The Stables Theatre and Arts Centre
The Bourne, Hastings
East Sussex TN34 3BD
01424 423221
The Bourne, Hastings
East Sussex TN34 3BD
01424 423221
Waiting for Godot
By Samuel Beckett
A Stables Theatre production
Directed by Bunmi Popoola
24 October–1 November 2008
Reviewed by Margaret Blurton
By Samuel Beckett
A Stables Theatre production
Directed by Bunmi Popoola
24 October–1 November 2008
Reviewed by Margaret Blurton
This is a play which demands the utmost from both actors and audience. It is wordy and almost entirely action-free—hard work for a Friday night! However, it would have been a mistake to have missed this production.
Deftly directed by Bunmi Popoola, a newcomer to the Stables, the play was tight and confident throughout, leaving the audience free to grapple with the content. Bill Allender (Estragon) and Mike Stoneham (Vladimir) had a tough task: portraying two tramps’ friendship with warmth and energy within the framework of a bleak, tedious existence. They cannot give up the wait without risking an anonymous “punishment”, yet the succour which Godot should bring never arrives, and clearly never will. Allender and Stoneham used the stage with adroitness, their acting throughout sure and well-timed, the most intense dose of inactivity you could wish for.
The nothingness of their waiting was interrupted by Pozzo (John Turner) and Lucky (Peter Barrs), who represented the daily grind of society: the wealthy man with his comforts and the wretched servant with none, but neither in any way free from each other, inexorably moving on together, going nowhere. Both were accomplished performances, and Peter Barrs’ sudden call into action and intellectual activity was beautifully achieved, his character graceful yet incoherent, powerful yet helpless, once able yet now terminally damaged.
The scenery (designed by Bunmi Popoola and Nicky Harris) was simple but effective; the costumes (Gill Jenks, and cast members) and props (Kerry Blackford) excellent, marked by attention to detail and style.
So what was it all about? Beckett was reflecting ideas circulating in the Paris of the postwar years. Can there be a god, if they allow so much evil and suffering? Why do people look to a saviour who will not come? Why do the toiling masses collude in their own entrapment? What is there that makes life worth living? Only one theme emerges in a positive light, a view directly opposing Sartre’s 1944 play Huis Clos, in which “hell is other people”. In Waiting for Godot, the hell is broken up by friendship, a good relationship with other people.
What would Beckett have made of 2008? These days we have TV and computer games to fill the void vividly portrayed in this play, so most people are immune to the stultifying boredom of life. But happiness? I still think Beckett was right.
Deftly directed by Bunmi Popoola, a newcomer to the Stables, the play was tight and confident throughout, leaving the audience free to grapple with the content. Bill Allender (Estragon) and Mike Stoneham (Vladimir) had a tough task: portraying two tramps’ friendship with warmth and energy within the framework of a bleak, tedious existence. They cannot give up the wait without risking an anonymous “punishment”, yet the succour which Godot should bring never arrives, and clearly never will. Allender and Stoneham used the stage with adroitness, their acting throughout sure and well-timed, the most intense dose of inactivity you could wish for.
The nothingness of their waiting was interrupted by Pozzo (John Turner) and Lucky (Peter Barrs), who represented the daily grind of society: the wealthy man with his comforts and the wretched servant with none, but neither in any way free from each other, inexorably moving on together, going nowhere. Both were accomplished performances, and Peter Barrs’ sudden call into action and intellectual activity was beautifully achieved, his character graceful yet incoherent, powerful yet helpless, once able yet now terminally damaged.
The scenery (designed by Bunmi Popoola and Nicky Harris) was simple but effective; the costumes (Gill Jenks, and cast members) and props (Kerry Blackford) excellent, marked by attention to detail and style.
So what was it all about? Beckett was reflecting ideas circulating in the Paris of the postwar years. Can there be a god, if they allow so much evil and suffering? Why do people look to a saviour who will not come? Why do the toiling masses collude in their own entrapment? What is there that makes life worth living? Only one theme emerges in a positive light, a view directly opposing Sartre’s 1944 play Huis Clos, in which “hell is other people”. In Waiting for Godot, the hell is broken up by friendship, a good relationship with other people.
What would Beckett have made of 2008? These days we have TV and computer games to fill the void vividly portrayed in this play, so most people are immune to the stultifying boredom of life. But happiness? I still think Beckett was right.
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Photographs > www.artypharty.com
A selection of production photographs from the 1950s to the present is available at our photographer Peter Mould’s website.
A selection of production photographs from the 1950s to the present is available at our photographer Peter Mould’s website.
