by Cid Standifer
Jason Carpp ’06 and Mark Gardiner ’05 stare out over the heads of the audience, looks of anguish and fear on their faces, the hopelessness of their characters laid bare. Within the span of seconds their comical banter has given way to dead time. Practiced silence interrupted by short, desperate lines make the tension born of sheer deadly boredom tangible to the audience. This is a scene from the masterpiece Waiting for Godot that director Miguel Trejo ‘04 has decided to take on this semester, which will be performed May 1 and 2 at 8 p.m. at the Wall.
Waiting for Godot is a play by Samuel Beckett that is about just that—two people named Estragon (Gardiner) and Vladimir (Carpp) waiting for someone named Godot who never comes and trying to fend off boredom day in and day out. The other characters they happen to encounter in their wait are Pozzo (Paul Wainright ’07), Lucky (Emily Markovitz, ‘05) and an anonymous boy (Nick Timmer ‘05).
Some members of the cast, like Wainright, read the play earlier and loved it. “I was really excited about having someone do a production of it,” he said. Trejo, like many other first-time readers of Waiting for Godot, was not an instant fan. He said that when he read the play in high school, “I didn’t understand it and I didn’t like it, frankly.” It wasn’t until Trejo worked with scenes from Godot at the National Theatre Institute that he developed an appreciation for the play’s nuances. “I really found out what a lot of the roots of the play are,” he said. Knowing the origins of the play’s style in Vaudeville, Victorian music hall and slapstick comedy helped him understand the play and increased his admiration for it.
Since Trejo first found a taste for Godot, he has come to deeply respect playwright Samuel Beckett’s works, particularly Waiting for Godot. Trejo said that part of his attraction to the piece comes from his sympathy with what he believes Beckett’s message is. “I think in the play there’s this idea that things are really bad in the world,” said Trejo. “You have to find a way to keep going.” Trejo thinks that many directors are intimidated by Waiting for Godot’s status as a classic, but he decided to take on the play anyway.
While the director and his cast are drawn to the significance of the play, Trejo has asked the actors not to obsess over the meaning of Godot. Wainright said Trejo told them not to read too much about the play because there were so many interpretations that worrying too much about how to think about the play would interfere with the acting aspect. Gardiner believes that delving too much into the play would take the actors out of character. “[Vladimir] and [Estragon] are there demonstrating some facts about existence or possible interpretation of what human existence is about, but they’re not really philosophers themselves,” he said. Instead of seeking other interpretations of Beckett’s work, Trejo has decided to focus almost exclusively on the script itself.
While Beckett provides very specific stage directions, one challenge that the playwright can’t solve for the producers is the issue of timing. According to Trejo, both the humor and tragedy of the play hinge on figuring out the perfect length of time for the pauses. Carpp, Gardiner, Wainright and Trejo are all members of Grinnell’s improv group, The Ritalin Test Squad, so they are all familiar with the perfect timing required for many of Godot’s gags to come off well.
The cast’s skill at creating humor is obvious in a scene where Lucky and Pozzo end up in a heap on the floor with Pozzo flailing his arms aimlessly between piteous yowls for help. Trejo said he has struggled more with the silences that bring out the play’s moments of desolation.
“Silence on stage is often more difficult than talking because it can get very uncomfortable,” said Gardiner. “You have to figure out a way to infuse [the silence] with energy. But at the same time you want to evoke that same feeling of discomfort, frustration and anxiety that comes along with a long pause.” That discomfort flies at the audience in many of the play’s anticlimactic moments, such as a long, stifling gap between the end of a magnificent monologue delivered by Pozzo and the next line.
Despite the stigma sometimes associated with the absurdity of the play, Trejo, Wainright and Gardiner are confident that the audience will appreciate its various facets. “[Godot is] really poetry in theatre,” said Wainright. “It tries to embody so many different facets of existence as we know it. It’s really thought provoking.”
Gardiner also thinks that many people will enjoy the play. “It’s not everybody’s cup of tea,” he said, “but at the same time it is entertaining and I think a lot of people haven’t seen it done in a way that brings out the humor.”
Trejo thinks that showing the play here will help promote the production of Beckett’s plays in general. He said that he would like to see more directors work on pieces by Beckett because “I think his plays are very understandable. You just have to see them done and they aren’t done as much as they should be.”
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