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Review: Wanting More and Still Waiting

"Waiting For Godot," Geffen Playhouse, Nov. 6 - Dec. 15, 2024


Nov. 18, 2024 | By Bruce R. Feldman


In Brief: A professional production that respects but does not illuminate Beckett’s perplexing story. Rainn Wilson and Aasif Mandvi star.


Aasif Mandvi and Rainn Wilson in Waiting for Godot at Geffen Playhouse. Directed by Judy Hegarty Lovett. (Photo: Jeff Lorch)


Apart from a handful of Shakespeare’s most famous works, perhaps no play has been written about, analyzed, questioned, or studied more than Waiting for Godot.


Since it’s French-language premiere in Paris in 1953 and its English-language debut in London in 1955, Samuel Beckett’s masterpiece has been viewed alternately as a philosophical allegory, an existential discourse, a post-World War II parable, and a religious or psychoanalytic (both Jungian and Freudian) exposition.


That’s the short list of interpretations directors, critics, and academics of all kinds have ascribed.


No one really knows exactly what Beckett’s intentions were. The playwright never wanted to talk much about the work, except once to have said that it is a simple thing that people try to overcomplicate.


Beckett also described the play as a game. Perhaps he wanted it to be a puzzle that can frustrate the hell out of you or maybe just a game to be played primarily for amusement.


We don’t really know which one applies to Waiting for Godot, although scholars would be out of a job if they chose to regard the work as nothing more than an diverting performance piece.


At its core, Waiting for Godot is a spare, enigmatic tale of two disheveled men, Vladimir and Estragon, who meet in the middle of nowhere in the hope that the title character will show up. While waiting, they talk about all sorts of random issues, some weighty, others trivial.


A traveler, Pozzo, and his slave, Lucky, stop for a vague interlude, as does a boy.


All of this mystery and ambiguity makes the play intriguing for audiences and critics and a tremendous challenge for directors and actors to produce something that will posit a satisfying underlying meaning or in some way illuminate the text.


The production now at the Geffen in Westwood does neither. Nor does it play Beckett’s non-story strictly for laughs as, some famous Broadway productions have done, notably one starring Robin Williams, Steve Martin, and Bill Irwin and a later revival headlined by Nathan Lane, John Goodman, and, again, Bill Irwin.


Rainn Wilson, as Valdimir, and Aasif Mandvi, as Estragon head the cast. Wilson’s comedy is not peppered with the kind of physicality that Robin Williams, Bill Irwin, or Nathan Lane use to punctuate their lines and please playgoers.


As Wilson’s acting is understated here, it’s up to Mandvi’s deadpan reactions to provide occasional laughs.


These performances, along with those of Conor Lovett as Pozzo and Adam Stein as Lucky, are adept, but do not feel inspired. It’s hard to know whether the actors are capable of more or whether they simply are giving director Judy Hegarty Lovett the reading she wants.


Either way, as Becket tells us very little about the characters, the audience depends on the actors and director to fill in the blanks. Failing that, the result is a production that is professional but feels more reverential than enlightening.


It will be up to others in the future to provide the answers audiences crave. Until then, we wait.


“Waiting for Godot,” Geffen Playhouse, 10886 Le Conte Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90024, geffenplayhouse.org, (310)-208-2028

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