A Play for Our Time? Houston Theater Company Brings Dystopian Masterwork to the Stage

HOUSTON, TX — Wallace Shawn is a man of many talents, including writing and acting. Many know him only from his role as Vizzini in "The Princess Bride," for good reason. But that sells Shawn short. He is a gifted playwright above all, and this month marks your chance to see one of his best plays on a Houston stage.

"The Designated Mourner," which Shawn wrote in 1996, is being staged by The Catastrophic Theatre at The Match through January 15. Imagine three characters in an enclosed space, dealing with mortality, sex, identity, politics ... and exactly what it means to be human dealing with other humans in a world fraught with uncertainty and unease. Jack, Judy, and Howard are something to be experienced, especially coming on the heels of perhaps the most divisive presidential election in modern American times.

Jason Nodler, the Catastrophic's artistic director, says that "The Designated Mourner" is his favorite piece of writing for the theater from the past 50 years — high praise, indeed — and is directing this production.

“This is not a play that chooses sides with regard to American politics, but it does speak to the unprecedented division in our country between the haves and have-nots, and it is more relevant today than any time since it was written," Nodler writes. "The day after the divisive election season came to its end, at least five people contacted me asking that we bring this play back now. None of them could have known I was already halfway there myself. It will be tough adding an off-season play to be performed almost immediately, so why are we doing this at this moment? It has something to do with ‘the fierce urgency of now.’ It is truly a masterwork, a play about, well, everything — an enormous story told with such intelligence and generosity, and somehow told so simply and with such economy, an almost impossible thing of beauty. Since it was published in 1996 I have frequently, repeatedly, gathered friends together to read it aloud late at night."

Catastrophic's production of "The Designated Mourner" stars Greg Dean, Patricia Duran, and Paul Menzel, and tickets are available here.