The Chairs

Synopsis

An old couple live alone at the top of a building, their world has been destroyed by failure and humiliation. To justify their sad lives, they throw a party and invite guests from all walks of life to hear their story, told by a professional orator. This is a tragic farce, a black comedy, depicting the unreality of life and its emptiness, where the meaning is not in what is said but in the underlying passion and commitment.

Our Review:

27 November 2006

What a real treat this is: having just announced her resignation as artistic director of the Gate, Thea Sharrock - who will be directing Peter Shaffer’s Equus in the West End next spring - has revived Martin Crimp’s superb 1997 translation of Eugene Ionesco’s wonderful tragic farce, in which a nonagenarian couple sign off in a tower surrounded by water after welcoming a crowd of invisible visitors, and the emperor, the king of kings, to hear the Old Man’s farewell speech.

In the 1950s, Ionesco’s play became part of the ideological battleground between absurdism and social relevance, even though it was always a Royal Court play. The distinctions are not so clear these days, even if the old debate has lately been resurrected by David Hare and Peter Hall. In the consummate playing of Nicholas Woodeson and Susan Brown under Sharrock’s baton, you get a sense of both valedictory, lyrical euthanasia and disappointment in a little man’s lot.

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