Come and Go

Background >

Setting

The playing space is enveloped in darkness save for a small area, centre stage, which is lit from above only. Beneath the dim, vertical light is a narrow bench-like seat, rendered practically invisible by being just long enough to accommodate the three figures seated upon it. The director's notes call for 'as little visible as possible. It should not be clear what they are sitting on.'

'I've photographed it to look like an old Victorian coloured photograph' says John Crowley, director of the Beckett on Film production. 'So when each character leaves, she dissolves into darkness like an old photograph fading. I wanted to find a cinematic convention analogous to Beckett's stage directions. He doesn't bother with simple entrances and exits. He never has anyone going off to make a cup of tea. They just disappear.'

This paltry, nondescript place is anywhere and everywhere and there is nowhere else. When the characters take their exits, as director John Crowley observes: 'They don't go anywhere – they're simply absent.'