Breaking News

Slump in Aer Lingus long-haul traffic 08/02/10
Calls for review on child asylum seekers 08/02/10
Lee leaves Dáil and Fine Gael 08/02/10
Famous stately home damaged in blaze 08/02/10
Pub investigated in Sligo pub raid 08/02/10
AIB charges 40,000 clients by mistake 08/02/10

Beck again

Endgame @Duchess Theatre, London By Shelley Marsden - 04/11/09

You could be mistaken for thinking Samuel Beckett has gone main-stream. Recently, we had Waiting For Godot at a West End theatre with Patrick Stewart and Ian MKellan; now we have Complicite’s version of Endgame just down the road.

The difference is that Endgame is much, much darker. Written in 1957 and Beckett’s grimmest play by far, it confronts our darkest fears, its characters sloshing around in complete physical and spiritual isolation.

A hobbling servant (Complicite founder/director Simon McBurney) and his bullying, blind master (Mark Rylance) witness each other’s physical and spiritual despair as they each descend into their own private hell.

Yards away, the master’s parents (Miriam Margoyles and Tom Hickey) live in two dustbins, only pulling the lids back and comically popping their heads out to ask for something or reminisce, brutally depicting how our past lives may have been shared, but in the last phase of our lives, it’s each man to his own.

This unsettling, tormenting play, which McBurney’s experimental company gives a fresh layer of bleak humour to, was last seen over here in 2004, when Michael Gambon and Lee Evans took the leads.

This time, though its inherent humour is exploited, an astounding Rylance – who proves what a chameleon he is in his latest incarnation – fills us with infinitely more dread than his predecessor did, while McBurney’s creepy, dragging presence does no less to assuage the general feeling of unease.

Endgame runs until Sat 5 Dec 09. Visit www.duchesstheatre.co.uk or call 0845 434 9290.

Pic: Robbie Jack