"WAITING FOR GODOT" AT COMÉDIE DE CAEN #3

 

From the figure of the onion to the figure of the clown

 

Rehearsals continue for Samuel Beckett’s “Waiting for Godot”, directed by Jean Lambert-wild (Lucky), Lorenzo Malaguerra and Marcel Bozonnet (Pozzo). Three weeks from opening night, the work is punctuated by many sighs but also liberating laughter. In short, we will move here from the figure of the onion to the figure of the clown…

 

 

Three weeks away from opening night, the show’s final image is becoming increasingly clear. Our way of working – which we call in jest “peeling an onion” – means repeatedly going through the play, stopping on almost every line. Every day, we manage to take off another layer of this Beckettian onion which heart will be, if all goes well, revealed during the first show. And like when we peel an onion, peeling Godotcan be painful. 

 

 

We have already said that Beckett’s way of writing informs the way the play is directed, in the sense that the author noted down the smallest of movement, described the tiniest action, gave rhythm to the way each line is delivered. Our rehearsals are then punctuated by shouts coming from the auditorium: “Pause”, “Silence”, “Long silence”, “Break”! If musicians are used to this way of working, it is a lot less common for actors who must leave backstage any vague hope they might have of using their own score. The economy of silences and their value are essential to Beckett’s work: in turn, they create a sense of metaphysical void, an utterance of language that has become unbearable and therefore stops, forgetfulness or dreaming. They allow ruptures in tone that multiply the motifs of the play’s wait. Thus, day after day, we repeat that “only by scrupulously following the text and the stage directions will we find freedom at the end of the road.”

 

Pozzo (suddenly furious): Have you not done tormenting me with your accursed time! It’s abominable! When! When! One day, is that not enough for you, one day he went dumb, one day I went blind, one day we’ll go deaf, one day we were born, one day we shall die, the same day, the same second, is that not enough for you?

 

This labour, the cause of so many sighs, is also a source of joy when suddenly a section that had been torpid for a while lightens up with a liberating laugh. This is what happens when the characters of Pozzo and Lucky appear onstage, a few minutes after the start of the show. Through the minutiae of a choreography full of causes and consequences, comedy finally invades the stage: a terrifying scream causes Estragon to drop a carrot, there is a frenzied escape backstage, Estragon returns to pick up the carrot and his lost shoe, Lucky crosses the stage over 20 metres, on a diagonal, bowing down under the weight of his luggage and disappearing backstage before Pozzo enters, shouting: “Back!”, which provokes Lucky to fall with dozens of cans simulating the fall of Rome.

 

 

It is not insignificant to know that Beckett was really familiar with clowning as an art form, and that Waiting for Godotis a play full of references to famous acts. We watched all the films of The Marx Brothers, Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton, Fellini’s famous “Clowns”, Grock’s shows, Licedei’s Russians and descriptions of the first Augustes and white clowns of history, such as Footit and Chocolat. This preparatory impregnation was essential to fully pinpoint the characters, the ways they move and perform. It was also essential to fully understand the play, which is anything but a stylistic exercise on boredom. 

 

This way, our rehearsals move from tears to laughter, and we sometimes even cry with laughter when Michel Bohiri, the actor who plays Vladimir and whom we will focus on in another Carnet de bord, puts Lucky’s minuscule red hat on his head, in Act II. On stage, an African Grock is born. 

EN ATTENDANT GODOT - Carnet de bord # 3

François Royet

Show

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