No Exit
By Jean-Paul Sartre
Directed by Paul Wishart
Seneca Productions
Polygot Theatre, 27A Cromwell Road, South Yarra, until September 10. Bookings (03) 686 6755
Reviewed by Daniel Board

Seneca Productions' performance of Jean-Paul Sartre's timeless play No Exit is an especially moving one. The play is set in hell, but not the torturous and sweltering ball of flames that has been a symbol of much Christian religion through the ages. Sartre's hell is unerringly lifelike, featuring the interaction of three very wicked and incompatible “sinners”. Thus unfolds a challenging exploration of what it is to exist.

Sartre wrote No Exit in 1943, and by 1948 it was attracting much interest throughout Europe and the US. Sartre was an influential part of a growing trend of thought in Europe which became known as existentialism, although his works tended to lack a vision of the collective and the spirit of hope which contemporaries such as Camus were able to muster.

A famous line from the play, “Hell is other people”, was an accurate description, not of the futility of social interaction, but of how regressive relationships can be when left to meander unresolved.

The obnoxious butler from hell aside, the three central characters are Joseph, a hardened journalist who was shot 12 times; Inez, a postal clerk with a sharp but vicious tongue; and Estelle, a naive social climber who killed her child. They soon learn that their hell is each other, trapped eternally together with little option but to attempt to resolve their personal and interpersonal dilemmas. The decision to move forward, take action, or simply appraise one's current reality with progressive honesty is critical to existence as Sartre views it.

Seneca is a joint venture between actor/director Paul Wishart and producer Neville Drake. Earlier productions have gained the company quite a following, and this comes as no surprise given the passion with which Sartre's themes are explored. The stage props and setting, while simple in design, give full meaning to the potentially oppressive yet “normal” nature of the characters' hell.

No Exit leaves one strikingly aware of the complexities and hardships of existing at a personal, social and universal level. Sartre does not totally void his work of hope, however, and it is such progressive strains that must be embraced.

This article was posted on the Green Left Weekly Home Page.
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