KINGS OF COMEDY

Steve Martin and Robin Williams will trod the boards at NYC’s Lincoln Center next June in Samuel Beckett’s absurdist classic “Waiting for Godot” in the roles (respectively) of Vladimir and Estragon. Mike Nichols directs, with F. Murray Abraham as Pozzo and Bill Irwin as Lucky.

Irwin--who got a special Obie in 1981 for “inspired clowning”--told us he’s been trying to line up a “Godot” production for five years, but the closest he got was enlisting the moral support of the playwright, whom he finally met last May in Paris.

“A lot of credit for making it happen has to go to my agent, Sam Cohn,” said Irwin. Cohn knew Nichols, also a client, had wanted to do ‘Godot’ and prodded him to see Irwin in “The Regard of Flight,” Irwin’s tour-de-force pastiche of clowning, mime and commentary on contemporary theater, earlier this year.

“A couple of months ago,” Irwin said, “I was invited to read it with the others. It sounds like a dream project, but we’ve been told to show up next May for rehearsals.”