Heartbreak House

By George Bernard Shaw
Directed by Robert Estes
January 21 to February 19, 2011

Actor's Ensemble of Berkeley opens its 54th Season with George Bernard Shaw's Heartbreak House. A comedy of fancy, game playing, heartbreak, illusion, and finally, joyful destruction.

Heartbreak is set just before World War I, when the moneyed classes were oh so sure of themselves and their appetites - so sure that a World War might be an interesting diversion.

The house in question is that of Captain Shotover - retired ship captain, current inventor, and forever opinionated eccentric.  His daughters have married badly in his eyes-one to a dim-witted plodder, one to a sharp-witted layabout.  Enter into the house one Ellie Dunn, daughter of a failed businessman, who intends to marry the ruthless capitalist who ruined her father – for reparations, if for nothing else.  All - the husbands, the fathers, the wives, the daughters, the aging playboy, the burglar - come together in "this silly house, this strangely happy house, this agonizing house, this house without foundations."  Shaw said about the play, "It has more of the miracle, more of the mystic belief in it than any of my others."

Robert Estes made his directorial debut with Actors Ensemble of Berkeley with our well-received 2010 production of Sam Shepard's Curse of the Starving Class (quite a different kind of house!)  He also recently directed Other People's Money for Masquer's in Point Richmond, and is well known for his Grove talks before performances at Orinda's California Shakespeare Theatre.

Heartbreak House opens Friday, January 21 and runs Friday and Saturday evenings at 8pm through February 19th.  There will be a special Sunday matinee performance at 2 p.m. on February 13th, and a special Thursday performance at 8 p.m. on February17th.

Tickets are $15 for adults, $12 for students and seniors. There is a special rate of $10 for groups of 15 or more. Tickets are available through the Actors Ensemble of Berkeley website.  Reservations for purchase at the door may be made by calling the box office at 510-649-5999 (cash or check only at the door).

Notes: Box office/will call opens 1/2 hour before start of show.  Cash or check only at the door.  Two intermissions. Wheelchair accesssible.

---

Cast

Michele Delattre ......................... Hesione Hushabye
Taylor Diffenderfer ...................... Ellie Dunn
Amaka Izuchi ............................ Lady Utterwood
Keith Jefferds ........................... Boss  Mangan
Brian McManus ...........................Randall Utterword
Joseph O'Loughlin ...................... The Burglar
Lynn Sotos ............................... Nurse Guinness
Stanley Spenger ........................ Hector Hushabye
Matthew Surrence ...................... Mazzinni Dunn
Jeff Trescott ............................. Captain Shotover

Production

Director ........................................ Robert Estes
Assistant Director ...........................Vicki Siegel
Stage Manager ............................ Carrie Lynne Barnes
Stage Manager ............................. Kim Wilber
Producer ....................................... Jerome Solberg
Backdrop Painting ............................Gian Banchero
Costumes .................................... William Curry
Set design .................................... Jerome Solberg
Lighting design .............................. Alecks Rundell
Original Compositions......................Richard Herrera-Lopez
Photography ................................... Anna Kaminska
Sound Effects ................................. Steve Jemera
Painting Assistants ..........................Lynn Sotos, Stanley Spenger, Matthew Surrence, Jeff Trescott
Makeup Assistance .......................... Emily Petersen
Set Construction .............................. Bob Gudmundsson, Alecks Rundell, Jerome Solberg
Sound & Light Operation ....................Steve Martinot, Sylvia Mwihaki

---

 

---