Cal Shakes Review: Samuel Beckett's "Happy Days"

[hrj]

I'm wondering if this year's dramatic theme is "strange lack of sympathetic characters" or "urge to slap characters silly and tell them to get over themselves". I can tell that I'm supposed to appreciate Beckett's Happy Days as a deeply meaningful and symbolic presentation of the ways people trap themselves and are trapped into meaningless ritual, but ... what do you do when your response to what is, essentially, a full length monologue is to want to scream at the character to just shut up already? Ah well, the last play of the season is A Midsummer Night's Dream and I anticipate enjoying it thoroughly.

I really do like being exposed to a wide variety of more modern (and yet classic) playwrights, and I understand that not everyone will be tuned in to every play in the season. But I find myself longing for characters I'm willing to make some emotional investment in.

Comments

[tafelspitz.livejournal.com]

In the 11+ years j_i_m_r and I have had season tickets to ACT, there have been only two plays we have walked out on at the intermission. When I went back and looked them up, I found it interesting to note that both were by Samuel Beckett.

One was _Waiting for Godot_. Although performed well by actors we like, we got tired of waiting. The other was Beckett's _Texts_. This was performed by Bill Irwin and featured prominently a Sisyphean dirt hillside. The futility of the situation was fully transmitted in the first ten minutes of the play. Since then, "A Pile of Dirt" has been shorthand between us for something worthy of being walked out on. From these two experiences and the description of _Happy Days_, I have concluded that Samuel Beckett's plays are not our cup of tea.

response

[(Anonymous)]

maybe it touched a nerve in your life? how is different from a blog

Re: response

[hrj.livejournal.com]

You know, this is why anonymous posting gets a bad rep. How is it different from a blog? I didn't sell you a $40 ticket for the privilege of reading my blog.