ENDGAME
Hamm: Mine was always that–Endgame
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For his waiting game, Clov receives a biscuit a day. He wheels Hamm aimlessly around (though the blind man insists on exact placement) and fetches for him the crudely stuffed dog Clov has fashioned. Clov also lugs around and misplaces a stepladder, from which he peers through a broken telescope to report what little he sees. He refuses to give Hamm his painkiller and plots escape. He growls out news about objects that have disappeared and people who have died, the remains of the world perishing around them in painful installments. As Hamm says, “Nature has forgotten us.” It’s a dog’s life–and a man’s.
Beckett slyly lets the terms of their exchanges suggest that emptying world. Hamm: “What’s happening?” Clov: “Something is taking its course.” The way that they sigh out the simple word “yesterday” makes it take on an aching poignance.
Endgame is rarely revived, reason enough to encourage the new Sybil Theatre Company: their goal is to restore neglected works of the avant- garde. Craig Bradshaw’s staging, their debut offering, certainly justifies bringing back Beckett; Bradshaw is adept at fostering the illusion of movement in the midst of checkmate, and he knows how to energize futility and invigorate paralysis.
