Alvin Epstein
Alvin Epstein (May 14, 1925 – December 10, 2018) was an American actor and director. He was a founding member of both the American Repertory Theater and Yale Repertory Theatre. He was particularly admired for his performances in the plays of Samuel Beckett. He also served as Artistic Director at the Guthrie Theater. Born in the Bronx, Epstein was the son of Harry Epstein, a physician, and his wife Goldie Epstein (née Rudnick). He graduated from the High School of Music & Art in Manhattan and the Queens College, City University of New York. After serving in the United States Army during World War II in Germany, he studied dance in New York with Martha Graham and mime in Paris. His early performances in New York City included appearing in mimes with Marcel Marceau. In 1956 he made his Broadway debut as the Fool in Orson Welles’ 1956 production of William Shakespear's King Lear. That same year he portrayed the slave Lucky in the Broadway premiere of Beckett’s Waiting for Godot. Epstein continued to appear in many productions of Beckett's plays, including Clov, the servant, in the United States premiere of Endgame in 1958. He portrayed two more characters in that play during his career: Hamm, Clov’s tyrannical blind master, in a 1984 Off-Broadway production that he also directed, at the Samuel Beckett Theater; and Hamm’s aged father, Nagg, who lives in a garbage can, performed at the Irish Repertory Theatre in Manhattan in 2005 and again, in 2008, at the Brooklyn Academy of Music.
Beauty and the Beast
as Bookseller (voice)Follow the adventures of Belle, a bright young woman who finds herself in the castle of a prince...
Movie pageSynecdoche, New York
as Man with Nose BleedA theater director struggles with his work, and the women in his life, as he attempts to create...
Movie pageNever Met Picasso
as Uncle AlfredStill living at home with his avant-garde actress mother, constantly rejected by art schools,...
Movie pageWaiting for Godot
as LuckyTwo derelicts, Vladimir and Estragon, occupy themselves as they wait for 'Godot' to make an...
Movie pageMy America
as uncredited21 monologues written by American playwrights form a sort of fractured portrait of the American...
Movie pageEverybody Rides the Carousel
as Prologue (voice)Everybody Rides The Carousel invites the viewer along on eight "rides" through the different...
Movie pageAge Isn't Everything
as Dr. HirschYoung man gives up his dream of becoming an astronaut to go into business — and finds himself...
Movie pageStory Theatre
as Ensemble MemberBrothers Grimm tales like "The Golden Goose," "The Bremen Town Musicians" and "The Blue Light"...
Movie pageDoing Life
as Lou RosenbergTony Danza stars in this prison drama about Jerome "Jerry" Rosenburg, a self-professed...
Movie pageEngram
as uncreditedAn elderly woman enters a Manhattan subway station only to find herself sitting on a bench...
Movie pageLaw & Order: Special Victims Unit
as Harold LassiterIn the criminal justice system, sexually-based offenses are considered especially heinous. In...
TV Show pageLaw & Order
as Dr. ChesterIn cases ripped from the headlines, police investigate serious and often deadly crimes, weighing...
TV Show pageLaw & Order
as Stuart RubinIn cases ripped from the headlines, police investigate serious and often deadly crimes, weighing...
TV Show page