'When a writer of pulp crime novels gets an interview with a notorious serial killer he believes he has snared the coup of his career. But when he arrives at the asylum, he finds nothing can be trusted, not even his own eyes. Through a series of lies, manipulations and memories, dark secrets are revealed. Why is there a skeleton in the doctor's office? Where did the raw meat in the fridge come from? What is the nurse so afraid of? ...and most importantly, how does one get out?'
These questions and more can be answered in the New York premiere of Anthony Horowitz's acclaimed thriller, MINDGAME starring Tony Award nominated actor Keith Carradine, directed by Ken Russell, the acclaimed director of the films Tommy, Woman In Love and The Boyfriend. Produced by Monica Tidwell, Darren Lee Cole, and Michael Butler, MINDGAME begins performances at SoHo Playhouse (15 Vandam Street) on October 28th and opens Sunday, November 9th.
MINDGAME played London's West End in 2000 at the Vaudeville Theatre following a successful 10-month engagement at Colchester's Mercury Theatre and a two-year tour of the UK.
Carradine is best known to New York theatre audiences for his Tony Award nominated performance as the title character in The Will Rogers Follies. He won the Outer Critics Circle Award for Foxfire with Hume Cronyn and Jessica Tandy, and most recently appeared as Lawrence in Dirty Rotten Scoundrels at the Imperial Theater. His television appearances include Wild Bill Hickock in HBO's "Deadwood", FBI Special Agent Frank Lundy on Showtime's "Dexter", Agent Carl McGowan in the new season of CBS' NUMB3RS and the CBS mini-series Chiefs.
Carradine appeared with brothers David and Robert as the Younger brothers in Walter Hill's film The Long Riders. His first notable film appearance was in director Robert Altman's McCabe & Mrs. Miller. He went on to appear in other Altman films including Thieves Like Us and the critically acclaimed Nashville, for which he won an Oscar and Golden Globe award for his top-ten hit "I'm Easy".
His other film credits include Emperor of the North, Louis Malle's Pretty Baby, The Tie That Binds, Ridley Scott's The Duellists and many of Alan Rudolph's films including Choose Me, Trouble in Mind, Paris in The Moderns and a cameo role as Will Rogers in Rudolph's Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle. He recently completed filming an as-yet untitled dark comedy with Hope Davis, Selma Blair and Dermot Mulroney, and Peacock with Cillian Murphy, Susan Sarandon and Ellen Paige.
Currently in rehearsal for MINDGAME, Carradine took some time out to talk with me.
TJ: How's life in New York, Keith?
CARRADINE: I love New York. When my wife and I come here, it's always a great adventure and there's always something exciting and exhilarating and crazy things happening. It's just the most exhilarating city in the world. We love it here.
TJ: Where are you from?
CARRADINE: I grew up in California. I was born near San Francisco. San Mateo, California was my birth city and that was where my grandparents lived and where I partly grew up. I went back and forth between the Bay area and Los Angeles until I was about eighteen years old, at which point I was on my own. I started out in Venice and then I came to New York to be in the Broadway cast of Hair for a year. Then, I came back to California and I have been there ever since, with the exception of six to eight years in Colorado. I had a place in Colorado for a while.
TJ: So, you were in the cast of Hair? I didn't know that!
CARRADINE: I was! Yeah, that was my first job!
TJ: Wow, that takes me back a few years!
CARRADINE: 1969. I like to say that was my first job but I actually did play a very small part in a B movie. It was like a biker flick. A friend of David's and mine made a movie called The Pink Garter Gang. It was about bikers and some very tough women. I played a surfer on a beach. I actually have to include that in my credits as that was my first actual paying job as an actor. But really, it began with Hair.