"The show works well because of strong direction and some strong performances...it’s worth seeing “Picasso at Lapin Agile” in a semi-real dive bar setting."--Augusta Warner--Online Buffalo

 

"3 1/2 starts...LaChiusa directs a superbly cast ensemble, certainly one of the best of this theater season...his cast is tuned in beautifully to the goofy and the complex, having a great time and fun in the process.  ART has a winner here." Ted Hadley, The Buffalo News

 

American Repertory Theater of WNY present the third show of the 2014-15 season with Steve Martin's PICASSO AT LAPIN AGILE, March 2015. Known as an existential comedy, PICASSO AT LAPIN AGILE is Steve Martin's tongue-and-cheek poke at the deep philosophical pieces penned by French playwrights like Jean Paul Sartre or Eugene Ionesco. In this Victor Hugo a go-go knee-slapper, Martin creates an alternative universe where famed theoretical physicist Albert Einstein and famed theoretical romantic and painter Pablo Picasso meet at the Parisian bar Lapin Agile and wax philosophies, ponder existence, and, with help of a time-traveling "country boy", brave the new 20th century world and the future beyond. 

 

PICASSO AT LAPIN AGUILE  features a great cast and crew featuring Sean Marciniak as Picasso and Matthew Chavez as the famed Albert Einstein, Diane DiBernardo Blenk as the saucy bar-maid, Germain, with her bartender lover, Freddy, played by  ART/WNY steadfast alumni David Mitchell, Keith Wharton joins the company as Picasso's art dealer Sagot, Both Stefan Brundage and Eric Mowery make their ART/WNY debut with Stefan playing the big dreaming/no knowledge inventor Charles Dabernow Schmendiman as Mowery plays a simple country-boy Visitor. ART/WNY alumni Leacel Hillenbrand (THE CRUCIBLE) and Michael Leszczynski (SHINE) also offer their talents to this production.

 

Production crew included Matthew LaChiusa as director and set designer, Katie Ludwig as lighting designer, Elaine Heckler as costume designer with Carly Weiser as stage manager and Justin Karcher as dramatuge and assistant director.  

 

 

Photographs by Kathryn Ludwig