Samuel Beckett’s classic Endgame will be at the Baxter’s Golden Arrow Studio in August with Andrew Buckland, Rob van Vuuren, Antoinette Kellerman and Soli Philander, directed by Sylvaine Strike.
Buckland plays the role of Hamm, with Van Vuuren as Clov and Philander and Kellerman as Nagg and Nell. Set and lighting design is by Patrick Curtis and costume design is by Birrie le Roux.
Johannesburg-based Sylvaine Strike directed Moliere’s Tartuffe last year and some of her other productions at the Baxter over the years include The Travellers, Black and Blue, The Miser and Tobacco, and the Harmful Effects Thereof.
Samuel Beckett was born in Dublin, Ireland, on Friday 13 April 1906. An avant-garde novelist, playwright, theatre director, poet, and literary translator, he lived in Paris for most of his adult life where he wrote in both English and French.
In 1969 he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. Endgame, Waiting for Godot and Krapp’s Last Tape are some of his best-known plays.
Beckett’s work offers a bleak, tragicomic outlook on human existence, often coupled with black comedy and gallows humour, which is why he is considered one of the last modernist writers and one of the key figures in what is called “Theatre of the Absurd”.
Endgame explores the relationship of master and servant; boss clown and underdog and in some contexts father and son; parent and child.
The limited season runs from Wednesday August 8 to Saturday August 25, at 7.30pm nightly, Monday to Saturday, with previews on August 8 and 9 and opening on Friday August 10. Booking is through Webtickets or selected Pick * Pay stores. There is an age restriction of 12 years and parental guidance is advised. Visit www.baxter.co.za for more information.