Alan Mandell, acclaimed actor and interpreter of playwright Samuel Beckett's work, dies at 98
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Set us as preferred Alan Mandell, an acclaimed classical actor and one of the foremost interpreters of playwright Samuel Beckett‘s work, died Tuesday at his home in Westwood.He was 98.Representatives for Mandell’s family confirmed his death to The Times.
Mandell started his theater career in the early 1950s as the artistic director of Theater ‘49 in Toronto.While visiting his sister, he started to work with the San Francisco Actor’s Workshop in 1954.During his time with the theater group, his collaboration with co-founders Jules Irving and Herbert Blau helped transform the workshop into one of the first regional theater companies in the U.S.“My one-week vacation turned into a 12-year stay,” Mandell told The Times in 1992 about what was meant to be a short trip.
Alan Mandell, an award-winning actor, arts patron and arts administrator, was best known for co-founding the San Quentin Drama Workshop and interpreting the plays of Samuel Beckett.During an Actor’s Workshop production of Beckett’s absurdist play “Waiting for Godot” in San Quentin Prison, his portrayal of Lucky inspired the prisoners and led to the creation of the San Quentin Drama Workshop with inmate Rick Cluchey.The troupe operated from 1958 through 1965, making it the first extended prison theater program in the U.S.
launched by prisoners.John N.Apostol, then supervisor of recreation at San Quentin, told Recreation Magazine in 1963 that the group served a twofold purpose.“Not only does it provide an excellent creative outlet for the men, along with serving as a leisure-time activity, but the group has proven to be a splendid emotional outlet with marked therapeutic values,” he said.
“The men learn to work together and accept a responsibility toward the show they are doing and toward one another.”Irving and Blau were later selected...