MURPHY

His staging of Samuel Beckett's plays with his fellow inmates at San Quentin earned Rick Cluchey a reprieve from his life sentence. He has been spending his freedom in charge of the San Quentin Drama Workshop, still specializing in Beckett's oeuvre. This title first appeared in 1938 but was generally ignored until the success of WAITING FOR GODOT (1952) catapulted the poetic Irish pessimist to international celebrity. MURPHY uses grim humor to describe the adventures of a typical Beckett tramp transplanted from Dublin to London. Superb West Coast actors--Fionnula Flanagan, Brendan Dillon, Colm Meaney, Cluchey, et al.--cannot save an incoherent production, badly recorded and poorly directed. Thanks to their talent and the author's eloquence, we receive some sparkling moments despite the want of cohesion. Y.R. (c) AudioFile 2001, Portland, Maine [Published: DEC/ JAN 02]