Touching portrait of pandemic expert
The time could not be more right for a play about a virologist who’s made a special study of pandemics in an attempt to predict and perhaps even prevent them. But, however compelling the discussion of the nature of viruses may be in “The Catastrophist,” the new oneman play by San Francisco playwright Lauren Gunderson, that aspect turns out to be a relatively small part of her deep, loving, touching portrait of her husband, prominent virologist Nathan Wolfe.
Streaming on demand through the end of February, Marin Theatre Company’s world premiere production — presented online, of course, because of the present COVID-19 pandemic — is a coproduction with Round House Theatre from Bethesda, Maryland.
Gunderson is the playwright in residence at Marin Theatre Company, which premiered her acclaimed play “I and You” and has also produced her “Christmas at Pemberley” trilogy of “Pride and Prejudice” sequels cowritten with Margot Melcon, the third installment which is scheduled to premiere at MTC this November.
A powerful subset of Gunderson’s body of work has been stirring portraits of scientists, especially women scientists, in dramas such as “Silent Sky,” “Ada and the Memory Engine” and “Emilie: La Marquise du Châtelet Defends Her Life Tonight.” In that sense, her husband’s work is subject matter right up her alley as a playwright.
In fact, the dramatized Nathan in “The Catastrophist” comments on this affinity as he deduces early on in the play that he is in fact in a play. His bewilderment and resigned amusement at suddenly being in a play — with the inaudible voice of his wife and author giving him occasional corrections and instructions — might seem at first like a clever metafictional de