Having his face hanging bigger than life on South El Molino Avenue is one thing Anders Craggs Keith remains to be getting used to.
“Sort of like looking in a fun-house mirror,” he stated, standing under the large poster.
Born in Eagle Rock, the Anders household moved to South Pasadena the place he attended highschool and reduce his theatrical enamel with the youth group Theatre 360. However he all the time had his eye on the Playhouse.
“I saw plays here growing up and would always walk by and think, ‘Oh, gosh, what a beautiful space. What an awesome building,’” Keith recalled. “It’s a dream come true.”
He graduated from Juilliard simply final 12 months and, in a approach, “The Sound Inside” sends him again to highschool. He performs Christopher, a Yale pupil with a couple of quirks. Christopher prefers to make use of a handbook typewriter over his model new MacBook and he hates e mail and twitter.
“Twitter is basically cheap haiku for the overly caffeinated,” his character rants earlier than launching into an in depth, lower than savory description of the baristas on the campus café.
“He is an individual by his own choice,” Keith defined, noting that some would possibly discover him pretentious. “He thinks of himself almost like a character from a Dostoevsky story.”
Literary references are widespread on this two-hander, which additionally stars Amy Brenneman as Christopher’s inventive writing trainer. She admits she’s extra of a non-fiction fan however she’s loved submerging herself in her character Bella’s library, together with Gentle Years by James Salter and Salinger’s Franny and Zooey.
“One of the things I love about acting is you do what your characters do,” she defined. “If they’re a surgeon, you hang out with surgeons, and I have just loved diving into the waters that she swims in.”
Set at Yale, between an educational and her pupil, each writers, it stands to cause that the language could be elevated. There may be depth to the way in which these characters converse that weaves a spell, leaving the viewers hanging on each phrase.
“I think these are deep feeling, deep thinking people,” Brenneman stated of Bella and Christopher. “I think in this moment of, you know, everybody’s got to publish their life every five minutes. And usually, it’s the good stuff. And these are private people. They’re thoughtful people. They’re isolated people, but they are a little bit out of step with the dominant culture. And that’s why, even though they’re decades apart, they find each other.”
The play additionally permits Brenneman to do one thing else she loves: converse on to the viewers. It’s a mode she typically employs in her personal theatrical writing and one she finds particularly resonant at a time when screens are ubiquitous.
“She comes out and she’s like, ‘Hi, I see you audience,” she defined of Bella’s entrance at the beginning of the play. “’I see you and you see me and off we go.’ I get to talk to humans that showed up to be together.”
Sadly, ticket gross sales at theaters throughout the nation point out that folks could have gotten out of the behavior of seeing dwell performances. Earlier this 12 months, Middle Theatre Group introduced a pause in programming on the Mark Taper Discussion board and different regional theaters, like Artists Repertory Theatre in Portland, have taken related measures. Which is why Brenneman encourages folks to come back see this present — or any present really.
“If you care about being together in community and seeing live performances, go see it because this is a time to show our support,” she stated. “Otherwise, some of these beautiful theaters may not come back.”
Creative Director Danny Feldman had an identical request, as he welcomed the opening night time viewers. He urged the gang to see theater throughout city, from the smallest areas to the big homes, explaining that the theater neighborhood is one ecosystem.
As for Keith, his Playhouse debut is one among two massive issues he’s obtained brewing. He’s additionally starring as Frasier’s nephew within the reboot of the collection that may stream on Paramount+. The present was filmed in entrance of the dwell viewers so he says it nonetheless had a theatrical really feel to it which is nice as a result of like Brenneman; he longs for the neighborhood and immediacy of dwell theater.
“I love the theater and I want to do this for the rest of my life if that’s allowed,” Keith stated. “Fingers crossed.”
Spoken like a somebody within the midst of writing their very own future.
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