Playwright: Samuel Beckett. At: Steppenwolf Theatre, 1650 N. Halsted. Phone: 312-335-1650; $20-$77
Runs through: June 6
"Finished," mutters Hamm at the onset of Endgame. So begins one of the most elliptical and poetic meditations around on being and nothingness. Samuel Beckett's drama of profound displacement leaves itself open for all manner of bleak interpretations. It's about nihilism. It's about the futility and pointlessness of existence. It's about how life is a bitch and then, if you're lucky, you die. Hamm is stuck, a blind man who can't stand, ordering about Clov, a seeing man he treats as if he can't stand, in a room as dour and inescapable as a massive trash can, gunmetal walls reaching to infinity.
What to make of Steppenwolf's masterful staging of Samuel Beckett's terse, playful tragic-comedy? ( "Nothing is funnier than unhappiness," notes Hamm's mother, Nell notes in one of the piece's many tragic-comic profundities. ) At just over 70 minutes, it will be bearable even to those who find absurdism to be one of the Circles of Hell that Dante left out. For those who can succumb to the seemingly pointless apocalyptic jabbering, Endgame is as riveting as the final moments in a chess match between masters. In this world of no-exit bleakness there are dramatic riches. And enough food for thought ( never mind that Clov's off-stage kitchen seems to be the domain of rats and fleas and ancient biscuits. ) to keep one gnawing for hours.
Director Frank Galati and his all-star cast convey Endgame's hidden-picture of a story ( You must let your figurative eyes de-focus an d relax. Only then, as in hidden picture images within images, does the drama make itself obvious. ) with grace, depth and intelligence. And — all-importantly — a level of humanity that allows the audience to truly feel for these trapped souls even when it can't figure out precisely what in hell ( are they in hell? ) talking about.
So much of that all-important empathy stems from the performances. As Clov, the slow staggering servant and sole subject of the blind king, Ian Barford depicts wells of sorrow, anger, frustration and dogged, stubborn hopefulness. It's the human experience all rolled into one concise bundle of fragmented sentences. As the king of nothing, William Petersen radiates a domineering, tattered majesty. He's at once wholly impotent and all-powerful, endlessly needy and coldly autonomous: A paradox of a figure within a paradox of a story. Filling out the cast as Hamm's parents are Martha Lavey ( Nell ) and Francis Guinan ( Nag ) , bodiless beings stuck in trash barrels and visible only from the shoulders up . One of Endgame's sweetest moments comes as they try to kiss, but can't reach each other. Surely they know that the attempt is hopeless — presumably, Nell and Nag have been stuck in theses trash cans for days unknown. But that doesn't stop them from trying. Human contact. If not today, maybe tomorrow. Such are the hopes that keep people alive, even under circumstances of unbearable cruelty.
"Let us pray to God ," intones Hamm and then: "Bastard. He doesn't exist." Yet somehow, like that kiss, you get the sense that Hamm will keep trying to pray anyway. Because just maybe, He/She/It does exist. Such are the beliefs that distinguish humans from dumb, everlasting rocks. Even under circumstances that would try the patience of a stone.