Theatre 40 at The Reuben Cordova Theatre (Beverly Hills, CA)
Theatre 40 presents the Los Angeles premiere of David Mamet's streamlined adaptation of the dark 1905 drama by British playwright Harley Granville-Barker. The Voysey Inheritance is a portrait of greed, centering on a family of financial planners who have been using a Ponzi scheme to defraud their clients and lead an extravagant lifestyle for two generations.
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The last date listed for The Voysey Inheritance was Saturday July 18, 2009 / 8:00pm. (view all dates)
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The acting was first rate! I believed every word they said and they truly transported me to their time and place. I highly recommend this play. The set and wardrobe was stunning.
This is a play written 100 years ago and adapted by David Mamet. It is as relevant today as it was when it was first produced. Staging, costuming and acting were all first rate. This was definitely a very entertaining two hours.
Shady practices in financial firms? Quelle suprise! 100 years old and still timely, except perhaps for the ethical qualms of young Edward Voysey and the notion of making reparations, and doing so equitably. The sets and costumes are first-rate; the acting and accents uneven. A tad long and wordy as you might expect from Mamet., though he did cut it down from the original.
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Theatre 40 at The Reuben Cordova Theatre is a small theater located on the campus of Beverly Hills High School. Starting with this empty storeroom, grants from the City of Beverly Hills, the Beverly Hills Unified School District and the Ahmanson Foundation, along with a lot of sweat and work from company members, the Reuben Cordova Memorial Theatre was created. It was designed by acclaimed Broa
Theatre 40 will open its 2009-2010 Season with the Los Angeles Premiere of David Mamet's streamlined adaptation of Harley Granville-Barker's 100-year-old play The Voysey Inheritance. This is a dark play that denounces the greed that it feels is bred into us all. It is a portrait of a family in crisis. The Voyseys have been systematically defrauding the clients of the family financial firm for two generations but as proud members of the British upper classes, they are not about to let the discovery of their ruthless business practices and possible ruin of innocent clients disturb their extravagant lives. The Voysey Inheritance opens at Theatre 40's newly refurbished Reuben Cordova theatre on the Beverly Hills High School Campus.
Old Voysey is on top of the world, reigning with Victorian splendor over his large and spoiled family, but the son he has chosen to take over the family investment firm is in a state of panic. There is nothing of value left on deposit, just a set of cooked books representing years of possible fraud, a closed-circuit Ponzi scheme that will crash bringing ruin to clients ranging from the wealthy to widows and orphans.
"Coolly explaining to his perturbed son the practice of borrowing from one client's account to pay dividends due to another, Voysey père sighs 'Oh, why is it so hard for a man to see clearly beyond the letter of the law!' As any number of recent scandals in the business world remind us, the freedom given to businessmen with good connections and respectable facades to pursue their ruthless ends undisturbed by moral qualms, to say nothing of legal consequences, is a story that remains as fresh as tomorrow's stock options."
Harley Granville-Barker is one of the most unfamiliar British playwrights of the early 20th century. His reputation as a contemporary playwright of the period has been overshadowed by the fame of George Bernard Shaw, Oscar Wilde and J.M. Barrie. Granville-Barker has recently come to the forefront through productions in London, Baltimore and New York with revised scripts to suit modern tastes. The Voysey Inheritance was first presented in London in 1905, but the play about greed is as relevant today as it was in Edwardian times.
David Mamet is widely known and respected for his work not only as a Director but also as a Playwright and an Author. His works are known for their clever terse, sometimes vulgar dialogue and arcane stylized phrasing, as well as for his exploration of masculinity. He received Tony Award nominations for Glengarry Glen Ross (for which he won the Pulitzer Prize) and Speed-the-Plow. Other plays include Oleanna, Sexual Perversity in Chicago, The Duck Variations, American Buffalo, The Woods and Edmond. As a screenwriter, he received Oscar nominations for The Verdict and Wag the Dog. In addition to his Pulitzer, Mamet's awards include: the Joseph Jefferson Award, Obie Award, NY Drama Critics Award, Outer Circle Award, Society of the West End Theatre Award, Dramatists Guild Hall-Warriner Award, American Academy Award and Tony Award.
Veteran Actor and Director Bruce Gray has been chosen to helm Theatre 40's production of The Voysey Inheritance. Gray most recently directed the critically-acclaimed American Premiere of Halo at Theatre 40. Prior to that, he helmed Dangerous Corner and The Little Foxes, a production called "fabulous" by one critic and one which garnered several "Critic's Choices" as a result. Previously he had helmed Somerset Maugham's classic The Constant Wife and two thoroughly modern comedies Chekhov in Yalta (Critic's Choice) and Veronica's Position. Following a five-year hiatus (whence he played a series lead in Lifetime's Traders. Gemini Award), he was invited back to Theatre 40 to direct Plastic for the One Act Festival. He has directed a play each year for the Company, from Neil Simon's moving Chapter Two to Seymour In The Very Heart Of Winter (Critic's Choice). His 9th directorial assignment for Theatre 40 was a revival of Joe Orton's comic masterpiece What The Butler Saw. His earlier productions of Orton's Loot and Enertaining Mr. Sloane received multiple Drama-logue awards, and were nominated for Robbie and LA Weekly awards. The LA Times called his 1982 staging of Blithe Spirit for Theatre 40 'the year's most beautiful production.' Gray has directed at virtually every major Waiver Theatre in town, from his controversial production of My Life In Art at the Tiffany to the AIDS play "seven sundays" (Drama-logue) at Theatre 40 (later transferring to the Odyssey). His 1993 production of the Holocaust play Shayna Maidel was hailed by critics as "wondrous. It doesn't get better than this."
Theatre Forty, the Beverly Hills' only resident professional acting company, has provided the community quality theatre productions for over 30 years. Recent productions include "An Almost Perfect Person" directed by Cliff Berens, and "The Manor," specially created for Greystone Mansion.