On the Barrington Stage Company schedule, June 22 through July 3 at BSC Stage 2, 36 Linden Street, Pittsfield, is a return engagement of Freud’s Last Session, by Mark St. Germain, which received its world premiere in June 2009. Starring Mark H. Dold and Martin Rayner, under the direction of Tyler Marchant, Freud’s Last Session moves on to an Off-Broadway production at the Marjorie S. Deane Little Theatre, 5 West 63rd Street, NYC, beginning July 9, with an opening scheduled for July 22.

Freud’s Last Session centers on legendary psychiatrist Dr. Sigmund Freud (Martin Rayner), who invites a young, little known professor, C.S. Lewis (Mark H. Dold), to his home in London. Lewis, expecting to be called on the carpet for satirizing Freud in a recent book, soon realizes Freud has a much more significant agenda. On the day England enters World War II, Freud and Lewis clash on the existence of God, love, sex and the meaning of life—only two weeks before Freud chooses to take his own. The play is based on Dr. Armand Nicholi’s The Question of God, which was presented as a two-part PBS television presentation in 2004.

Playwright Mark St. Germain was intrigued by an account of Sigmund Freud’s meeting with an unnamed Oxford don shortly before Freud committed suicide in 1939 to end his battle with oral cancer. In Freud’s Last Session, the psychoanalyst’s visitor is C.S. Lewis, author of The Chronicles of Narnia and The Screwtape Letters.

Mark H. Dold (C.S. Lewis) At BSC: 7 seasons. Broadway: Absurd Person Singular. Off-Broadway: Shockheaded Peter, The Little Shubert; NY Shakespeare Festival; Classic Stage Company; Manhattan Theatre Club; TFNA; WPA; INTAR. Regional Highlights: Mark Taper; Old Globe (San Diego Critics Circle Award); Chicago Shakespeare; Shakespeare DC; Long Wharf (Connecticut Critics Circle Award); Trinity Rep; Yale Rep. Film: 3 Windows, Say You’ll Be Mine, Junior Creative, Charlie’s Party. TV: 6 years on All My Children, Third Watch, Gossip Girl, Third Watch, Conviction, Brother Outsider (PBS), Law + Order (original, SVU + Criminal Intent), The Progressives (miniseries), Novel Reflections (pilot). Education: The Yale School of Drama.

Martin Rayner (Freud) Recent: American premiere of Frank McGuiness’s Gates of Gold (59E59), Fugard’s The Road to Mecca (Studio Theatre DC), American premier McGuiness’s The Bird Sanctuary (Pittsburgh Public). Favorite On/Off-Broadway: Hans in Sixteen Wounded, Pater in Stoppard’s The Invention of Love, Charles VI in Henry V (Central Park), Henry in Travels with My Aunt (Minetta Lane – Drama Desk, Outer Circle Awards), Frizer in Kit Marlowe (Public). Favorite regional: Yale Rep: Underground, You Never Can Tell; McCarter: Loot; A.R.T.: King Lear, When We Dead Awaken; Wilma: The Invention of Love, The Magic Fire. Television: Dr. Chaotica, Star Trek Voyager, Frasier, Law & Order: CI., Dangerous Curves, Churchill’s People, Benjamin Franklin. Favorite commercial: Grey Poupon.

Barrington Stage has presented Award-winning playwright Mark St. Germain’s The God Committee, Ears on A Beatle and The Collyer Brothers at Home/Period Piece. He has also written Camping with Henry and Tom (Outer Critics Circle Award and Lucille Lortel Award), Forgiving Typhoid Mary, Out of Gas on Lovers Leap, among others. His musical theatre credits include The Gifts of the Magi, co-written by Randy Courts, and Stand By Your Man – The Tammy Wynette Story.
Mr. St. Germain was also a creative consultant and writer for several seasons on The Cosby Show and co-wrote the screenplay for the acclaimed film, Duma.

Tyler Marchant (Director) At BSC: Freud’s Last Session, A Picasso. Recent directing credits include the world premiere of 40 Days by Laura Eason, RENT, Lend Me a Tenor, Cloud 9 and the world premiere of the musical Anne of Green Gables at the Lucille Lortel Theatre in NYC. From 2000-2006, Tyler served as the Associate Artistic Director at the Off-Broadway theatre Primary Stages. M.F.A. in Directing at University of South Carolina , member SDC.

Barrington Stage’s production design team for Freud’s Last Session will once again includes Brian Prather (scenic design), Mark Mariani (costume design), Clifton Taylor (lighting design), Beth Lake (sound design). Kate Cudworth is production stage manager.

Performances of Freud’s Last Session are Tuesday through Friday at 7:30pm, Wednesdays at 2pm, Saturdays at 4pm and 8pm and Sunday at 7:30pm at BSC Stage 2, 36 Linden St., Pittsfield. Please note additional performance on Thursday, July 1 at 4pm. Tickets: $15-$45. For ticket information call 413-236-8888, stop by the BSC Box Office at 30 Union Street , or visit www.barringtonstageco.org.

May 29, 2010 concert reviewed by Ronald K. Baker.

Chalk up another stellar concert organized by BerkshiresJazz.org, presented in an intimate, perfect venue – the Berkshire Museum’s Little Cinema auditorium. The museum’s 9-foot Steinway Grande piano got a good workout courtesy of the power and technique of the towering artist, Randy Weston, as he played his African Rhythms concert along with bass player, Alex Blake.

(Watch a video clip from the concert at BerkshiresJazz.org.)

By way of introduction, Mr. Weston spoke of the spirit as being the foundation of all his music. Music is everywhere in nature, he said, and nowhere is that spirit more evident than it is in Africa. The concert opened with Blue Moses, a Moroccan piece that set the tone for the rest of the evening. After a free-flowing introduction, the bass came in and joined Weston’s thundering octaves and fifths as he milked the low range of the piano.

It turns out that bassist Alex Blake is a percussion section unto himself. His dominant foot stomping was tireless, commanding, and engaging. Against this obstinate continuum, he provided a mix of elemental drum sounds through a range of dazzling techniques. Subtle bongo sounds rippled from the fingers of his left hand tapping gently on the neck of his instrument. Louder accents and percussive pops sprang from the palm of his right hand as he slapped here and there along the entire length of the fingerboard. For the most exclamatory, he’d pluck the lowest string with such force that it created a resounding whack akin to the crack of a whip.

While accompanying Weston, Blake proved himself a repository of provocative rhythms, often strumming the bass as though it were a guitar. He coupled this technique along with double and triple stops in order to create chords, most notably in his solos. And he had one more trick up his sleeve, both figuratively and literally. He wore a smooth metal bracelet on his right wrist. Whenever he wanted a loud smack to punctuate a phrase, he would slap the lower part of the fingerboard with the bracelet simulating a rim shot on a snare drum. It clearly was yeoman’s duty, and, as Weston gazed at him bemused, the array of sounds Blake achieved was masterful. He threw himself bodily into each piece like a whirling dervish with an intensity that left him visibly winded. The audience erupted repeatedly into spontaneous applause.

Randy Weston’s playing seemed effortless in contrast; he was the picture of coolness in his understated, gray silk shirt, matching kufi cap, black slacks and wingtips sans socks. He was gracious guide introducing each work along with some tidbits of history of African music as well as of slavery. His compositions – exotic voyages – contrasted delicate, evocative passages with explosive fortissimos that filled the hall. Overall, his style recalls Ahmad Jamal more than it does Oscar Peterson.

But since his pieces are largely bereft of repeated melodies, his improvisations rarely drew applause, as even some of the hippest jazz listeners seemed scarcely able to discern the divergence of theme from variation. No matter. It made for rapt attention. And judging from his own appreciative smiles and self-effacing demeanor, Randy Weston probably would have considered clapping an unnecessary distraction anyway.