About the Project
“The Bean Team Box Set” is a silly little rock & roll comedy show that takes place in the doorway of a college dorm room in 1979. When last staged in Hollywood in 1997, Variety raved: “The Bean Team: An awe-inspiring minimalist genre — bombards the senses with an endless stream of absurdity!”
From the original Variety review:
As described by Steve Bean, young drama student Steve Levy (his earlier self) did not waste his time during his two-year stay at Pittsburgh’s prestigious Carnegie Mellon University back in the late ’70s. Before the school politely asked young Levy to take an extended leave from the campus (he never returned), he and his two roommates, Michael and Crocker, spent their time mastering the art of “Rien!” (Nothing!), or at its most elevated state: “Tres Rien!” (Totally Nothing!). Buoyed by an ample supply of various chemical substances, the trio evolved into the Bean Team, inventing an awe-inspiring minimalist genre called Doorway Theater. Director Roger Cox displays a great empathy for this theatrical form as the second half of evening is devoted to a re-creation of this amazingly mercurial series of “sketchlets” by Bean, ably assisted by Steve Scionti and Kevin Black. Utilizing a simple doorway as a mini-proscenium and a light switch for blackouts, the trio proceeds to bombard the senses with an endless stream of absurdity, including the visage of Death as a sight gag, a fascinating laser show with lit cigarette butts, renderings of their gibberish national anthem, a rock concert with vacuum cleaners, visits with the very earthy Meat family, impromptu home movies by way of rapid digital manipulation of the light switch, and on and on.
Bean, Scionti and Black demonstrate total commitment to the absurdity of their endeavors, their energy and their inventiveness boundless. Impossible to single one out over another, their rapidly evolving personas envelop each other as they segue from scene to scene in a never-faltering rush of physical and verbal activity.
Aiding immeasurably in all this inspired silliness are light and sound operators Sybil Coffee and Bruce Blair.
Learn More at beanteamboxset.com
Production Team
