Theatre Chess Video - Richard III - Opening Chess Game

Hello chess blog friends, LUTheatre presents: Richard III - Opening Chess Game - From the 2014 production in collaboration with RSC's Open Stages. Enjoy.






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Kingsley’s Gambit - One-Act Play by Weston High Theater Company

Chess Blog for Daily Chess News and Trivia (c) Alexandra Kosteniuk, 2014

Hello everyone,

“Kingsley’s Gambit” is an original one-act play created by 19 cast members of the Weston High Theater Company. The play is the story of a chess master, Charles Kingsley, who transfers his techniques of controlling from the chessboard to his family life. Through a mix of comedy and drama, it addresses the destructive nature of control and the nature of winning – for every win, there must also be a loss.

“Kingsley’s Gambit” is an original one-act play created by 19 cast members of the Weston High Theater Company.

The play is the story of a chess master, Charles Kingsley, who transfers his techniques of controlling from the chessboard to his family life. Through a mix of comedy and drama, it addresses the destructive nature of control and the nature of winning – for every win, there must also be a loss.

“Kingsley’s Gambit” has made it though the first two rounds of the Massachusetts Educational Theater Guild Drama Festival, and is now one of the 14 schools to make the state finals on March 27 to 29 at the John Hancock Hall/Back Bay Events Center in Boston.

During the first round of competition at Norwood High School on March 1, seniors Alex Rougeau, Charlie Gold, James Cebulla and Sammy Hooper all received acting awards for their performances.

Weston High School hosted one of the semifinal rounds on March 22 and was one of two schools selected to move on to state finals. Garnering awards on that day for Weston were Becky Jesurum for lighting design, and Clark Eglinton, Kristen Sands, James Mullany and Michael Brown for acting. Also, Becky Jesurum won the David Dooley Award as the “unsung hero” of this round of the festival.

Weston High School takes the stage for the state finals on Friday, March 28 at 8 p.m. Tickets can be purchased online (http://ticketstage.com) or at the box office (cash or check only) at the corner of Berkeley and Stuart streets in Boston.

From Alexandra Kosteniuk's
www.chessblog.com
Also see her personal chess blog
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Fish Men Actor Talks About Chess Hustlers

Chess blog for latest chess news and chess trivia (c) Alexandra Kosteniuk, 2012

Hi everyone,

Remember the recent post we put up about a nice presentation - Fish Men? 

Fish Men Chess Play - Humour, Pathos, and Super Story!

Here is an interview with its protagonist and his take on the chess hustlers of Washington Park!
 

In “Fish Men,” the second of three world premieres at the Goodman produced in partnership with the Latino troupe TeatroVista, by Teatro resident playwright (and US Chess Federation Grand Master) Candido Tirado, Cantor plays Stuart, a successful real-estate broker who considers himself part of the scene at the park.

Though the chess hustlers consider him just another “fish” or mark, one of the two meanings of the show’s title, along with a reference to mythical figures from the Mayan Book of the Dead, who come down to Earth to redeem and/or punish the wicked.

Preceding the action of the play, which unfolds in real time on a set recreating the gaming tables in Washington Square, the chess hustlers have savagely fleeced a sucker who was unstable enough to allow himself to be taken for everything he owns — and Stuart, as self-appointed moral arbiter, takes them to task. Soon after, a young half-Mayan named Rey Reyes (Raul Castillo) arrives. A survivor of genocide in Guatemala, he seems at first to be just another fish but eventually reveals a vengeful agenda of his own.

Who’s on top

“One of the themes in the play is a set of concentric circles, micro to macro, about the way exploitation and brutality and domination plays out in the world,” said Cantor, an Evanston resident and assistant professor of acting at Northwestern University. “The most micro is the game of chess itself, which can be very aggressive. Then you have the community in the park, with its dominators and dominated. Then you have political domination, all the way up to using genocide to oppress a population.”

The play also concerns itself, he said, with revealing the motivations driving
the various characters,
from the chess hustlers, to the guys hanging out in the park like his character (“after all my sanctimoniousness, it’s revealed that I’m a bit of a slumlord”), to a World War II Holocaust survivor (Howard Witt), who has taken an oath never to play chess again, for mysterious reasons, and who forms an attachment to the young Guatemalan survivor.

If none of that sounds like a laugh riot, “Fish Men” may surprise you, according to Cantor.

“It might sound grim, but it’s also very funny,” he said. “There’s a lively, free-spirited, humorous street culture among the hustlers that’s really enjoyable. Tough things are going on in the play, but it’s fun and colorful and kind of hilarious at the same time.”

Read the full interview here.

From Alexandra Kosteniuk's
www.chessblog.com
Also see her personal blog at
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Theatre, love and chess - the great combination!

Chess blog for latest chess news and chess trivia (c) Alexandra Kosteniuk, 2012

Hi everyone,

There is another play that revolves around chess and love.

Fijian boy meets English girl over a game of chess and begin an unlikely love affair.

 

Artistic director Nina Nawalowalo's parents' first meeting in Wellington in the 1950s is the premise for The Conch theatre company's new play Masi.

Her father was a Fijian high chief from the island of Kadavu and her mother the daughter of Cambridge-educated public schoolmasters.

The pair met at the Wellington Chess Club and their young romance was captured in photographs by then budding photographer Ans Westra – her mother's flatmate.

"It was quite unusual in the 1950s, a Pacific Island man marrying an English woman. Also the story is very elemental, because a lot of New Zealanders' parents or grandparents came from somewhere else. So it's a meeting of different cultures in that way."

A story close to her heart, Nawalowalo has been developing the play for several years. Her father has since died and her mother has been battling dementia.

"When one loses their parents, these memories which are linked to something in the past become so important. It's something everybody goes through, losing things in that way."

Read the full story here.

From Alexandra Kosteniuk's
www.chessblog.com
Also see her personal blog at
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Video clip: The Closing To Search For Bobby Fischer 1994 VHS

Chess blog for latest chess news and chess trivia (c) Alexandra Kosteniuk, 2011


Hello everyone,

Here is a cool video for all those fans of Josh Waitzkin and 'Searching for Bobby Fischer' with Maurice Ashley asking the questions! Enjoy.





Here is the final scene from the super movie!





From Alexandra Kosteniuk's
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Also see her personal blog at
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Combat Chess in the theatre!

Chess blog for latest chess news and chess trivia (c) Alexandra Kosteniuk, 2011

Hi everyone,

Six Elements Theatre Company has come up with Human Combat Chess - another unique way that chess links to theatre.

The Company has already performed thrice before fans at the University Baptist Church in Dinkytown. Mike Lubke, one of the founders of the Company, says he combined his personal loves - theatre, combat and sporting atmosphere. The show features mock battles and fighting. Quite cool for those who have an appetite for this stuff.

In the photo you see Kathryn Jacobs kicking Rachel Persdorf during Human Combat Chess at the University Baptist Church in Dinkytown. Read more at this link.

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Theatre chess - World premiere of Fish Men - story of chess hustlers!

Chess blog for latest chess news and chess trivia (c) Alexandra Kosteniuk, 2011

Hi everyone,

The Goodman Theatre has announced that it will add a world premiere to its 2011-12 season: “Fish Men,” a play about urban “chess hustlers” by the Puerto Rican playwright Candido Tirado. Slated for April 2012, it’s a co-production with the Teatro Vista theater company, part of the partnership between the two Chicago companies. The show will be directed by Edward Torres.

In Fish Men, according to Goodman's April 20 announcement, "a group of chess hustlers engage each other in spirited matches on a hot summer day in Washington Square Park, hoping to draw unsuspecting players into a high-stakes hustle. Their patience is soon rewarded by the appearance of Rey Reyes, a young student who naively agrees to their challenge. But as the game progresses, the chess tables are turned — raising the stakes and revealing the traumatic circumstances that have made them seek refuge in a game that has become their obsession. Resounding with biting humor and unexpected pathos, Fish Men focuses on a group of unforgettable characters, drawn together by their need to overcome individual tragedies."

Playwright Tirado, who has since become a chess master rated by the United States Chess Federation, said in a statement, "When I graduated from college, I decided I wanted to combine two great loves of my life: writing plays and playing chess! But it wasn't until 2000, as I was walking by the chess tables in Washington Square Park, that suddenly the play Fish Menrevealed itself to me. Outwardly, the play deals with the cruel art of the chess hustle — but underneath is man's inhumanity towards his fellow man."

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From Alexandra Kosteniuk's

www.chessblog.com

Also see her personal blog at

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