Even without the attendance of Matt or Ben, the production has far exceeded expectations to become one of the past year’s most talked-about theatrical debuts. Time Magazine’s theater critic Richard Zoglin deemed it one of the top five productions of 2003, and it was awarded Best Overall Production at the New York International Fringe Festival.
Following its successes at the P.S. 122 theatre in New York City and ACME Comedy Theatre in Los Angeles, Matt & Ben jetted through a series of popular runs across the U.S. and Canada. Harvard will be the cast’s last stop before taking Matt & Ben around the globe to test the show’s viability in front of international audiences.
The arrival of the show on Crimson soil is a product of the efforts of producer Andrew Arthur. A non-resident film and drama tutor at Winthrop House and director of various campus plays over the years, Arthur originally conceived of a student production of the show. He called up the playwrights to ask them to lease the rights. He was denied, but Arthur had one hand left to play.
“I shared the Harvard legend with Mindy [Kaling] that Matt’s last performance at Harvard was at Winthrop,” says Arthur. Kaling’s Boston roots and Morris’s former enrollment in Harvard Summer School were subsequently revealed, and they were sold. Through the standard approval process for campus shows, Arthur was able to rent out Winthrop’s JCR for two weeks to kick the production into gear.
Cabot House senior James Patton will serve as co-producer of the show. A former collaborator with Arthur, he says that he has been recruiting students for light and sound coordination. Patton claims everything except the acting and stage management will be done by Harvard students.
Patton cites high curiosity among the student body—with a possible future Matt Damon among them—when he discusses the production. “It’s a novel concept and everyone I’ve talked to seemed extremely interested in the show,” he says.
The players involved seem equally excited by the prospect of bringing their show to the Harvard audience, describing the various connections between the play and the college.
“It will be exciting to see how it plays especially since Matt went to Harvard,” says Bernstine. “Maybe the audience will get more of the subtle references [to Cambridge and Boston], because there are definitely references made to that area.”
Kaling says, “The fact that Ben and Matt are from Cambridge, and that Matt went to Harvard makes me feel like the show is coming home.”
Her only regret for the homecoming of her play is that she wishes “Bren [Withers] and I were performing, and then after getting a huge Bartley’s burger and shake. That is the best burger and shake in the world.”
As for how Harvard undergraduates will feel about the play’s approach to a former member of their clan, Kaling says, “Matt is the smart hero in the play bound for greatness. That’s very flattering, isn’t it?”
—Staff writer Ben B. Chung can be reached at bchung@fas.harvard.edu.