The Arabian Powder (1724)
by Ludvig Holberg
Performed by Brian Wallace, I.B. White, Eric Murdoch, Paul Coffey, Andy Grotelueschen, Jessie Austrian, Rheaume Crenshaw, Noah Brody and Rainard Rachele. Recorded August 30, 2009.
The Play
Commentary
Outtakes
About Ludvig Holberg
Considered the founder of modern Danish literature, Ludvig Holberg was born a subject of one of those curious political partnerships in European history, the Dano-Norwegian joint monarchy, in 1684. Orphaned at an early age, a series of great fires caused him to shuttle between relatives, fluctuate financially, and fitfully pursue an education.
He began writing stage comedies for the Lille Gronnegade, Denmark's first public theater, in 1721. In so doing, Holberg single-handedly elevated the Danish language at a time when high European art and discourse were primarily conducted in Latin, French, or German. However, when yet another fire destroyed Copenhagen in 1728, the economy and national character narrowed. Holberg's sense of humor and wry, almost contrarian, independence seemed out of step with the new mood, and he devoted the rest of his life to teaching, traveling, investing, and writing about history and philosophy. Largely self-taught in these and several other subjects, Holberg finally gained a professorship in 1736. His works on law remained relevant reading in Denmark for the next 200 years.
Holberg's most famous comedies include Jeppe of the Hill, The Political Tinker, Erasmus Montanus, and Henrik & Pernilla. These full-length plays were inspired by the traditions of commedia d’ell arte, which Holberg witnessed in Roman street theater, and by the satirical wit on display at Moliere’s Comedie Francaise in Paris. Ludvig Holberg's legacy rivals that of Voltaire as the quintessential Enlightenment figure. It has been said that he found Denmark with no books, and proceeded to write a library for it. Upon his death in 1754, Holberg left his fortune to the Soro Academy, a school for genteel boys, and not to an orphanage, as Brian erroneously stated in the commentary. We are, however, confident that genteel boys do sometimes feel lonely.
The Company, In Order of Appearance
Brian Wallace recently portrayed Gooper in the sold-out run of Cat on A Hot Tin Roof at Arkansas Rep, and was part of the original cast of the Pulitzer-nominated hit The Good Negro at the Public Theater and Dallas Theater Center, as well as Jonathan Leaf's The Caterers, a part for which he was nominated for a New York Innovative Theater Award. Regional credits include productions at Capital Repertory Theater, the Berkshire Theater Festival, Lake George Dinner Theater, Stamford Center for the Arts, Verse Theater Manhattan, and Trinity Rep. A generous tipper, attentive lover, and frequent litterbug, Brian is also the co-creator of LostPlays.com along with I.B. White. Website: www.bri-curious.com 
I.B. White appears occasionally in the long-running off-Broadway show My First Time. He was recently seen in the award-winning short film "Numskull", featured during the series premiere of NBC's Knight Rider. Ian played Tim in the West Coast leg of the Old Globe/Roundabout coproduction of Greg Kotis' Pig Farm, and has performed in readings and workshops at the Public Theater, the Huntington Theater, Soho Rep, New Georges, and the Lark Play Development Center. He is an MFA graduate of the Brown/Trinity Consortium. 
eric murdoch is an actor in new york city. he is currently working on a production of "three sisters" directed by anna brenner. he holds an mfa from the brown/trinity consortium. eric is a canadian and he has been in three episodes of the lost plays podcast. big thanks to brian and ian!
Paul L. Coffey has appeared with various New York and regional theaters including Fiasco Theater, The Public Theater, New York Theatre Workshop, Rattlestick Playwrights Theater, HERE, Ars Nova, Ensemble Studio Theatre, The Mint Theater Co., Aquila Theatre Co., Trinity Repertory Co., Pig Iron Theatre Co., The Vineyard Playhouse, The Theater at Monmouth, The Peterborough Players and The Berkshire Theatre Festival. Paul received his M.F.A. in acting from the Brown/Trinity Consortium where he was a Stephen Sondheim Fellow. 
Andy has toured nationally with the Guthrie Theater and the Acting Company (Henry V/The Spy, dir. Davis McCallum) and internationally with the Glass Contraption. Other credits include Lucy Thurber's Monstrosity (13P, dir. Lear deBessonet),The Scariest (The Exchange, dirs. Ari Edelson/Meredith McDonough), The Glass Contraption's The Amazing Ted Show! (Ars Nova), Clowns. (The Public/NY Clown Festival, dir. Christopher Bayes), Don Cristobal, Billy Club Man (St. Ann's Warehouse, Here, dir. Erin Orr), Girls Just Wanna Have Fund$ (Women's Project), Cymbeline and Twelfth Night (Fiasco Theatre). Regional credits include the Guthrie, Arizona Theatre Company, and Trinity Rep. (Moliere Impromptu, dir. Christopher Bayes). Andy is a graduate of the Brown/Trinity Rep. Consortium (MFA). He is currently apprenticed to Christopher Bayes studying the Clown, and he's from Iowa. 
Off Broadway: The Marriage of Bette and Boo at the Roundabout Theatre Company. Regional credits include: My Fair Lady at Virginia Stage Company, Actors Theater of Louisville and Cleveland Playhouse. Jane Eyre at the Guthrie, The Mystery of Edwin Drood at Trinity Repertory Company, and Cabaret & Main at the Williamstown Theatre Festival. Jessie is a company member, teaching artist and coach with the New York-based Fiasco Theater Company, fiascotheater.com . She proudly holds an MFA in acting from the Brown/Trinity Consortium.
The Princess and the Black Eyed Pea (New York Theatre Workshop); The Full Monty (Paper Mill Playhouse); Funkentine Rapture (The Triad); The Buccaneer reading (New Dramatists); All Shook Up and Barnum (Surflight Theater); Ripfest (Film Marathon); Dreamgirls, The Wiz, Raisin, Home: The Musical, Damn Yankees, and Godspell (St. Louis Black Repertory Company); Black Nativity (Goodman Theatre/Congo Square Theatre Company); Nuncrackers: The Nunsense Christmas musical and 1940s Radio Hour (Old Creamery Theatre); Showboat (MUNY); Fame: The Musical (European production). 
Rainard Rachele is a member of American Globe Theatre in NYC where he has performed such roles as Shylock in Merchant of Venice, Friar Lawrence in Romeo & Juliet, Kulyigin in Three Sisters, Autolicus in Winters Tale, Algernon in Earnest, Tartuffe in Tartuffe, Malvolio in Twelfth Night, Howard in Picnic, Stanislavski in To Moscow, Oliver/Amiens in As You Like It, Theseus in Midsummer, and many others. Off-Bway: The Seagull dir. by Austin Pendelton, William Shakespeare in Dammit Shakespeare. Regional Theatre: American Stage, North Shore Music Theatre, Hangar Theatre, and the Orlando, NJ, CO, Utah and Kings County Shakespeare Festivals. Internationally: Edgar in King Lear and Nick in Virginia Woolf. Rainard is a member of AEA. He received his M.F.A. from Cornell and studied Shakespeare with John Basil at AGT. He currently studies Voice with John Capes at The Singers Forum and is Director of Finance of New World Stages, NYC's premier Off-Broadway Theatre destination.