End of Beckett Festival offers valuable reminder to production organizers

The annual Beckett Festival is apparently no more.

Organizer and Test Market head Ernest Hemmings sent out an e-mail recently announcing that he was pulling the plug on the festival of plays scheduled for November. Hemmings said he felt it was not worth abandoning his family during rehearsals, learning roles and "(making) frantic phone calls to fill (other) roles."

The program, started a half-dozen years ago, had experienced mixed success. It undoubtedly introduced some locals to the likes of Beckett and Ionesco, but was plagued from the beginning with disorganization. Many accomplished actors predicted it was doomed for failure because Hemmings refused, or didn't know how, to delegate authority. It's certainly understandable that a person would want to spend more time with his family -- believe it or not, there are more important things in life than theater -- but the festival's closing is a reminder of the danger of one man doing it all. If he gets tired, the theater goes down. In a multiownership/management deal, the show can go on. We have too many "guru" managers in Vegas, and that's not healthy for an unstable theater community. ...

Insurgo's "Cannibal! The Musical" -- Trey Parker's "South Park"-ish salute to Alferd Packer and adolescent silliness -- has extended its run at the Stage Door Theatre in Town Square through Saturday at 8 p.m. It's bizarre enough to deserve a permanent home. ...

In my last column, I mentioned a young actress I had met at one of Lawrys Prime Rib's annual "A Christmas Carol" dinner shows (being directed this year by Ed Gryska). I noted the actress remained in character as she ate at a table full of teasing businessmen who were trying to get her to say something mean about Tiny Tim. It didn't work. She was a real pro. I heard from the production's founder, Frank Pasquale, who told me the actress was his daughter, Victoria. Pasquale directed the show for several years (and also worked in advertising for the Review-Journal and the Business Press) and is now trying to get the show up and running in his hometown of Kingston, N.Y. His day job is working advertising for his hometown paper. Things have come full-circle for him. ...

Las Vegas Little Theatre is continuing to expand. In late October, it will open a studio at 3890 Schiff Drive (just a few doors from its current location) with the intent of renting it out for rehearsals, classes, performances, readings. It'll be a black box space with a seating capacity of about 35. Board president Walter Niejadlik said they are planning to lease the space in four-hour increments at around $100. "We are still finalizing the numbers," he says, "but we want to make it as affordable as possible -- without sending LVLT into bankruptcy."

Anthony Del Valle can be reached at DelValle@aol.com. You can write him c/o Las Vegas Review-Journal, P.O. Box 70, Las Vegas NV 89125.