STAGES
Repertory Theatre
Presents
Edward Albee's
ALL OVER
Directed by Sidney Berger
The Best Friend (Charles Krohn), Bonnie Gallup (The Mistress), Sharon Bennett (The Nurse)
Phil Fisher (The Doctor), Lillian Evans (The Wife), Sally Edmundson (The Daughter)
and James Huston (The Son)
March 5 through March 29th, 1998
Featuring
Lillian Evans...........................The Wife
Sally Edmundson...................The Daughter
Bonnie Gallup.........................The Mistress
Phil Fisher................................The Doctor
James Huston..........................The Son
Charles Krohn.........................The Best Friend
Sharon Bennett.......................The Nurse
Chuck Hutchison, Austin Vernon, Marion Helen Wood as The Reporters
TIME
The Present
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Stages Repertory Theatre presents the rediscovered, rarely produced masterpiece All Over by
Edward Albee, oneof the most heralded dramatists of the 20th century and winner of three Pulitzer
Prizes. Wife, mistress, best friend, son and daughter hold vigil at the deathbed of a famous public
figure. Their intertwining lives flash before their eyes as they confess past injustices, confront petty
power struggles, and explore the ties that bind.
Lillian Evans (The Mother) and Sally Edmundson (The Daughter)
"In a great play the themes reverberate beyond the confines of the plot,"says Stages Artistic
Director Rob Bundy. "All Over is about more than this family and their relationships - it's about all
of us and how we avoid death and how conversely we avoid living. This play's searing investigation
of death is what good live theatre is about and what makes me truly respect Edward Albee."
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EDWARD ALBEE: The List
Edward Albee is the author of a large body of work.
Many of his plays have entered the standard theatre repertory:
The Zoo Story (Vernon Rice Award)
The Death of Bessie Smith
Farm and Yam
The American Dream (Foreign Press Association Award)
Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf (Tony and Drama Critics Circle Award for Best Play)
The Ballad of the Sad Cafe
Tiny Alice
Malcolm
A Delicate Balance (Pulitzer Prize)
Everything In the Garden
Box and Quotations From Chairman Mao Tse-Tung
Seascape (Pulitzer Prize)
Listening
Counting The Ways
The Lady from Dubuque
Lolita
The Man Who Had Three Arms
Finding The Sun
Walking
Marriage Play
Three Tall Women
(Pulitzer Prize, London Evening Standard Award, Drama Critics Circle, Lucille Lortel and Outer
Circle Critics Awards for Best Play)
The Lorca Play (Commissioned by the University of Houston)
and Fragments--A Concerto Grosso
Albee has directed The Zoo Story (1961, Off-Broadway and on tour), Who's Afraid of Virginia
Woolf (1976 Broadway revival and 1980 Los Angeles revival with Glenda Jackson and John
Lithgow), Litening and Counting The Ways (1977 American premiere), Albee Directs Albee (all
one-act plays, tours), Marriage Play (world premiere at Vienna's English Theatre, 1987), and
Three Tall Women (world premiere at Vienna' English Theatre, 1991). Currently a Distinguished
Professor of Theatre at the University of Houston, Albee was also named an associate artist at the
Alley Theatre in 1989. His work there has included directing productions of Who's Afraid of
Virginia Woolf, the 1992 American premiere of Marriage Play, and Albee Directs Beckett:
Krapp's Last Tape and Ohio Impromptu by Samuel Beckett. He is a member of the Dramatists
Guild Council, P.E.N. American, The American Academy of Dramatic Arts and Letters,
International Theatre Institute U.S.A. and is President of the Edward Albee Foundation. He is the
recipient of the Gold Medal in Drama from the Academy of Arts and Letters and an Obie Award
for sustained achievement in theatre.
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DIRECTOR'S NOTES: DR. SIDNEY BERGER
In the first scene of Edward Albee's All Over, a character named "The Best Friend" talks about the
ritual that surrounds the process of dying within a family. "Isn't it one of our customs," he asks, "that
if a man has not outlived his wife and children.....they gather?"
Lillian Evans (The Wife) and Sally Edmundson (The Daughter) and James Huston (The Son)
And indeed, this play is about the gathering, and, in essence, the waiting for the final act of death to
occur.
I doubt that it is about the fact of death. Rather it is about the waste of lives, the misperceptions, the
dreaded expectations, and all of the miscommunications that so often mark the entity we call
Family. It is about whether ultimately, we can step out of the shadow of expectation and graps our
own lives in our fists and proceed to lead them, however, disappointing to those who love us and
those who do not.
Locked together in this room within which this family gathers to wait out the process of an
important death, battle ensues, all framed in the diamond clarity of language from one of America's
most potent and articular playwrights.
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The Director Dr. Sidney Berger
ALL OVER Director Dr. Sidney Berger is the director of the University of Houston School of
Theatre and producer of the Children's Theatre Festival. In past seasons at Stages Repertory
Theatre, Berger has directed Edward Albee's A Delicate Balance, as well as Sight Unseen and
Substance of Fire. He is the founder of the Houston Shakespeare Festival, past president and
founder of the Shakespeare Theatre Association of America, and a member of the International
Shakespeare Globe Centre Board. Recent HSF productions directed by Berger include Much
Ado About Nothing, Henry V, The Merchant of Venice, Hamlet, and As You Like It. As an
associate artist of the Alley Theatre, he has directed Frankie and Johnny in the Claire De Lune, T
Bone N Weasel, and All In The Timing. He recently directed My Fair Lady for Theatre Under The
Stars. Berger is a recipient of the Mayor's Arts Award for Outstanding Contribution by a
Performing Artist and a member of the College of Fellows of the American Theatre.
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THEATRE CRITICS RAVE ABOUT ALL OVER
"The best American play of several seasons." --- Harold Clurman, The Nation
"Without question the best-written, the most mature, the most deeply felt and the most sensitively
wrought drama Albee has written so far. And without question, it's the best play - American and
British - of this and many past seasons. It restores faith in the American Theatre - and
re-establishes Broadway as an artistic forum and Edward Albee as our foremost
dramatists."---Samual Hirsch, Boston Herald Traveler
"A boldly beautiful and quietly brilliant play."---Elliot Norton, Boston Record American
"All Over stands as the most original and finest Coup de Theatre of American origin this
season."---William Glover, Associated Press
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