2024 Season

ChipandGus

September 26 - October 6, 2024

The Fat Knight Production of
CHIPandGUS
 Written and Performed by John Ahlin and Christopher Patrick Mullen

September 26 – October 6, 2024



Graphic: Jim Schumann

Link to Press Page with Photos

“A play that comes at you like a sharp volley and overwhelms you with wit, charm, and most of all heart … Bridge Street Theatre, home of passionately supported, idiosyncratic theatre, has another winning left turn on its hands with ‘ChipandGus’. A ferociously smart, hysterically funny love story of two men who express themselves through exceptional worldplay, philosophical discussions, touching honesty, and ping pong … If I can convince one person to head down to Catskill tonight to see this original, ravishing comedy, I’ll feel pretty good about it … The ping pong is glorious. Not unlike ‘The Wolves’ or ‘Flex’ where the young women in those plays run soccer or basketball drills (respectively) while holding long discursive conversations, the action heightens the dialogue, sharpens our listening, and can be some of the most thrilling moments you spend in the theatre! … I highly recommend you catch this very enjoyable play!”  Patrick White, Nippertown
 
“Two lonely men, Chip and Gus, meet every third Tuesday of the month to play ping-pong in the back room of a bar in Schenectady, New York. Chip, a struggling professional musician and composer, teaches music at a university as an adjunct professor; Gus has a Ph.D and is the chairman of the philosophy department at the same college. He has written fourteen books and has delivered lectures all over the country. This odd couple are the only characters in the hysterical and touching play ‘ChipandGus’ (that is how the title is written) by John Ahlin and Christopher Patrick Mullen at Bridge Street Theatre in Catskill, New York … The play runs for ninety minutes; for seventy or more of those minutes they continuously volley making unbelievable shots time after time. Their dialogue is priceless filled with bon mots, terrible yet funny puns, intellectual humor, sarcasm and wisdom which flies faster than their volleys. As the evening goes on what has started as simply a game night sees a richer affinity evolve between them … A fabulous performance!” Macey Levin, Berkshire On Stage   More…
 
“Who would have thought a game of ping-pong could produce a production this enthralling? Certainly not the opening night audience who couldn’t stop laughing, me included. These two men carry on at a rapid, intense tempo making me wish I could see the play again in order to hear the laugh lines I may have missed while I was laughing … For eighty-seven minutes the two men play ping-pong, discuss life, education, marriage, sexual orientation, work, moving, isolation, consolation, consultation and their relationship while the game goes on. Long held secrets are revealed. Personal fears are unveiled. Grammar is discussed. Disgust is revealed and revelations are displayed. And even the most tragic moments are funny … Both Mullen and Ahlin deliver brilliantly and the show will leave you weak. There is really only a week in which to see it and if you enjoy laughing then see it you must. What makes a comedy a comedy? Well, these two men know, and they will show you with their balls on the table, on the floor and in the air. If you sit in the front row you might want to bring your own paddle.” J. Peter Bergman, Berkshire Edge   More …

“Ping Pong in Schenectady makes great fun at Bridge Street Theatre in Catskill … It might seem a huge leap to compare the two- person comedy ‘ChipandGus’ with the work of Shakespeare. However, if you consider that one of the appeals of Shakespeare’s comedies is that they brilliantly mix low-comedy with high intellect, then there is a clear connection. ‘ChipandGus’ is a wildly smart play that is as entertaining as it is comically performed … This is not an elitist work. Indeed, the laughs from all parts of the audience on opening night proved this is a comedy for all … Like Tom Stoppard’s ‘Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead’ it captures the existentialistic dread of Shakespeare’s minor characters. In much the same way, the two characters have a kinship to Samuel Beckett’s tramps in ‘Waiting for Godot’. But too, it seems like a prequel to Neil Simon’s ‘The Odd Couple’. I guess you could say, it has something for everyone.” Bob Goepfert, WAMC

Audience Posts about the Show

“Did I just stumble into the back room of some bar in upstate New York and get to witness the lives of these two insanely funny and intelligent men? Happy to say that I was swept away and forgot that I was in a theater … If you are anywhere even close to Catskill you absolutely need to see this show!!! It is laugh out loud funny and brilliantly smart from beginning to end. Every moment between these two masters is as deft and agile as a high wire act; brimming with comedy and emotion … Once again Bridge Street Theatre has brought us an outstanding production equal to any theater that you’d be privileged to see anywhere!”  Michael Garfield Levine

“Anyone from upstate NY will love this show. Sooooo funny in ways you would never expect!”  Nancy Thackaberry

“Don’t miss this one! A brilliant comedy that touches on the many trials of life. The actors are magnificent in their roles. Every time I go to Bridge Street Theatre I am so delighted that we have this amazing venue here in our little village. Bravo!!!”  Tom Illari

“Run do not walk to see this show. What fun!”  Flo Hayle

“My face hurt from laughing!”  Johanna D’Aleo

“Highly recommended!”  Neil Blackadder

“Don’t miss it!”  Marie Greco

“I had walked halfway home before I realized that it would be equally amazing whether they had memorized all those lines or whether they had improv-ed them, or whether there were some set passages with improvisation in-between. I mean, whatever they did & however they did it — it was purely amazing! And I felt very fortunate to have been able to be there & enjoy it. And how did all those ping-pong balls remember their parts???? Whatever… thanks to all of you who made it happen!!!!!!!”  Shebar Windstone

“I defy you not to have fun seeing this show!”  Chris Foster

“A wonderful play, a wonderful production, amazing actors!  Thank YOU!” Jamie Stiller

The two loneliest guys in upstate New York meet once a month in the grungy back room of a rundown Schenectady sports bar to do the one thing they both love – play ping pong –  in Fat Knight Theatre’s production of “ChipandGus”, coming to Catskill’s Bridge Street Theatre at 44 West Bridge Street for eight performances September 26 – October 6.

In this award-winning ‘comedy with balls’, Gus is chair of the Philosophy department at a middling liberal arts college who lives almost entirely inside his own estimable head. Chip is a frustrated adjunct music teacher and struggling composer who’s got big hopes – but he’s never had a dream yet that didn’t get crushed. Playwright/performers John Ahlin and Christopher Patrick Mullen balance a furiously fast pace, a delicately slow reveal, blisteringly brilliant comedy, and unbelievable ping-pong action as these two sad sacks, the most casual of acquaintances, discover that their lives intertwine in ways they could not possibly have imagined. Swap out the ping pong paddles for bowler hats and it could pass for a modern-day homage to “Waiting for Godot” – a hilarious, cathartic, and emotionally resonant buddy comedy for thinking audiences. Conceived over a ping pong table and written and rehearsed in basements, attics, and garages, “ChipandGus” was the winner of the Overall Excellence Award for Ensemble in the 2016 NYCFringe Festival, was selected for an extended run in the Fringe Encore Series at Soho Playhouse in NYC, and has been touring ever since.

“I remember the exact moment the idea for the play came into my head – and it was at a ping pong table,” says John Ahlin. “I was playing ping pong for fun a few years ago, blowing the rust off my atrophied skills, when somehow, like a young me, I laced a screaming backhand down the edge and in an overly theatrical way I turned to an imaginary crowd and drank in imaginary cheers. And then I stopped, mid faux-celebration, and thought, ‘Standing here, at the end of a ping pong table feels very theatrical …. I wonder if this game would work on stage?’ And with that one idle thought, Ahab-like, I began chasing this leviathan of an idea.”

Come spend a little time with Chip and Gus in what is possibly the finest ‘buddy comedy’ yet written in the 21st Century!

Click Here for More Information and an Interview with John and Chris.

Bios

John Ahlin (Gus) is delighted to be back at the amazing Bridge Street Theatre. Acting credits on Broadway include; Waiting for Godot, Journey’s End (2007 Tony Award Best Revival), The Lieutenant of Inishmore, Voices in the Dark, One Mo’ Time, Whoopee! and Macbeth. Off-Broadway he’s appeared in a wide variety of productions, including as Orson Welles in Orson’s Shadow. Regional credits: The Shakespeare Theatre in DC, The Guthrie, The Kennedy Center, La Jolla Playhouse, Center Stage, St. Louis Rep, Cincinnati Playhouse, Pittsburgh Public Theater, Actors Theatre of Louisville, Old Globe Theatre, Goodman Theatre, Studio Arena, McCarter Theatre, Syracuse Stage, George Street Playhouse, Goodspeed, and others. Appearing in over 60 Shakespeare productions, John has portrayed Falstaff 15 times. TV and Film credits include Law and Order: SVU, Late Night with David Letterman, Third Watch, The Education of Max Bickford, and the Coen Brothers’ movie Inside Llewyn Davis. As a playwright, John’s award-winning Gray Area received highly acclaimed productions in Los Angeles, Atlanta and Off-Broadway. His most recent play, My Witch, The Margaret Hamilton Stories, recently finished hugely successful runs in Hackettstown, NJ, Cambridge, NY, and Lewiston and Boothbay Harbor, Maine. John is also Artistic Director of the New York City-based Fat Knight Theatre Company. www.FatKnighttheatre.org  www.JohnAhlin.com 

Christopher Patrick Mullen (Chip) Previously at BST: Sexual Misconduct of the Middle Classes, Long Day’s Journey into Night. Other credits include: West Side Story (1st National Tour); The Runner Stumbles (Off-Broadway); Birds of North America (Chester Theatre); Hapgood (Lantern Theatre); Assassins, Cabaret, Metamorphoses, Macbeth, A Little Night Music, Candide, (Arden Theatre); The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time, Noises Off, Rumors, Leading Ladies, ChipandGus (Arts Center of Coastal Carolina); A Christmas Carol Comedy, Amadeus Hedgerow Theatre; Productions with the Pennsylvania Shakespeare Festival since 1992 include: The Tempest, Sense and Sensibility, Henry iv Parts One & Two, Irma Vep, Shakespeare In Love, Richard II, Love’s Labour’s Lost, Pericles, Henry VIII, Charley’s Aunt, Hamlet, The Glass Menagerie, Twelfth Night, As You Like It, and Macbeth; Compleat-Wrks-of-Wllm-Shkspr, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Hamlet, The Taming of the Shrew (Orlando Shakespeare Theatre). TV: Law & Order, FBI; Training: DeSales University. ChristopherPatrickMullen.com