Actor Revives Karl Marx on WC Stage To Defend His Ideals for Social Justice

Bob Weick as Karl Marx

Actor Bob Weick will perform Howard Zinn’s one-man show Marx in Soho on the Decker Theatre stage at Washington College on Tuesday, September 23, at 7:00 p.m. The hour-long production brings political philosopher Karl Marx back to life to defend the ideals of communism and rail against injustice and inequality.

Weick has been performing the play at college campuses and other venues across the country for more than a decade.  The play’s creator, Howard Zinn, was a historian and social activist best known for his 1980 history, A People’s History of the United States. Before he died in 2010, Zinn was able to see Weick perform Marx in Soho, and he praised the actor for capturing Marx and his ideas “with the proper strength and subtlety, moving very effectively through a range of moods: humorous, angry, poignant.”

In reviewing Weick’s portrayal for Minnesota State University, a professor there wrote, “the audience will encounter a Marx who remains passionate about injustice, critical of inequality, and combative with his rivals … but also a Marx who is loving toward his family, saddened by their poverty, and willing to rethink some of his ideas.”

The performance is free and open to the public, thanks to sponsorship by the College’s Sociology and Drama Departments, Louis L. Goldstein Program in Public Affairs, and Richard Holstein ’68 Ethics Program. It will be followed by a Q&A discussion between the audience and the actor. For more information, visit www.ironagetheatre.org/marx.html, and www.washcoll.edu.