SAN DIEGO–One hundred years ago, Ambrose Bierce – the unique, cynical, sardonically witty, and obscurely famous American author – disappeared mysteriously off the face of the earth without any trace.
In this highly amusing and often moving play, Bitter Bierce, by the Obie-winning playwright Mac Wellman, Bierce returns once more to our world in order to share some of his strange fictions and real experiences with the audience – his tales of harrowing participation as a soldier in some of the fiercest battles of the Civil War, plus his exploits as an uncompromising newspaperman confronting hypocrisy and corruption during America’s Gilded Age, as well as his meetings with the great and near great, and along with some sharp, biting, and hilarious definitions from his well-known “Devil’s Dictionary.”
Director Walter Ritter brings to life this “serio-comic monologue” (subtitled “The Friction We Call Grief”) with George Weinberg-Harter in the solo role of Ambrose Bierce. Walter Ritter, who serves as Executive Director and Co-Founder of Write Out Loud, where he frequently performs, is also a Resident Artist at both Ion Theatre and Lynx Performance. He has also performed at Lamb’s Players Theatre, Sledgehammer, Moonlight Stage, Starlight Opera, and others.
George Weinberg-Harter has long participated in San Diego theatre in a variety of ways, having performed with the San Diego Gilbert & Sullivan Company, Lamb’s Players Theatre, Starlight Opera, Teatro Mascara Magica, Talent to aMuse Theatre, Scripps Ranch Theatre, 7th & Penn Theatre, and others. Some of his favorite roles have included Pandarus in “Troilus and Cressida,” Bottom in “A Midsummer Night’s Dream,” the title role in Moliere’s “The Imaginary Invalid,” Henry in “The Fantasticks,” Mr. De Pinna in “You Can’t Take It With You,” Don Marzio in Goldoni’s “The Coffee Shop,” and numerous Gilbert & Sullivan patter-song characters.
Mac Wellman, born in 1945, is an American playwright, author, and poet. Wellman is best known for his experimental work in the theater. Wellman is the Donald I. Fine Professor of Play Writing at Brooklyn College, New York City, and in 2010 he became a CUNY Distinguished Professor. Wellman is author to more than forty plays. He has received grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, New York Foundation for the Arts, the Rockefeller Foundation, the McKnight Foundation and a Guggenheim Fellowship. In 1990 he received an Obie award for Best New American Play (for Bad Penny, Terminal Hip, and Crowbar). In 1991 he received another Obie award for Sincerity Forever. He has received a Lila Wallace-Readers’ Digest Writers Award, and most recently the 2003 Obie award for Lifetime Achievement as well as a grant from the Foundation for Contemporary Arts that same year. He is a co-founder of The Flea Theater in New York City. His play 7 Blowjobs was seen here in 1991 at the Sledgehammer Theatre.
In commemoration of this the centenary of Ambrose Bierce’s mysterious disappearance, Bitter Bierce will be produced by the semi-professional theatre company, Talent to aMuse, at the 10th Avenue Theatre’s Cabaret Theatre on the 4th floor.
Performances will take place on June 13 to 22. Show times are 8 p.m. on Fridays and Saturdays, 4 p.m. on Sundays, and 7 p.m. Thursday.
For reservations, call (619) 940-6813, or email at info@talenttoamuse.com. Pre-purchased tickets are $20 for adults and $15 for seniors, military, and students. Tickets purchased at the door cost $5 more.
Mac Wellman’s Bitter Bierce is produced by special arrangement with Playscripts, Inc.
