Worth the Wait

Waiting for Godot
(Theatre Royal Haymarket Productions)

St James Theatre, Wellington
30 June – 2 July

“The acting was fantastic, the set was great, but I don’t think I really like the play.”

“I didn’t really like it at the time, but I’ve thought about it so much since and seen many more layers the more I think about it.”

“There are many ways to interpret the play, and this production really accentuated the comedy.”

“I think this is perfection – I’m not sure that I ever need to see that play again.”

The above comments are from my friends who saw the recent production of Waiting for Godot in Wellington. I can agree with all of them. It’s a ‘difficult’ play. Ostensibly nothing happens – a couple of old blokes wait around for a man who never comes. A messenger tells them that Godot is sorry that he won’t be able to come today, but can they come back again tomorrow. They do so. We get the impression that they may have been doing this for some time now and may continue to wait forever.

People admire Beckett’s formidable reputation: they respect Waiting for Godot; they study it; they wrestle with it; they fear it; and they appreciate it. But do they really like it? After all; what’s to like (see synopsis above)? There is no real character development, no explanations, and no glib back-story: the characters merely are what they do and say, and that really isn’t very much. I have heard this described as “an actor’s play” but it could equally be “a directors’ play” because the interpretation is everything – and director Sean Mathias has worked with his actors to produce a sumptuous production.

Estragon (Gogo) – Ian McKellen – and Vladimir (Didi) – Roger Rees – are perfectly balanced like children on a see-saw that have rocked to a stand-still. Didi seems to be the practical, protecting one, while Gogo is the entertainer or whiner, depending on his mood. Didi tries not to laugh, due to a weak bladder and unspoken prostate complaint, but Gogo frequently has him in stitches. To pass the time as they wait, they try conversing, arguing and contradicting each other. Their verbiage is delightful and it is refreshing to hear Ian McKellen talk in his natural Lancashire (not Yorkshire as I have seen reported – he was born in the same hospital as Him Outdoors) accent.
 
The two old men are totally in-synch, and we believe theirs is a relationship that has blossomed over the years with equal parts affection and irritation. They are clearly afraid of being alone but even the talk of hanging themselves from the emaciated tree is done in a quirky and flippant manner. The humour masks the sinister, nightmare quality that can seep through this play. As Didi tries to explain to Gogo that they were here yesterday and what they did, Gogo’s inability to remember is not as dark as it could be – nor is the fact that he is beaten every night – by what or whom we don’t know, but it doesn’t seem to matter as much as it could.

Across their radar stumble Pozzo and Lucky. Matthew Kelly (yes, the one from Stars in their Eyes) is sensational as Pozzo. He uses his imposing height and commanding voice to tower over the cowering old tramps. But although he is the one literally cracking the whip and pulling the strings, he is helpless and lonely, demanding companionship from the macabre Lucky (Brendan O’Hea) who is anything but. He can command Lucky to sing, dance or think, which he does with energetic aplomb. These two are defined by this chilling master/servant relationship with an unidentified tipping point.

The raw emotion is paramount as the characters behave like vaudevillian clowns – Lucky even appears with white-face and big blackened eyes. The physical theatre is excellent from the business with the bowler hats and boots (as explicitly specified in the stage directions), to the shuffle dance and mocking imitations. This isn’t a long play on paper, but it lasts for over two and a half hours and the repetitions begin to feel increasingly surreal.

The silences are substantial as the men inhabit their feelings: anxiety; hope; fear; anger; frustration; sadness; envy; need; hunger. They cross the boundary between mental sensation and physical state. We have animal sensibilities but we are human in our need to relate. We are only who we are in relationship to each other, and how that relationship develops depends on the part we choose – yes, choose – to play. The theory that we can choose to determine our own development is the definition of existentialism, of which this play is regarded to be one of the greatest proponents. As ever, the great man was right: we are all merely players; and one man in his time plays many parts.

The set (designed by Stephen Brimson Lewis) deserves an individual mention as the ruined theatre confronts us. Is the rubble the aftermath of some violent event; should we be worried about the absence of Godot? Is it an indication of the deconstruction of the theatrical experience – no longer content to follow a traditional plot that troops through its chronological stages and sends us away satisfied with a happy ending? The spindly tree, frigid moon (lighting designer – Paul Pyant) and discordant sounds (sound designer – Paul Groothus) leave us aching with longing for something, but what? There really are more questions than answers in this play.

In essence, this raises the question of how we validate our existence. If I have been for walk, read a book, shopped for groceries, done the washing, paid the bills and written a couple of letters, I will still answer ‘nothing much’ when someone asks, ‘what have you done today?’ We spend a lot of time waiting for something exciting and diverting to happen to us – when it doesn’t, can we really say we have lived, or just existed? I think we can consider this production of Waiting for Godot to be one of the most exciting and diverting to happen in a long time.