Alec Baldwin to Star in EQUUS at Guild Hall this Summer

According to the New York Times, following his stint as Oscar co-host this Sunday, Alec Baldwin will be heading back to the east coast to star as the psychiatrist Martin Dysart in Peter Shaffer's Equus this summer at Guild Hall in East Hampton, N.Y. The production will run from June 8 - July 13 at the John Drew Theater at Guild Hall. This will be Baldwin's first production at Guild Hall, of which he is a board member. 

Equus, written in 1973, tells the story of a psychiatrist who attempts to treat a young man who has a pathological religious/sexual fascination with horses. The New York Times is reporting that Shaffer plans to rewrite parts of the script for this next production and will work in residence at Guild Hall. Equus will be directed Tony Award-winning set designer Tony Walton.  

The play was originally staged at the Royal National Theatre at the Old Vic in London in 1973. It was directed by John Dexter and starred Alec McCowen as psychiatrist Martin Dysart and Peter Firth as Alan Strang, the young patient. In 1976 it transferred to the Albery Theatre with Colin Blakely playing Dysart. It was also presented on Broadway at the Plymouth Theatre with Anthony Hopkins and Peter Firth.

Equus was revived in 2007 in London's West End, with Richard Griffiths and Daniel Radcliffe in the leading roles. The production, directed by Thea Sharrock, opened in February 2007 at the Gielgud Theatre. This London revival transferred to Broadway in 2008 and played the Broadhurst Theatre, running through 8 February 2009. Radcliffe and Griffiths reprised their roles, and Thea Sharrock returned as director.

No stranger to the stage, Baldwin made his Broadway debut in 1986, in a revival of Joe Orton's Loot alongside theatre veterans Zoe Wanamaker, Željko Ivanek, Joseph Maher and Charles Keating. His other Broadway credits include Caryl Churchill's Serious Money with Kate Nelligan, and a highly acclaimed revival of Tennessee Williams' A Streetcar Named Desire; his performance as Stanley Kowalski garnered him a Tony Award nomination for Best Actor. This production also featured Jessica Lange, Amy Madigan, Timothy Carhart, James Gandolfini, and Aida Turturro. Baldwin would receive an Emmy nomination for the television version of the production, in which both he and Lange reprise their roles. That version featured John Goodman and Diane Lane.

In 1998, Baldwin played the title role in Macbeth at The Public Theater alongside Angela Bassett and Liev Schreiber. The production was directed by George C. Wolfe. In 2004, Baldwin starred in a revival of Twentieth Century with Anne Heche. In 2005 he appeared in a concert version of the Rogers and Hammerstein musical South Pacific at Carnegie Hall. He starred as Luther Billis, alongside Reba McEntire as Nellie and Brian Stokes Mitchell as Emile. The production was taped and telecast for PBS. In 2006, Baldwin made theater news in Roundabout Theatre Company's Off-Broadway revival of Joe Orton's Entertaining Mr. Sloane.

Baldwin has appeared in numerous Hollywood films including Beetlejuice, The Hunt for Red October, and Martin Scorsese's The Aviator and The Departed. He was nominated for the Academy Award, Golden Globe, and Screen Actors Guild Award for his performance in the 2003 film The Cooler. Currently, he appears as Jack Donaghy on the NBC sitcom 30 Rock, a role for which he has won two Emmy Awards, two Golden Globe Awards, and three Screen Actors Guild Awards. Baldwin has hosted Saturday Night Live 14.

 

Photo Credit: Peter James Zielinski