Riding the tide
'Floodgate' laffs at congressional hearings, heads for N.Y.
Nope.
Try Delgado Community College.
The play, a scathing post-Katrina comedy about congressional hearings held in the wake of a catastrophic D.C. flood, was performed in benefit readings March 17-19 at the Louisiana college.
A fictional FEMA-like org called COMA is among the targets of its bipartisan barbs. Local celebs, including thesp Jay Thomas, appeared in the reading.
Next stop: an evening at New York Theater Workshop on April 17, to be directed by Moises Kaufman ("Laramie Project").
Gelbart has updated the play to accommodate recent events such as Dick Cheney's hunting mishap. "Who can keep up with these people?" he asks. "This Washington crowd is a living punchline."
Delgado lost about half of its 22 campus buildings in Katrina, and dropped from 17,000 students to 10,000.
Kris La Morte, the faculty member at Delgado who directed "Floodgate," connected with Gelbart through friend Jay Malarcher, who wrote a book about the scribe.
"The fact that we got the play before New York, I love that," says La Morte, via cell phone.
His land line won't be restored until April.
