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| Saskia Noordhoek Hegt, left. |
ENDGAME
[Dramatic
Revival] A: Samuel Beckett; D: Andre Gregory; DS: Jerry Rojo; P: Lyn Austin
i/a/w New York Shakespeare Festival; T: Public Theater/Martinson Hall (OB);
4/29/74-5/10/74 (12)
Andre Gregory’s
production of Beckett’s 1959 existentialist classic appeared Off Broadway in a
season of plays offered by his Manhattan Project company under a guest
residency sponsored by the Public Theater. It had already played Off-Off
engagements in February 1973 and April 1974. Viewing the first of these, Clive
Barnes was moved to call the director “one of the most interesting and
innovative . . . in the world,” yet he acknowledged that some other critics had
completely opposite views. Barnes believed this revival “is one of the best
things in the American theatre here and now.” John Simon, by contrast, branded
Gregory as “a madman who imagines he is Jerzy Grotowski.” Simon’s negativity
was the more prevalent reaction.
The spectators satin
small, four-chair cubicles screened both from the stage and from other audience
members by chicken wire. They surrounded a hexagonal acting area lit by bright,
white lighting, made even more glaring by he set’s tin flooring. Barnes said
the production was played “straight—but with differences,” while his colleagues
filled their notices with examples of all the “differences” without explaining
what Barnes might have meant by “straight.”
The interpretation
focused on the broad humor Gregory detected in the play. It insisted on
providing numerous references to American pop culture never mentioned by
Beckett. As viewed by Simon, this meant “an endless series of nightclub turns,
vaudeville routines, dialect jokes, sophomoric running gags, and ludicrous
sight gags, all grafted onto Beckett’s defenseless play like silicone breasts
on a grand piano.” There were even show tunes like “Tea for Two,” “You Took
Advantage of Me,” “Hello, Ma Baby,” “Give My Regards to Broadway,” and so on.
Walter Kerr noted with
disdain the elaborate vocal mannerisms and sounds emanating from Clov, who made
every variety of sound from “cock-crows” to “burbles” to “machine-gun
rat-a-tat-tats.” Nell (Saskia Noordhoek Hegt) and Nagg, instead of being in
ashcans, were in a G.E. appliance carton and laundry bin, respectively. It all
went “on much too long,” grieved Edith Oliver, and dissolved “into
pointlessness and facetiousness.” Simon said the play had been misconceived and
distorted, and Kerr thought it “inventive only at a rather childish level,” as well
as being “impertinent.”
Unusually, the principal sources do not provide the cast breakdown, so, other than the actress mentioned above who played Nell, it is not clear who played Clov, Hamm, or Nag. Not wishing to spend more than the hour I've already spent trying to track the casting down, I will mention only that the other actors, all of whom continued to work regularly, were Tom Costello, who died in 1996, Larry Pine, and Gerry Bamman. The latter two are still very active in 2020. If any reader can let me know who played who, I'll update accordingly.
Unusually, the principal sources do not provide the cast breakdown, so, other than the actress mentioned above who played Nell, it is not clear who played Clov, Hamm, or Nag. Not wishing to spend more than the hour I've already spent trying to track the casting down, I will mention only that the other actors, all of whom continued to work regularly, were Tom Costello, who died in 1996, Larry Pine, and Gerry Bamman. The latter two are still very active in 2020. If any reader can let me know who played who, I'll update accordingly.