Alvin Epstein (May 14, 1925 – December 10, 2018) was an American actor and director. He was a founding member of both the
American Repertory Theater
The American Repertory Theater (A.R.T.) is a professional not-for-profit theater in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1979 by Robert Brustein, the A.R.T. is known for its commitment to new American plays and music–theater explorations; to ne ...
and
Yale Repertory Theatre
Yale Repertory Theatre at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut was founded by Robert Brustein, dean of Yale School of Drama, in 1966, with the goal of facilitating a meaningful collaboration between theatre professionals and talented stud ...
. He was particularly admired for his performances in the plays of
Samuel Beckett
Samuel Barclay Beckett (; 13 April 1906 – 22 December 1989) was an Irish writer of novels, plays, short stories, and poems. Writing in both English and French, his literary and theatrical work features bleak, impersonal, and Tragicomedy, tra ...
. He also served as Artistic Director at the
Guthrie Theater
The Guthrie Theater, founded in 1963, is a center for theater performance, production, education, and professional training in Minneapolis, Minnesota. The concept of the theater was born in 1959 in a series of discussions among Sir Tyrone Gut ...
.
Life and career
Born in the Bronx, Epstein was the son of Harry Epstein, a physician, and his wife Goldie Epstein (née Rudnick). He graduated from the
High School of Music & Art
The High School of Music & Art, informally known as Music & Art (or M&A), was a public specialized high school located at 443-465 West 135th Street in the borough of Manhattan, New York, from 1936 until 1984. In 1961, Music & Art and the High S ...
in Manhattan and the
Queens College, City University of New York
Queens College (QC) is a public college in the New York City borough of Queens. Part of the City University of New York system, Queens College occupies an campus primarily located in Flushing.
Queens College was established in 1937 and offe ...
.
After serving in the
United States Army
The United States Army (USA) is the primary Land warfare, land service branch of the United States Department of Defense. It is designated as the Army of the United States in the United States Constitution.Article II, section 2, clause 1 of th ...
during
World War II
World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...
in Germany, he studied dance in New York with
Martha Graham
Martha Graham (May 11, 1894 – April 1, 1991) was an American modern dancer, teacher and choreographer, whose style, the Graham technique, reshaped the dance world and is still taught in academies worldwide.
Graham danced and taught for over s ...
and mime in Paris. His early performances in New York City included appearing in mimes with
Marcel Marceau
Marcel Marceau (; born Marcel Mangel; 22 March 1923 – 22 September 2007) was a French mime artist and actor most famous for his stage persona, "Bip the Clown". He referred to mime as the "art of silence", performing professionally worldwide ...
. In 1956 he made his
Broadway debut as the Fool in
Orson Welles
George Orson Welles (May 6, 1915 – October 10, 1985) was an American director, actor, writer, producer, and magician who is remembered for his innovative work in film, radio, and theatre. He is among the greatest and most influential film ...
’ 1956 production of
William Shakespear's ''
King Lear
''The Tragedy of King Lear'', often shortened to ''King Lear'', is a Shakespearean tragedy, tragedy written by William Shakespeare. It is loosely based on the mythological Leir of Britain. King Lear, in preparation for his old age, divides his ...
''. That same year he portrayed the slave Lucky in the Broadway premiere of Beckett’s ''
Waiting for Godot
''Waiting for Godot'' ( or ) is a 1953 play by Irish writer and playwright Samuel Beckett, in which the two main characters, Vladimir (Waiting for Godot), Vladimir (Didi) and Estragon (Gogo), engage in a variety of discussions and encounters w ...
''.
Epstein continued to appear in many productions of Beckett's plays, including Clov, the servant, in the United States premiere of ''
Endgame'' in 1958. He portrayed two more characters in that play during his career: Hamm, Clov’s tyrannical blind master, in a 1984
Off-Broadway
An off-Broadway theatre is any professional theatre venue in New York City with a seating capacity between 100 and 499, inclusive. These theatres are smaller than Broadway theatres, but larger than off-off-Broadway theatres, which seat fewer tha ...
production that he also directed, at the
Samuel Beckett Theater; and Hamm’s aged father, Nagg, who lives in a garbage can, performed at the
Irish Repertory Theatre
The Irish Repertory Theatre is an Off-Broadway theatre company founded in 1988.
History
The Irish Repertory Theatre was founded by Ciarán O'Reilly and Charlotte Moore and opened its doors in September 1988 with Sean O'Casey's '' The Plough ...
in Manhattan in 2005 and again, in 2008, at the
Brooklyn Academy of Music
The Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM) is a multi-arts center in Brooklyn, New York City. It hosts progressive and avant-garde performances, with theater, dance, music, opera, film programming across multiple nearby venues.
BAM was chartered in 18 ...
.
Credits
Film
Television
References
External links
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Epstein, Alvin
20th-century American male actors
1925 births
2018 deaths
American male film actors
American male stage actors
American male radio actors
American male television actors
Queens College, City University of New York alumni