REVIEWS
GHOSTS...
"Director Carey Perloff has used the unusual set design by Diane Laffrey wonderfully as emotions and health move the characters to and fro and back and forth around the large stage in Williamstown. Perloff has certainly given each character his/her moments in which to shine, and she has moved the play out of its own antiquity and into the more contemporary light where, even now, certain things are never discussed in polite society."
–– THE BERKSHIRE EDGE
"This production with the new translation is notably fresh and remarkably relevant. Where most tragedies deal mainly with the unhappy consequences of breaking the moral code, GHOSTS deals with the consequences of not breaking it. The parallels between the material written 138 years ago and events currently playing out in the US and across the world are stunning and undeniable."
–– BROADWAY WORLD
THE FIT...
"Carey Perloff back at ACT’s Strand Theater — as a playwright this time"
“Set in the strange realm of Silicon Valley venture capital firms, 'The Fit' follows an Indian-American woman struggling to make her way in an industry where she has to deny her own identity and values to get ahead.
'I have been interested in gender politics my whole career,' Perloff says, “wrestling with the nature of leadership and whether what we want as women is simply to step into the shoes of the men around us or whether we actually want to try and remake what the table looks like, as it were.”
– THE MERCURY NEWS
PRIVATE LIVES...
"Stratford Festival Review: 'Rolling with laughter' at Private Lives."
"Witty dialogue and superb acting makes Private Lives a hilarious night out in Stratford this summer"
“The performances Perloff has elicited are refreshingly down-to-earth. None of that debonair posturing, the artificial old-mannered acting styles that can drag down Coward productions. Peacock is superb as Amanda – a rich and aimless woman who nevertheless nurses a deep sadness that apparently only Elyot and his tempers can assuage. The actor's line deliveries are fresh and funny, but there's always a beating heart underneath. Wyn Davies, meanwhile, isn't afraid to play Elyot as a violent misogynist. 'I should like to cut off your head with a meat axe,' he shouts at Sibyl, no Cowardian charm to couch it.”
– GLOBE AND MAIL
"Director Carey Perloff has compiled a fine cast. Lucy Peacock and Geraint Wyn Davies as ex spouses Amanda and Elyot are a divine pairing. From the moment Amanda knows to hand Elyot the fruit from her cocktail, it is clear that these two share something far more intimate with each other than they do with their new spouses. Their chemistry is excellent and they are equally as fun to watch when they are getting along as they are when they are sparring."
– BROADWAY WORLD
A THOUSAND SPLENDID SUNS...
"The best theatre of 2018, A Thousand Splendid Suns, Old Globe Theatre:" repressive period (the years between 1979 and 2001). Directed by Carey Perloff, the play also featured original music by David Coulter, who contributed another layer of artistry to a remarkable production."
"...A powerful production that had the audience sobbing."
"Epic splendor...dazzles with its opulence and humanity."
"Radiant and real...a stunning stage production. Almost defies you not to be moved."
Critic Picks A Thousand Splendid Suns and Queens for The Best of San Diego Theater in 2018:
“This knockout co-production of A Thousand Splendid Suns at The Old Globe, the American Conservatory Theatre and Theatre Calgary, was as splendid as its poetic title, under the magnificent direction of Carey Perloff (who extended her San Diego stay to direct a superb production of Queens at the La Jolla Playhouse right after this one; see below). Splendid Suns beautiful imagistic set, lovely score (much of it played on the musical saw) and evocative lighting and sound added up to an extraordinary evening that underscored, even in the very worst of circumstances, the enduring hope for a better, freer life.”
–– TIMES OF SAN DIEGO
“...A powerful production that had the audience sobbing.”
–– CALGARY HERALD
“Epic splendor...dazzles with its opulence and humanity.”
— SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE
“Emotionally stirring! once the story is underway, it's hard not to be swept along. theatergoers are rewarded not with a fairy tale ending but with a clarification of what redeems us as human beings.”
— LOS ANGELES TIMES
“Carey Perloff's direction as she leads these two women through their journeys is stunning. she never forces a moment or the pace but simply lets them unfold creating a raw and honest tone and lending a sense of realism to the actors who are stunning."
— BROADWAY WORLD
“...'theatrical alchemy.' it's where all the right elements seem to magically come together in just the right ways to form pure theatrical gold. seattle rep currently has a bunch of alchemists...working with them with their joint production with the american conservatory theater and their presentation of 'a thousand splendid suns,' a riveting tale filled with so much tragic beauty, that you'll be left breathless.”
— BROADWAY WORLD
"CAREY PERLOFF STAGES LAST PLAY AFTER 25 YEARS AT HELM OF ACT KQED FORUM (AUDIO INTERVIEW)"
"Carey Perloff is stepping down as artistic director of ACT after directing the company for a quarter century. Her final show was Harold Pinter's "The Birthday Party." Forum talked with Perloff about her career, the future of theater in San Francisco and her final production."
–– KQED FORUM
"CAREY PERLOFF, LEADING LADY OF ACT"
"I was absolutely sure that I was going to be fired," Carey Perloff says of her tumultuous first year as artistic director of the American Conservatory Theater.
She had good reason to worry. Outraged Catholic Church members had picketed and leafleted playwright Dario Fo's satire "The Pope and the Witch." Audiences had walked out in droves, and the theater and local newspapers were flooded with angry letters about the pervasive, S&M-tinged nudity in another production, "The Duchess of Malfi."
–– Robert Hurwitt, SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE
CAREY PERLOFF: LEFT COAST, RIGHT TIME
"After a quarter century at the helm of ACT, the classics-minded director/playwright is quitting while she’s ahead."
–– Robert Avila, AMERICAN THEATER
"CAREY PERLOFF: CANADIAN THEATRE’S STATESIDE CHAMPION"
"What's wrong with Canadian plays?" Asked a prominent American theatre commentator in a widely circulated blog post last summer – nearly causing an outbreak of familiar cultural cringe on this side of the border. "Quick, name five modern Canadian playwrights," Howard Sherman, former executive director of the American Theatre Wing in New York, challenged his readers in the online journal HowlRound. "Having trouble? I bet you are."
–– THE GLOBE AND THE MAIL
"SHE'S STEPPING DOWN FROM A.C.T., BUT CAREY PERLOFF CONTINUES THE FIGHT FOR WOMEN'S STORIES"
"Fundamental to the theater's success, she said, has been a commitment to the audience: 'Bill Ball felt the audience would rise to the level that you challenged them to rise to, and I've always believed that too. We have never dumbed down.'"
–– Charles McNulty, LOS ANGELES TIMES
THE BACCHAE
by Euripides
A Live Rehearsal
Presented by San Francisco Playhouse
REVIEW...
For the rare opportunity to watch two master actors—Anthony Fusco and John Douglas Thompson—work and rework a short scene under the direction of equally inspired former American Conservatory Theater artistic director Carey Perloff, check out this San Francisco Playhouse “Zoomlet”: The actors explore a small section of Euripides’ “The Bacchae,” reading it three times (including switching roles) and, in between, discussing the various motivations and attributes of the two characters, the god Dionysius and Pentheus, the King of Thebes. It’s an eye-opening glimpse of actors and director (joined by SF Playhouse’s Bill English) in top creative form as they tackle a Greek classic. Visit https://www.sfplayhouse.org/sfph/zoomlet/.
–– THE SAN FRANCISCO EXAMINER
Olympia Dukakis, Minister of the Interior
A fierce, unsentimental explorer of the human experience, she was also a subversive wit and a dear friend, especially to her audiences.
A Tribute By Carey Perloff
Roxanna Raja, Olympia Dukakis, and Marco Barricelli in American Conservatory Theater's 1998 revival of "HECUBA." Photo by Ken Friedman
Peter Riegert's
PODCAST
THE MARTIN E. SEGAL THEATRE CENTER
presents
SEGAL TALKS with Carey Perloff
A conversation about curating, producing, and presenting theatre
and performance in the time of Corona
Moderator: Frank Hentschker, Director, MESTC
The Wisdom of Theater Elders in COVID Time
(ClydeFitch Report)
These artists remind us of how multivalent the theater is, how many solutions there are to the crises of funding, isolation, censorship and personal voice.
Carey Perloff Gives Keynote at the
Alliance for Jewish Theater
Annual Conference