In a 1958 essay, cultural theorist Theodor Adorno said that Samuel Beckett wrote Endgame in a post–World War II context where the “shattered common thread[s] . . . of existentialism” created a “bombed-out consciousness.” Facility Theatre’s production of Endgame, directed by Yasen Peyankov, maps that explosion onto today’s climate anxieties. The “gray light” of Beckett’s exacting stage directions is rendered here in stark fluorescents by lighting designer Richard Norwood. The cold strip lights shudder and flash, lending a bunker ambience to this Endgame.
Endgame
Through 6/29: Thu–Sat 7:30 PM; also Sun 6/22 and 6/29 3 PM; Facility Theatre, 1138 N. California, facilitytheatre.org/end-game, $30 suggested donation or pay what you can
As Clov and Hamm, York Griffith and Kirk Anderson (who also designed the gray, undulating set) are equally combative and codependent. Anderson’s Hamm is a spitting tyrant to his last moments, but he clearly needs Clov nearby, not just to perform menial tasks, but to affirm that he was ever human. The emotional stakes are incredibly high for all of these characters, as they feel not just the stasis of this postatrocity world, but also the inherent tension in waiting to die. Rick Sims’s subtle, throbbing sound design underlines this sense of pressure.
As Nagg and Nell, Hamm’s dustbin-bound parents, H.B. Ward and Shawna Franks display a great tenderness toward each other while holding a simmering disappointment in their neglectful son. Peyankov and his ensemble clearly understand Beckett’s bleeding heart, something often ignored or dismissed when talking about Beckett’s wily work. In Adorno’s view, Beckett wrote for a world utterly decimated. This Endgame hands these feelings to us today and asks us to mind them as things crash down around us.
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