NEW YORK (AP) – Some actors in New York play multiple roles a night. A very few are asked to play six dozen – including a rock and a river.
Such is the monumental task facing Billy Carter and Arnie Burton as they star in “39 Steps,” the clever spoof of Alfred Hitchcock’s 1935 movie thriller that returns to New York after a four-year absence.
The show is a whirlwind of dizzying costume changes as four actors play some 140 characters, from a Scottish policeman to a bog. The main props are just two ladders and three trunks.
“You lose weight, apparently, so that was one reason I took the job,” joked Carter, who has starred opposite Kevin Spacey on Broadway and with Simon Russel Beale in London. “It’s a free workout.”
The play frames the thriller in a provincial British theater company desperate for a hit. Most of the actors and crew have abandoned the company, leaving a leading man, leading lady and two vaudevillian clowns.