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Alan and Norman, New York and Fort Worth


by Jerome Weeks 22 Apr 2009 8:44 AM

It’s the last week for The Norman Conquests, the trilogy of comedies by Alan Ayckbourn at Stage West, and so The New York Times thoughtfully provides an update on the playwright, who at 70 has recovered from a stroke a few years ago. He’s healthy enough these days to start on an adaptation of Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya.

CTA TBD

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It’s the last week for The Norman Conquests, the trilogy of comedies by Alan Ayckbourn at  Stage West, and so The New York Times thoughtfully provides an update on the playwright, who at 70 has recovered from a stroke a few years ago. He’s healthy enough these days to start on an adaptation of Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya.

The fact that The Norman Conquests is set to open Thursday at the Circle in the Square in New York had nothing to do with the timing of the Times story. And the fact that the new production had a triumphant run at London’s Old Vic and that Stage West’s cafe just happens to be called the Ol’ Vic only proves that 1) people have run out of names to call things, 2) it all connects to Texas somehow, 3) the universe is a lot smaller than we think and these kinds of strange synchronicities between us and Alpha Centauri 4 will happen more often or 4) you could save a lot of money on air travel by just seeing the Ayckbourn trilogy in Fort Worth.

You’re welcome.

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  • Thank you for the mid-day chuckle. 🙂

    Also, that NYT article is really great… I hope more people read it and end up joining us at Stage West for the final weekend of “Norman.”

    BTW, our cafe is called The Ol’ Vic Cafe because 1) Stage West is located on VICkery Blvd and 2) Stage West was located at 821 W. Vickery once before – between ’81 and ’91 – and when we returned in 2007, our staff began to playfully refer to the building as the Ol’ Vic. The nickname stuck and became our cafe’s name.

  • Didn’t mean to imply that the people at Stage West lacked imagination in naming the cafe. I knew the references in Ol’ Vic — hey, I reviewed plenty o’ shows the first time through on Vickery. The coincidence was just too obvious to pass up.