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.
Life and career 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 Shakespeare'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.
Credits Film Movies Year Title Role 1976Everybody Rides the CarouselNarrator 1991Beauty and the BeastBookseller Age Isn't Everything 1996Never Met PicassoUncle Alfred 2002Alma MaterLeonard Carver 2003Psychoanalysis Changed My LifeOtto Zurmer 2004Beacon HillPreston Brooks 2008Synecdoche, New YorkMan With Nose Bleed We Pedal UphillMortimer 2013Young(ish)Old Man 2014EngramOld Man2016Year by the SeaErik Erikson
Television Year Title Role Notes 1956 Omnibus Segment: Androcles and the Lion 1959 The Further Adventures of Ellery Queen Elwood Parker Episode: "The Paper Tigers" 1960 Armstrong Circle Theatre Reinhard Heydrich Episode: "Engineer of Death: The Eichmann Story" 1961 Naked City Elliot Kesbek Episode: "The Fault In Our Stars" 1961 Play of the Week Lucky Episode: "Waiting for Godot" 1961 Play of the Week Camille Episode: "Therese Raquin" 1961 Great Ghost Tales Dr. Kaplan Episode: "Who Is the Fairest One of All?" 1963 The Doctors Philip Manning 1964 Mr. Broadway Chauvigny Episode: "Maggie, Queen of the Jungle" 1969 NET Playhouse Ensemble MemberEpisode: Story Theatre 1986 Doing Life Lou Rosenberg 1990 Law & Order Dr. Chester Episode: "Prescription for Death" 2004 Law & Order Stuart Rubin Episode: "City Hall" 2012 Law & Order: Special Victims Unit Harold Lassiter Episode: "Lessons Learned" 2015My AmericaElderly VeteranEpisode: "Roosevelt Island"
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