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Life is a Dream

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King Basilio of Poland has his son, Segismundo, imprisoned at birth because of a prophesy that says his son will rule disastrously if put on the throne. Tormented by guilt, the king decides to give his son a trial run at succession. Once freed, Segismundo’s pent up anger leads to irrational violence. As a result, the king banishes him once again. The poeple, however, having learned of the wronged prince, lead a successful revolt, and the prince is given a second chance. Segismundo matures in time, and rather than seek revenge, spares his father an untimely death. 

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Credits

Creative team

By

Pedro Calderón de la Barca

Translated by

Edwin Honig

Directed by

Anne Bogart

Directed by

Anne Bogart

A.R.T.: bobrauschenbergamerica, La Dispute, Life is a Dream, Once in a Lifetime, Hot 'n' Throbbing. Artistic director of SITI Company, which she founded with Japanese director Tadashi Suzuki in 1992. She is a recipient of two Obie Awards, a Bessie Award, a Guggenheim as well as a Rockefeller fellowship, and is a professor at Columbia University, where she runs the graduate directing program. Recent works with SITI include Hotel Cassiopeia, Intimations for Saxophone, Death and the PloughmanA Midsummer Night's Dream, La Dispute, Score, bobrauschenbergamerica, Room, War of the Worlds, Cabin Pressure, War of the Worlds (The Radio Play), Alice's Adventures, Culture of Desire, Bob, Going, Going, Gone, Small Lives/Big Dreams, The Medium, Noel Coward's Hay Fever and Private Lives, August Strindberg's Miss Julie, and Charles L. Mee's Orestes. She is the author of a book of essays entitled A Director Prepares: Seven Essays on Art and Theater and the co-author with Tina Landau of The Viewpoints Book: A Practical Guide to Viewpoints and Composition. Soon to be released by Routledge Press: a new book of essays entitled And Then You Act: Making Art in an Unpredictable World.

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Set design by

Loy Arcenas

Costume design by

Catherine Zuber

Costume design by

Catherine Zuber

Catherine Zuber has created the costumes for Richard II, The Doctor's Dilemma, and over forty other A.R.T. productions including Three Farces and a Funeral, Antigone, Loot, The Idiots Karamazov, Ivanov, Phaedra, The Merchant of Venice, Valparaiso, The Imaginary Invalid, The Taming of the Shrew, Peter Pan and Wendy, The Bacchae, Man and Superman, The Cabinet of Doctor Caligari, Woyzeck, The Wild Duck, The Naked Eye, Long Day's Journey Into Night, Tartuffe, Ubu Rock, Waiting for Godot, The Oresteia, Shlemiel the First, Picasso at the Lapin Agile, A Touch of the Poet, What the Butler Saw, The Cherry Orchard, and Orphée. Ms. Zuber's credits include work at Lincoln Center, The Joseph Papp Public Theater, Goodman Theatre, The Guthrie Theater, Mark Taper Forum, Seattle Repertory Theatre, Hartford Stage Company, La Jolla Playhouse, Berkeley Repertory Theatre, Houston Grand Opera, and Glimmerglass Opera, among others. Her Broadway credits include The Triumph of Love (Connecticut Critics Circle Award and Drama Desk nomination), Ivanov (Drama Desk nomination), The Sound of Music, Twelfth Night, The Red Shoes, London Assurance, The Rose Tattoo, and Philadelphia Here I Come. Ms. Zuber was the recipient of the 1997 Obie Award for sustained achievement in design. She is the costume designer for La Fête des Vignerons de 1999, the massive Festival of the Winegrowers in Vevey, Switzerland.

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Lighting design by

Richard Riddell

Sound design by

Matthias Gohl and Stephen D. Santomenna

Music composed by

Matthias Gohl

Cast

Rosaura

Cherry Jones

Rosaura

Cherry Jones

A.R.T.: Cherry was a founding member of the A.R.T. and has appeared multiple times on its stage, including: King Lear, Twelfth Night (with Diane Lane), Three Sisters, As You Like It, The Serpent Woman, Life is a Dream, The Caucasian Chalk Circle, Major Barbara, Love’s Labors Lost, Lysistrata. Broadway and Off-Broadway: Doubt (Tony Award, Drama Desk Award), The Heiress (Tony Award, Drama Desk Award), Pride’s Crossing (Drama Desk Award), Lincoln Center Theater; Angels in America; Imaginary Friends; Moon for the Misbegotten (Tony Award nomination); The Night of the Iguana; Our Country’s Good (Tony Award nomination); Faith Healer; Mrs. Warren’s Profession; The Baltimore Waltz (OBIE Award). Television: “24” (Emmy Award for role as President Allison Taylor), “What Makes a Family,” and most recently as Dr. Judith Evans in “Awake.” Film: Ocean’s Twelve, Cradle Will Rock, The Horse Whisperer, The Perfect Storm, Erin Brockovich, Signs, The Village, Mother and Child, Swimmers, Terrence Malick’s upcoming film Knight of Cups.

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Clarín

Derek Smith

Clarín

Derek Smith

Prince Segismundo

Tom Hewitt

Prince Segismundo

Tom Hewitt

Servant/Soldier

Ed Schloth

Servant/Soldier

Ed Schloth

Clotaldo

Jeremy Geidt

Clotaldo

Jeremy Geidt

A.R.T. Senior Actor, founding member of the Yale Repertory Theatre and the A.R.T. Yale: more than 40 productions (including The Seagull). A.R.T.: 100 productions including The Seagull (three turns as Sorin), Julius Caesar, Three Sisters, The Onion Cellar, Major Barbara (Undershaft), Heartbreak House (Shotover), A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Quince four times, Snug once), Henry IV (Falstaff), Twelfth Night (Toby Belch), The Caretaker (Davies), The Homecoming (Max), Loot (Truscott), Man and Superman (Mendoza/Devil), Waiting for Godot (Vladimir), The Threepenny Opera (Peacham/Petey), Ivanov (Lebedev), Three Sisters (Chebutkin), Buried Child (Dodge), The Cherry Orchard (Gaev) and The King Stag (Pantelone). Teaches at Harvard College, Harvard’s Summer and Extension Schools and at the A.R.T/MXAT Institute. Trained at the Old Vic Theatre School and subsequently taught there. Acted at the Old Vic, Young Vic, The Royal Court, in the West End, in films and television and has been hosting his own show “The Caravan” for the BBC for five years. Came to the U.S. with the satirical revue The Establishment and acted on and off Broadway, at the Stratford Shakespeare Festival and at the Lincoln Center Festival. Lectured on Shakespeare in India and the Netherlands Theatre School. Received the Elliot Norton Award for Outstanding Boston Actor and the Jason Robards Award for Dedication to the Theatre.

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Astolfo

Thomas Derrah

Astolfo

Thomas Derrah

A.R.T.: 119 productions, including R. Buckminster Fuller: THE HISTORY (and Myster) OF THE UNIVERSE (R. Buckminster Fuller), Cabaret (Fraulein Schneider), Endgame (Clov), The Seagull (Dorn), Oliver Twist (also at Theatre for a New Audience and Berkeley Repertory Theatre), The Birthday Party (Stanley), Highway Ulysses (Ulysses), Uncle Vanya (Vanya), Marat/Sade (Marquis de Sade), Richard II (Richard). Broadway: Jackie: An American Life (23 roles). Off-Broadway: Johan Padan (Johan), Big Time (Ted).  Tours with the Company across the U.S., with residencies in New York, Chicago, San Francisco and Los Angeles, and throughout Europe, Canada, Israel, Taiwan, Japan and Moscow, and has recently been performing Julius Caesar in France. Other: I Am My Own Wife, Boston TheatreWorks; Approaching Moomtaj, New Repertory Theatre; Twelfth Night and The Tempest, Commonwealth Shakespeare Co.; London’s Battersea Arts Center; five productions at Houston’s Alley Theatre, including Our Town (Dr. Gibbs, directed by José Quintero); and many theatres throughout the U.S. Awards: 1994 Elliot Norton Prize for Sustained Excellence, 2000 and 2004 IRNE Awards for Best Actor, 1997 Los Angeles DramaLogue Award (for title role of Shlemiel the First). Television: Julie Taymor’s film Fool’s Fire (PBS American Playhouse), "Unsolved Mysteries," "Del and Alex" (Alex, A&E Network). Film: Mystic River (directed by Clint Eastwood), The Pink Panther II. He is on the faculty of the A.R.T. Institute, teaches acting at Harvard University and Emerson College, and is a graduate of the Yale School of Drama.

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Estrella

Pamela Gien

Estrella

Pamela Gien

As both writer and performer of The Syringa Tree, Pamela Gien won the Obie for Best Play of 2001, the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Solo Performance, the Outer Critics Circle Award for Outstanding Solo Performance, a Drama League Honor, and nomination for the John Gassner Playwriting Award. Before its New York run, the play had its world premiere at ACT in Seattle, and Pamela has since performed it in London at the Royal National Theatre, and in Los Angeles. The production was filmed for Trio Arts Channel on television. She is completing the screenplay, and Random House has commissioned her to write it as a novel. Pamela has also written her second screenplay for an upcoming film, The Lily Field, to be produced by Matt Salinger. As a company member of the American Repertory Theater, she appeared in fourteen productions: as Sonya in the premiere of David Mamet's adaptation of Uncle Vanya with Christopher Walken, Anabella in 'Tis Pity She's A Whore with Derek Smith, Estrella in Life's A Dream with Cherry Jones, as Gabriella in Sweet Table at the Richelieu, Marianna in The Miser, and Angela in The King Stag with Thomas Derrah, all directed by Andrei Serban. She played Stella/Ann in The End of the World with Symposium to Follow, directed by Richard Foreman, and performed in two Pirandello productions directed by Robert Brustein, and appeared in Gillette and The Day Room, both directed by David Wheeler. Other theater credits include Lavinia in Titus Andronicus for the Public Theater's New York Shakespeare Festival, Alicia in Piano by Anna Deavere Smith, and Hannah Jelkes in The Night of the Iguana at the LATC, for which she won a Dramalogue Award for Outstanding Achievement in the Theatre. She has performed in the New Works Festival at the Mark Taper Forum, the Humana Festival at Actors Theatre of Louisville, and at South Coast Repertory. Her television appearances include guest-starring roles in Tales From the Crypt, Reasonable Doubts, Hunter, Secret Lives, and Into Thin Air. Her film credits include Men Seeking Women and The Last Supper.

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King Basilio

Daniel Von Bargen

King Basilio

Daniel Von Bargen

Ensemble

Dean HarrisonFran HarrsionBari HochwaldMichelle KroninJohn LathenAlice ManningSean RunnetteRoss SalingerSheryl Taub

Ensemble

Dean HarrisonFran HarrsionBari HochwaldMichelle KroninJohn LathenAlice ManningSean RunnetteRoss SalingerSheryl Taub