Beckett
on Film
The Beckett Film Project
I
|
Catastrophe | Ohio
Impromptu | Come and Go | Breath | Play | Act Without Words II | What Where |
Jeremy |
|
In no single instance is a
play brought off satisfactorily. Ohio Impromptu is best, because the
director is toying with his motion-control camera and lets Jeremy Irons get on
with it. In general, it’s best to toy with something behind the camera,
if you don’t know the business.
Catastrophe leads to a non sequitur, when Sir John
Gielgud lifts his head to receive the clapping of the Director and his
Secretary, unless one takes into account the revelation of Play, which is
like watching a play and watching it being performed (an experience you will
have if you go and see a play twice during its run).
Come and Go
might have been done differently. It would not have hurt to film it outdoors,
but the entrances and exits are just as easily accomplished as removals or
walk-ons on or off-camera.
Breath
does not gain by a digitalized plane of garbage in space, floating.
Play is
frankly hoked up by attributing film stock with the characteristics of the urns
the actors are in, and there is a good deal of digitalized quirkiness. The
actors speak too rapidly for comprehension, but this is so heroic and they are
so good and again the director is kept busy, so you have the play, although the
obvious solution has been burked, which would have been to situate the camera
in front of the actors and let it turn to each one turn and turn about.
Act Without Words II is presented as a digitalized palimpsest in a rather
amateur (film school) way, but the performance has at least one gag in it.
What Where
is for some reason situated in the Library of Babel, with the Book of Sand on
its floor. This does not obtrude, however, not being explicit, and the
elaborateness of the conceit once again filters away the cinematic occlusion,
and you have the play.
Overall, and this is the saddest part, this is
Beckett introduced to the younger generation in much the same way it has come
to know Tomorrowland: as a digital representation. Let’s call a spade a
spade. This is Beckett made to front for the new Irish economy. Notably, the
sound wants improvement. Nevertheless, and I say this full of misgivings, you
have Beckett in these films, not in a definitive film essence but transmuted
through the portals of cinema into a dramatic representation on film. And that,
viewer, is just enough to be getting on with.
II
|
Waiting for Godot |
|
Beckett labored no end to make the play suitable for
actors in English, but the results are hampered as a rule by unwarranted
interference from academic writers or critics.
For the benefit of actors, let us explain the play.
It is in two acts, and expresses two movements. The two main characters occupy
the stage; to them Pozzo and Lucky twice, once hopefully and once dejectedly. That
is all.
That is the operative structure, the one whole
solitary joke Beckett is trying to elicit. Careful attention to this will
remedy the artlessness trumped into artiness that damages the play in
performance.
The Marshall/Lahr/Kasznar production was solidly
acted with a vaudeville flair, though Lucky‘s part may be said to have
been treated to effects rather than as one. Donald Moffatt and Dana Elcar
played Laurel & Hardy in the actual desert, making one wish to see them in
a telefilm of Mercier & Camier, if that were possible.
This production is an eyeopener. It is neither well
directed nor well performed, which often amounts to the same thing. Be that as
it may, the actors are Irish (you may have seen an Irish production before, and
had your eyes opened). No doubt En attendant Godot plays well in French;
it can be done successfully in American English. In “Anglo-Irish,”
real difficulties melt away, and you are watching Captain Boyle and Joxer in Juno
and the Paycock (oh, that Hitchcock might have directed this).