Eh Joe
Theatre, particularly West End theatre, should be an unforgettable experience. It should be an event, something that stays with you for a long time.
Sonia Friedman has a knack of putting her name to these little nuggets and this production of Samuel Beckett’s powerful study of introspection, paranoia, guilt, is one such unforgettable experience.
Somehow, during the 30 minutes Michael Gambon is on stage, the theatre audience manages to be quieter and the auditorium darker than for any other production. It is like watching it through tar.
Gambon mesmerises. Sitting on a bed, side on to the audience, his face in close up is beamed onto the gauze curtain. His subtle yet anxious reactions are amplified as the camera moves ever closer.
Penelope Wilton voices his conscience, his anxiety and paranoia about how he has treated a woman he maybe loved and how terribly she might be reacting. Her words are emphasised by eye twitches or sudden jerks of the head from Gambon as his own internal litany drills into his attempts to sleep.
Eileen Diss creates a literal set, the real world for Joe to inhabit while his internal world of potential illusion and misinterpretation spreads through his mind like a cancer.
No other play in the West End has half an hour as powerful as this.
Production information
- By:
- Samuel Beckett
- Management:
- Gate Theatre, Dublin produced in the West End by Sonia Friedman Productions and Tulbart Productions
- Cast:
- Michael Gambon with the voice of Penelope Wilton
- Director:
- Atom Egoyan
- Design:
- Eileen Dis
- Lighting:
- James McConnell
- Costumes:
- Leonore McDonagh
- Run time:
- 30 minutes
Production information can change over the run of the show.
Run sheet
- Duke of York's London
- June 30-July 15 2006
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