The Wooster Group, SYMPHONY OF RATS. Photo by Spencer Ostrander.
Michaela Murphy, Niall Cunningham, Jim Fletcher, Ari Fliakos.
A president of the United States is receiving messages by mysterious means, and he doesn’t know whether to trust them. In this new Wooster Group production, directed by Elizabeth LeCompte and Kate Valk, Richard Foreman’s 1988 play is reimagined with a multilayered sound and video score that draws from wide-ranging literary and cinematic sources, including William Blake, D.H. Lawrence, and Charlie Chaplin. Set in a spaceship-museum gallery, this surreal production follows the president as he plunges into a series of encounters with otherworldly beings, among them a giant rat with a special message. Moving between the apocalyptic and the mundane, The Wooster Group considers how technology questions what it means to be human.
Join Elizabeth LeCompte and Kate Valk at Hauser & Wirth Downtown Los Angeles on Sunday, October 20 at 11am for a conversation about Symphony of Rats and The Wooster Group.
Please note: Symphony of Rats contains mature content and loud sounds.
Co-commissioned by piece by piece productions.
The creation and performance of Symphony of Rats is made possible by public funds from the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature; the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, in partnership with the City Council; and the National Endowment for the Arts; and support from Antonia Belt and Tom Shapiro.
Major support for The Wooster Group is provided by Rita Ackermann and Hauser & Wirth; the Gladys Krieble Delmas Foundation; The Howard Gilman Foundation; MacMillan Family Foundation; Fan Fox & Leslie R. Samuels Foundation; Select Equity Group Foundation; Shubert Foundation; and The Wooster Group’s Director’s Circle: Antonia & David Belt, Paul Cassidy & Vernon Evenson, Christine Larsen & Vincent Dopulos, Alan Mark & Jeffrey Fraenkel, Frances McDormand, Robyn Mewshaw, Catherine Orentreich (Orentreich Family Foundation), Tom Shapiro, and Wendy vanden Heuvel.
