Theater
Krapp's Last Tape
US Premiere
The Gate Theatre (Dublin)
Written by Samuel Beckett
Directed by Michael Colgan
A tragedy in one act for a lone actor, a tape recorder, and
many, many bananas, Krapp's Last Tape is one of Samuel
Beckett's most personal works for the stage-a feat of great
precision and tense economy. Featuring discreet details from the
writer's own life, this dramatization of the messy truths of memory
and time illuminates the predicament we face when we become
strangers to our former selves.
Reprising his role in the Gate Theatre's critically acclaimed
Dublin and London production, two-time Oscar nominee John Hurt
(The Elephant Man, Midnight Express) plays the
titular Krapp, an embittered and dyspeptic man who marks the
occasion of his 69th birthday by revisiting his 39-year-old self.
Veering from outrage to contemplation, Krapp exhibits the ticks and
tocks of a beaten man whose spirit unravels as the tapes unspool in
"all that old misery" of lost time.
Lighting by James McConnell