ARK Theatre Company
Encyclopedia
The ARK Theatre Company is an actor-driven repertory theatre ensemble working in Los Angeles
, California
.
works. The company was founded in 2000 by artistic director Paul Wagar, a former member of the Royal Shakespeare Company
. The Honorary Advisory Board of Directors consists of: Marshall Borden, Kitty Felde, Doug Jocelyn, Patricia Johnson, Lee Meriwether
, Karen Morrow, Lisa Rosen, Michael Rosen, Jennifer Rowland, Martin Sheen
, Mindy Steinman, and Gore Vidal
. Ark Theatre Company was cited by LA Weekly
as being among the "Los Angeles actor-driven ensembles with staying power," adding that the company "performs classics with a rock & roll sloppiness; equal parts aggravating and scintillating, always worth watching."
by Christopher Marlowe
to Charles Ludlam
's The Mystery of Irma Vep
. The Ugly Man by Brad Frazier, The Maids
by Jean Genet
, and F*cking Hollywood, adapted from Arthur Schnitzler
's La Ronde
by Paul Wagar, are all testament to the company's intrinsic eclecticism. Ark Theatre's controversial 2003 production of Anthony Burgess
' A Clockwork Orange
, directed by Brad Mays
, was nominated for three LA Weekly Theatre Awards, for Best Direction, Best Revival Production (of a 20th-century work), and Best Actress. Vanessa Claire Smith
won Best Actress for her gender-bending portrayal of Alex
, the story's music-loving teenaged sociopath. Richard Tatum was likewise nominated for an LA Weekly Theatre Award for his performance in Ibsen's The Doll's House. Other representative productions include director Richard Tatum
's staging of The Country Wife
by William Wycherley
for which Tatum received an LA Weekly Theatre Award nomination for Best Adaptation; Richard Tatum's staging of On the Verge by Eric Overmeyer; Steven Shields' production of William Shakespeare
's The Tempest
; Return to the Forbidden Planet
, directed by Vanessa Claire Smith; Les Miller's staging of Ibsen's Hedda Gabler
; Lloyd's Prayer by Kevin Kling and Christopher Durang
's Sister Mary Ignatius Explains It All For You
, both directed by Susan Lee Johnson; and Caryl Churchill
's sexual fantasmagoria Cloud 9
, and a reconceptualization of William Shakespeare
's The Merchant of Venice
, both directed by Paul Wagar.
Los Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...
, California
California
California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...
.
General
Ark Theatre Company is an ensemble of theatre professionals specializing in classical theatre, with an eye to contemporary plays that reflect the depth and interplay of language in classicalClassics
Classics is the branch of the Humanities comprising the languages, literature, philosophy, history, art, archaeology and other culture of the ancient Mediterranean world ; especially Ancient Greece and Ancient Rome during Classical Antiquity Classics (sometimes encompassing Classical Studies or...
works. The company was founded in 2000 by artistic director Paul Wagar, a former member of the Royal Shakespeare Company
Royal Shakespeare Company
The Royal Shakespeare Company is a major British theatre company, based in Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire, England. The company employs 700 staff and produces around 20 productions a year from its home in Stratford-upon-Avon and plays regularly in London, Newcastle-upon-Tyne and on tour across...
. The Honorary Advisory Board of Directors consists of: Marshall Borden, Kitty Felde, Doug Jocelyn, Patricia Johnson, Lee Meriwether
Lee Meriwether
Lee Ann Meriwether is an American actress, former model, and the winner of the 1955 Miss America pageant. She is perhaps best known for her role as Betty Jones, the crime-solving partner in the long-running 1970s crime drama, Barnaby Jones. The role earned her two Golden Globe Award nominations in...
, Karen Morrow, Lisa Rosen, Michael Rosen, Jennifer Rowland, Martin Sheen
Martin Sheen
Ramón Gerardo Antonio Estévez , better known by his stage name Martin Sheen, is an American film actor best known for his performances in the films Badlands and Apocalypse Now , and in the television series The West Wing from 1999 to 2006.He is considered one of the best actors never to be...
, Mindy Steinman, and Gore Vidal
Gore Vidal
Gore Vidal is an American author, playwright, essayist, screenwriter, and political activist. His third novel, The City and the Pillar , outraged mainstream critics as one of the first major American novels to feature unambiguous homosexuality...
. Ark Theatre Company was cited by LA Weekly
LA Weekly
LA Weekly is a free weekly tabloid-sized "alternative weekly" in Los Angeles, California. It was founded in 1978 by Editor/Publisher Jay Levin and a board of directors that included actor-producer Michael Douglas...
as being among the "Los Angeles actor-driven ensembles with staying power," adding that the company "performs classics with a rock & roll sloppiness; equal parts aggravating and scintillating, always worth watching."
Production history
Ark Theatre Company has, since its inception, produced a wide variety of material, from Edward IIEdward II (play)
Edward II is a Renaissance or Early Modern period play written by Christopher Marlowe. It is one of the earliest English history plays. The full title of the first publication is The Troublesome Reign and Lamentable Death of Edward the Second, King of England, with the Tragical Fall of Proud...
by Christopher Marlowe
Christopher Marlowe
Christopher Marlowe was an English dramatist, poet and translator of the Elizabethan era. As the foremost Elizabethan tragedian, next to William Shakespeare, he is known for his blank verse, his overreaching protagonists, and his mysterious death.A warrant was issued for Marlowe's arrest on 18 May...
to Charles Ludlam
Charles Ludlam
Charles Braun Ludlam was an American actor, director, and playwright.-Early life:Ludlam was born in Floral Park, New York, the son of Marjorie and Joseph William Ludlam. He was raised in Greenlawn, New York, on Long Island, and attended Harborfields High School. The fact that he was gay was not a...
's The Mystery of Irma Vep
The Mystery of Irma Vep
The Mystery of Irma Vep is a play in two acts by Charles Ludlam. A penny dreadful, Irma Vep is a satire of several theatrical and film genres, including Victorian melodrama, farce and the Alfred Hitchcock film Rebecca .-Background:...
. The Ugly Man by Brad Frazier, The Maids
The Maids
The Maids is a play by the French dramatist Jean Genet. It was first performed at the Théâtre de l'Athénée in Paris in a production that opened on 17 April 1947, which Louis Jouvet directed...
by Jean Genet
Jean Genet
Jean Genet was a prominent and controversial French novelist, playwright, poet, essayist, and political activist. Early in his life he was a vagabond and petty criminal, but later took to writing...
, and F*cking Hollywood, adapted from Arthur Schnitzler
Arthur Schnitzler
Dr. Arthur Schnitzler was an Austrian author and dramatist.- Biography :Arthur Schnitzler, son of a prominent Hungarian-Jewish laryngologist Johann Schnitzler and Luise Markbreiter , was born in Praterstraße 16, Leopoldstadt, Vienna, in the Austro-Hungarian...
's La Ronde
La Ronde (play)
La Ronde is a 1900 play by Arthur Schnitzler. It scrutinizes the sexual morals and class ideology of its day through a series of encounters between pairs of characters . By choosing characters across all levels of society, the play offers social commentary on how sexual contact transgresses...
by Paul Wagar, are all testament to the company's intrinsic eclecticism. Ark Theatre's controversial 2003 production of Anthony Burgess
Anthony Burgess
John Burgess Wilson – who published under the pen name Anthony Burgess – was an English author, poet, playwright, composer, linguist, translator and critic. The dystopian satire A Clockwork Orange is Burgess's most famous novel, though he dismissed it as one of his lesser works...
' A Clockwork Orange
A Clockwork Orange
A Clockwork Orange is a 1962 dystopian novella by Anthony Burgess. The novel contains an experiment in language: the characters often use an argot called "Nadsat", derived from Russian....
, directed by Brad Mays
Brad Mays
Brad Mays is an independent filmmaker and stage director, living and working in Los Angeles, California.-Background and education:...
, was nominated for three LA Weekly Theatre Awards, for Best Direction, Best Revival Production (of a 20th-century work), and Best Actress. Vanessa Claire Smith
Vanessa Claire Smith
Vanessa Claire Smith is an award-winning actress living and working in Los Angeles, California.-Background and education:Born in New Orleans, Louisiana, Vanessa Claire Smith attended Webster Conservatory for the Performing Arts in St. Louis, Missouri...
won Best Actress for her gender-bending portrayal of Alex
Alex (A Clockwork Orange)
Alex is a fictional character in Anthony Burgess' novel A Clockwork Orange and the film adaptation, in which he is played by Malcolm McDowell. In this film adaption, Alex's surname is DeLarge, in relation to Alex's reference to himself as "Alexander the Large" in the novel. This, in itself, is an...
, the story's music-loving teenaged sociopath. Richard Tatum was likewise nominated for an LA Weekly Theatre Award for his performance in Ibsen's The Doll's House. Other representative productions include director Richard Tatum
Richard Tatum
Richard Tatum is an American stage director, actor and voice actor who is known for voicing Agent 9 in the Spyro the Dragon games...
's staging of The Country Wife
The Country Wife
The Country Wife is a Restoration comedy written in 1675 by William Wycherley. A product of the tolerant early Restoration period, the play reflects an aristocratic and anti-Puritan ideology, and was controversial for its sexual explicitness even in its own time. The title itself contains a lewd pun...
by William Wycherley
William Wycherley
William Wycherley was an English dramatist of the Restoration period, best known for the plays The Country Wife and The Plain Dealer.-Biography:...
for which Tatum received an LA Weekly Theatre Award nomination for Best Adaptation; Richard Tatum's staging of On the Verge by Eric Overmeyer; Steven Shields' production of William Shakespeare
William Shakespeare
William Shakespeare was an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon"...
's The Tempest
The Tempest
The Tempest is a play by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written in 1610–11, and thought by many critics to be the last play that Shakespeare wrote alone. It is set on a remote island, where Prospero, the exiled Duke of Milan, plots to restore his daughter Miranda to her rightful place,...
; Return to the Forbidden Planet
Return to the Forbidden Planet
Return to the Forbidden Planet is a Jukebox musical by playwright Bob Carlton based on Shakespeare's The Tempest and the 1950s science fiction film Forbidden Planet ....
, directed by Vanessa Claire Smith; Les Miller's staging of Ibsen's Hedda Gabler
Hedda Gabler
Hedda Gabler is a play first published in 1890 by Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen. The play premiered in 1891 in Germany to negative reviews, but has subsequently gained recognition as a classic of realism, nineteenth century theatre, and world drama...
; Lloyd's Prayer by Kevin Kling and Christopher Durang
Christopher Durang
Christopher Ferdinand Durang is an American playwright known for works of outrageous and often absurd comedy. His work was especially popular in the 1980s.- Life :...
's Sister Mary Ignatius Explains It All For You
Sister Mary Ignatius Explains It All for You
Sister Mary Ignatius Explains It All For You is a play by Christopher Durang first performed on December 14, 1979, at the Ensemble Studio Theatre in New York City. It was performed on a bill with one-act plays that included works by David Mamet, Marsha Norman, and Tennessee Williams...
, both directed by Susan Lee Johnson; and Caryl Churchill
Caryl Churchill
Caryl Churchill is an English dramatist known for her use of non-naturalistic techniques and feminist themes, the abuses of power, and sexual politics. She is acknowledged as a major playwright in the English language and a leading female writer...
's sexual fantasmagoria Cloud 9
Cloud Nine (play)
Cloud Nine is a two-act play written by British playwright Caryl Churchill after workshops with the Joint Stock Theatre Company in late 1978 and first performed at Dartington College of Arts, Devon, on 14 February 1979....
, and a reconceptualization of William Shakespeare
William Shakespeare
William Shakespeare was an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon"...
's The Merchant of Venice
The Merchant of Venice
The Merchant of Venice is a tragic comedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written between 1596 and 1598. Though classified as a comedy in the First Folio and sharing certain aspects with Shakespeare's other romantic comedies, the play is perhaps most remembered for its dramatic...
, both directed by Paul Wagar.