For me, Sydney is at its best in September. Warm, sunny days and cool nights which can be spent in odd little theatres watching unique shows courtesy of the Fringe Festival. “No Exit” is both these things. It’s playing in an Archway and it’s a text which is more often read than performed.
Written by Jean-Paul Sartre in 1944 (this translation by Paul Bowles), NO EXIT explores the situation of three souls locked together in a small cell in Hell. They are brought there by a butler with no eyelids (Mathias Olofsson). Joseph (Matthew R Grego) is a coward and a wife beater; Ines (Beverley Bugeja) is a seducer of women and Estelle (Stephanie Cowton) has committed the gravest of crimes. They are confined together in this room, with no darkness, for eternity. Each arrives expecting fire, brimstone and a torturer. It is later they realise that they are not haphazardly cramped together, they are each other’s torturers.
NO EXIT starts slowly as the characters are introduced to their fate but when the three damned are alone in the space then the show really settles. Ensemble work can be like that, they are stronger together. Well-rehearsed, the cast has clear character objectives and an ability to be still.
The set is solidly presented as a slate lined cell with three chaise style divans and the perpetually lit chandelier above them. However it is use of the 4th wall which lifts this scene out of the ordinariness of a box set. Over the audience’s head is a window onto the world from which this trio have departed. Meta plays like this can abet actors who over respond during other actors’ speeches but this device gives a focal point for silence and interior monologue. At the same time, the spoken monologue describes the earthy events for the audience and draws them in.
Existentialism is not just studied in Drama and Philosophy courses but in Social Work, Vet Science even Urban Planning. Existential plays like this however, are at their best when given voice. This is an intimate venue and the voice of the text has resonance on the plain brick walls and arched ceiling. As does the audience laughter and their considerable applause.
An Archway 1 Theatre Company production directed by Leon Kowalski, NO EXIT runs at the Archway 1 Theatre in Annandale at Bicentennial Park (behind Crescent Hardware) until Sunday 21 September.