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Review: F. Murray Abraham Acts the Krapp out of Beckett at Irish Repertory Theatre

The Oscar winner stars in Krapp’s Last Tape, one of three shorts in Beckett Briefs.

Pete Hempstead

Pete Hempstead

| Off-Broadway |

January 26, 2025

F. Murray Abraham in Krapp's Last Tape part of Irish Rep's BECKETT BRIEFS, Photo by Carol Rosegg (5)
F. Murray Abraham stars in Krapp’s Last Tape, part of Beckett Briefs, directed by Ciarán O’Reilly, at Irish Repertory Theatre.
(© Carol Rosegg)

For fans of Samuel Beckett’s plays, every production feels like an event—not just the Godots with big stars, but the handful of smaller works that don’t get staged as often. In 2013, Irish Repertory Theatre ran a trio of shorter plays in A Mind-Bending Evening of Beckett, and they’re doing something similar in Beckett Briefs: From the Cradle to the Grave, a 75-minute set comprising Not I, Play, and Krapp’s Last Tape, all directed by Ciarán O’Reilly.

That list is enough to get a Beckett enthusiast excited, but when you add F. Murray Abraham to the cast, the show becomes a must-see. Best known for playing Salieri in Amadeus and Bert Di Grasso on The White Lotus, Abraham is giving a masterclass in Beckett’s brand of wistful existentialism as Krapp. Whether you’re a Beckett buff or not, you need to see this.

Sarah Street in Not I part of Irish Rep's BECKETT BRIEFS, Photo by Carol Rosegg
Sarah Street plays Mouth in Not I at Irish Repertory Theatre.
(© Carol Rosegg)

First up is Not I, one of the strangest monologues you’ll ever hear, or see. The theater goes completely dark as a red-lipped Mouth (Sarah Street) floats out high above the stage (think the iconic lips from The Rocky Horror Picture Show). Illuminated by only a tiny spotlight (fine-tuned lighting design by Michael Gottlieb), it belongs to an unnamed 70-year-old woman who launches into an enigmatic speech about her life, beginning with her premature birth. It’s difficult to comprehend exactly what has happened to her as her memories erupt fast and furious, but Street’s steady delivery, while brisk, lets us grasp that the woman seems to have been silent her whole life, and this explosive torrent of words is her long-suppressed indictment of the world.

Play doesn’t tax our comprehension quite as much. A man (Roger Dominic Casey) and two women (Street and Kate Forbes), trapped in some dark hellish place (scenic design by Charlie Corcoran), sit in funeral urns with only their heads exposed. There, they are forced to repeat for all eternity the details of the man’s marriage to one of the women and his affair with the other, while an interrogation light races from face to face. The first time we hear their story, there are plenty of laughs. But Beckett is torturing us as well as the characters: we have to sit though the same dialogue twice. Maybe hell isn’t other people—maybe it’s the theater.

Sarah Street, Roger Dominic Casey, and Kate Forbes in Play part of Irish Rep's BECKETT BRIEFS, Photo by Carol Rosegg
Sarah Street, Roger Dominic Casey, and Kate Forbes in Play, part of Beckett Briefs, directed by Ciarán O’Reilly, at Irish Repertory Theatre.
(© Carol Rosegg)

That idea evaporates with the last play, Krapp’s Last Tape, one of Beckett’s underproduced masterpieces. Sitting in a room littered with papers and spools of recording tape (Nicole Rozanski’s props are impeccably chosen), Krapp listens to his audio journals and thinks about the woman he once loved and lost. First produced in 1958, it’s a gently mournful piece (Orla Long’s loose vest and pants establish the time and reflect Krapp’s unsettled mind). But Abraham never lets things slip into the maudlin. He gets laughs with his comical massaging of a banana (though the schtick where he slips on the banana’s peel doesn’t land quite as well). Still, the play’s heart is always found in Abraham’s eyes as they glisten with regret and the pain of what might have been.

If I have one quibble, it’s Ryan Rumery’s music, which opens the show. Its thunderous volume seems totally at odds with the quieter rumble of voices that will follow; otherwise, his and M. Florian Staab’s sound design does Abraham and the rest of the cast justice. I’m always pleased when Beckett’s shorter works get their deserved stage time in solid productions like this. Keep them coming.

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