk Wood, with a distinguished cast of Welsh and Welsh-American actors.
The gold standard for the play was cast in 1954 with the BBC production starring Richard Burton, who famously said of the play: “It is all about religion, sex and death”…..it is a comic masterpiece.”
Thomas’ intensely beautiful, poignant and sublimely funny linguistic tour-de-force about the salty little fishing village of Llareggub (read it backwards) remains as haunting as ever. Even for today’s audiences, Llareggub remains an enchanted spot where the wicked are forgiven and their indiscretions transformed into rich fuel for comedy.
The characters who populate the fictional village have become household names: the blind old seadog Captain Cat forever mourning his dead love Rosie Probert, the Rev Eli Jenkins greeting each morning in verse, Polly Garter with her list of lost paramours, Mr Pugh who dreams of poisoning Mrs Pugh, Mrs Ogmore-Pritchard and her two dead husbands, Dai Bread and his two live wives.
Sara Sugarman directs Matthew Rhys, Laura Evans, John Francis, Jason Hughes, Christopher Monger and Cerris Morgan-Moyer. Keeping a welcome link with the late, great Burton, both his daughter and grandson, Kate Burton and Morgan Ritchie also appear in the cast.
Each performance will be recorded live in front of an audience (without sets or costumes), and the final version will air on LATW’s syndicated radio theater series, broadcasting weekly on public radio stations nationwide (locally, in Southern California, on KPFK 90.7 FM) and available for streaming on demand at www.latw.org.
WHEN: Thursday, Sept. 18 at 8 p.m.
Friday, Sept. 19 at 8 p.m.
Saturday, Sept. 20 at 3 p.m. and 8 p.m.
Sunday, Sept. 21 at 4 p.m.
WHERE: James Bridges Theater UCLA School of Theater, Film and Television, 235 Charles E. Young Drive Los Angeles, CA 90095
TICKETS: $15-$60 www.latw.org or 310-827-0889
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