Galileo in America 2012

Galileo in America

welcome to Galileo in America

created by Robert Allen + Antoinette LaFarge

Galileo in America is an original theatrical work in which clowns and inquisitors share the stage. Equally cabaret and courtroom, it is nominally set in the 1940s, when German playwright Bertolt Brecht fled to Santa Monica to escape the Nazis. But in the surreal time-space of the piece, Brecht meets both a character from one of his own plays and the FBI agents who had him under surveillance as a suspected communist.

During his exile in California, Brecht works on a new production of a play he has written about Galileo's struggle with the Catholic Church. The noted film actor Charles Laughton helps him with the translation and takes on the role of Galileo himself. Meanwhile, Brecht and his friends are being dogged by FBI agents, while Brecht is having trouble with Galileo's daughter Virginia, who is unhappy with her depiction in Brecht's play. Then, at the very end of this troubled period, Brecht has his own reckoning with authority when he is called to testify before the infamous House Un-American Activities Committee. More about the piece.

Galileo in America will have its world premiere at the new Experimental Media Performance Lab in the Contemporary Art Center at the University of California, Irvine, in February 2012. It has been supported by the Goethe Institute, Los Angeles; the Villa Aurora, Pacific Palisades; the Institute of Cultural Inquiry, Los Angeles; the University of California, Irvine; and contributions from individual donors, among whom we would like especially to thank Elizabeth Curtis, Joan Starr, Christel Dillbohner, Ravi Narasimhan, Zeph Bender, and Clare Allen.

Allen and LaFarge have created a number of well-received performance works, including Hangmen Also Die (2010), The Roman Forum Project (2003), Demotic (2006), and Playing the Rapture (2008). More about the artists