School of Theater Collaborates With Drive Theatre for Adaptation of Anouilh’s Becket

Opening Scene from ‘Becket’s Honour.’ | Courtesy of Drive Theatre Company.

From today until Saturday (Oct. 4), Drive Theatre Company and the CalArts School of Theater present proof-of-concept workshop performances of Becket’s Honour, a play adapted from Jean Anouilh’s Becket, by CalArts’ Head of Production Management Gary Kechely and alumna Kathleen Reinbold (Theater MFA 12).

While exploring the historical conflict between one-time friends King Henry II and Archbishop Thomas Becket as the original Becket does, Becket’s Honour delves deeper into the text by exploring the dichotomy between the inner and outer selves.

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While this adaptation nods to the historical considerations of the 12th-century setting, it focuses upon cracking open the interpersonal relationship and the relationship of a man with himself. The Becket text lends itself to this interpretation, and our adaptation pulls the strings further by double-casting Becket and Henry as a male and female. The four actors share the stage, lines, and interactions, but navigate the world and base their reactions and conflicts upon the “side” of the character they represent. They are, in a nutshell, the two halves of the same story, the mirrored opposites incarnate.

The performances feature a number of CalArtians in both the cast and the production side, with Chrissie Harms (Theater MFA 13) and William J. Reinbold as King Henry II, Matthew Bamberg-Johnson (Theater MFA 13) and Emelie O’Hara as Thomas Becket, and Genevieve Gearhart (Theater MFA 13) as Gwendolen and King of France.