Reviewed by James
Karas
Waiting for Godot is accepted as a game changer and a
masterpiece of the modern theatre, which means there are people who adore it
and those who snooze through it. The Stratford Festival’s production at the Tom
Patterson Theatre is very good and everyone should have enjoyed it but
unfortunately there were a few who did not return after the intermission or
yawned a bit too much at the end.
Director Jennifer Tarver presents a sensitive and detailed reading that
gives one a stunning impression of what they play may mean. Nothing happens in Waiting
for Godot, they say, but we do get Beckett’s bleak view of civilization, if
there is any. There is plenty of void and Beckett attempts the impossible task
of capturing that void or the idea of that void.
The cast is very strong. Stephen Ouimette (Estragon) and Tom Rooney
(Vladimir) play the two tramps. Rooney is a lean Vladimir in a bowler hat who
is quite agile. Ouimette is more portly and scruffy as the cynical and tired
Estragon.
Brian Dennehy is the tyrannical and psychotic Pozzo who wants to sell
his slave Lucky. The slightly stooped, deep-voiced Dennehy exudes both menace
and insanity. Pozzo and his slave are passing through from somewhere to somewhere
(more likely, from nowhere to nowhere) while Vladimir and Estragon are waiting
in the middle of nowhere for someone who is supposed to save them from
something if he exists.
Randy Hughson plays the slave Lucky and even with only a few lines to
speak he has a tough job. He is abused by Pozzo and he must strike poses,
“dance” and cater to his owner’s psychotic whims. A very good performance by
Hughson.
Waiting for Godot can be very funny but Tarver seems to have
chosen a more sedate reading. There are a few laughs when the characters make
some remarks but there is apparently no attempt by Tarver to emphasize or
exploit the clownish part of the tramps. They satirize their own situation and
their ridiculously extraordinary position where they cannot even commit
suicide. There is more room for dark humour than Tarver chose to use. Creating more
laughs may be used as a method to reduce yawning by hoi polloi but it also an
appropriate approach to the play.
The theatre-in-the-round Tom Patterson is well suited for the play.
Designer Teresa Przybylski places a curving road across the stage with the
leafless tree and that is all the set that we need.
The meaning of the play and the world that it reflects are matters for scholars
to debate. For the theatre goer, the impression of the world that Beckett
paints is unforgettable and highly effective. When it comes to understanding a
work of art, I like to go back to prima ballerina Pavlova who, after a great
performance, was asked what “it meant.” Her reply is suitable in many
situations. “If I could have said it, I wouldn’t have danced it.”
If you approach Waiting for Godot in that spirit and with that attitude
you are less likely to find it difficult to comprehend and, on the contrary,
you will wait for the next production so you can grasp a few more nuggets of
gold. You may not be able to describe the experience but you will feel it in
your bones which is much better.
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Waiting for Godot by Samuel Beckett opened
on June 27 and will run in repertory until September 20, 2013 at the Tom
Patterson Theatre, Stratford, Ontario. www.stratfordfestival.ca
