Background
Beckett followed up the success of his first drama ('Waiting for Godot') with his favourite work, 'Fin de Partie', translated into English in 1957 as 'Endgame'. Its genesis lay in the traumatic months Beckett had spent at the bedside of his dying brother.
When no theatre in Paris was prepared to stage a production, 'Fin de Partie' premiered in London at the Royal Court on 3 April 1957. Roger Blin, who had first directed 'Godot' (and to whom Beckett dedicated 'Endgame'), both directed and performed as Hamm. By all accounts it was a lacklustre production. A staging at the Studio des Champs-Élysées in Paris on 26 April 1957 was more successful. With the drama translated into English as 'Endgame,' Beckett's close friend, American director Alan Schneider, staged a creditable production in New York on 28 January 1958. July 1964 brought a notable London success for 'Endgame' with Patrick Magee as Hamm and Jack MacGowran as Clov.
Though 'Endgame' has much less clowning than 'Godot', the two plays share striking similarities. Both Hamm and Pozzo are pompous and blind, pitiless tyrants. Both Hamm and Estragon are preoccupied with their own imaginative dreams. Both Clov and Lucky are subserviently tied to their abusive masters. Clov, like Lucky and Vladimir, moves with a 'stiff, staggering walk'. However, the sense of desiring and moving towards an end of human existence is much more pronounced in 'Endgame'.
The Irish director of the Beckett on Film production of 'Endgame', Conor McPherson, reflects: 'I felt that "Endgame" was one of the plays that would best translate into film because there's a definite location, a room. Beckett only specified "interior". We had to be lively and inventive with the camera to keep surprising the audience.'
The screen production, which has a duration of 84 minutes, is performed by Michael Gambon as Hamm and David Thewlis as Clov. Charles Simon and Jean Anderson (both aged 92) play Nagg and Nell respectively.
