So true, we wait for everything, even the addict has to wait for their supplier, the patient for the dentist, the student for the lecturer, the mother for her child, the person for their life to unfold and finally cease.
I simply adore Ian Mckellen, and Patrick Stewart, but McKellen has always been at the top of my favourite actors and he seems such a wonderful man with it!
Interesting that he mentions Laurel and Hardy. The moment on the play both exchange their hats I couldn't help remembering Laurel and Hardy doing that all the time.
The script of W for G is so porous that with the phonetic mash-up of God and godot people can fill in the blanks and turn the play into many themes of a multi-faceted personal journey into their own waiting game in Life--mostly waiting for God, waiting for something that is a fiction waiting for something or someone who is a liar and waiting for some authority to give you permission to kill yourself or die or be a master or a slave--etc etc. I just like the comedy inherent in the play and the irony (not "just" but to me it's not a sad play but it's definitely an entire comic cosmic tragic human foible depicted by Beckett).
I think he probably did intend a resemblance to "God" but then rather some supplementary figure of power, almost like God- something of higher power that defines your life and meaning. But I think he actually did speak on it and said that it wasn't at all God so who knows I suppose :)
Mental note 📝 your rizz is a secret mission and you take your female partner several nights early only to not get the secret message but several nights alone, and you're a writer 😅.
McKellen has the gleam of the meaning of the play, but falls far short. The play takes place in the French countryside when Beckett was hiding from the Gestapo IN WWII. All the characters are different aspects of the same person-- him. What is the genius of Beckett is that unlike other playwrights who follow a time sequence, he examines a moment. Beckett says it well in the second act in the speech by Pozzo: "Have you not done tormenting me with your accursed time! It's abominable. When! When! One day is that not enough for you? One day I went blind, one day we'll go deaf, one day we were born, one day we shall die, the same day, the same second. Is that not enough for you?"
I mean, that's surely one reading but I think it's a bit too psychological for Beckett. One thing I like about Beckett is how he focuses on bodies themselves, usually with a disability of some kind (think of Endgame or Happy Days). He explores the body for its own sake and in its own way, without a reduction of the body to the mind. I really hate interpretations that reduce the bodies which populate his plays to figments of the mind. It forgets their corporeal nature which is so fundamental to their character. This I think makes sense of why Beckett progressed toward mime as a form of theatre with works like Quad. You see how I disagreed with you based on what I percieve as a flaw in your argument? Thats how you show someone "falls short" in their interpretation. Not by just stating your own interpretation as if it was the fact of the matter.
@@comiclover99 The interesting thing about your criticism is you don't give al alternative explanation of what the play is about. (I've got to admit you've got me with the idea that a writer can separate mind and body.) Again, place Godet in its historiical context and it makes complete sense.. If you take the same approah with Happy Days and Krap's Last Tape the meanings jump out at you. Quod and the unfinished movie he tried to make in New York showed a once great genius fighting to keep himself relevant. But I am glad you responded to my my critique of McKellen, who like the others who appear on UTube clips, seeks too hard and misses the obvious.
@@paultroop3850 I dont think the play is "about" something in the way you seem to present it. It can't be translated into a "true" meaning where all the characters represent something more than they actually are. All attempts at saying Vladimir represents this and Estragon that end up masking the experience of actually watching and experiencing the play. Interpretation should try to enlighten our experience of the piece rather than cover it up with a layer of interpretation as yours seems to do. So my interpretation is that Beckett uses the space of Waiting for Godot to explore the deterioration of bodies in a post-war world. The ways in which the body and the mind break down just as social order does. Thats what I felt when watching it but I needed time and work to know thats what I felt. Thats what interpretation should be. Not "heres some historical detail which reveals the hidden truth of the text". I doubt Beckett would ever agree to such a proposition. Especially considering your dismissal of his later work which explores the same fundamental insighrs his early work introduces.
@@comiclover99 (1) Beckett wrote the play in 1946. Hardly time for post-war "rot." to set in. I reading of a biolgraphy of Beckett would show the link between the play and his war-time experience hiding from the Gestopo. He was alone and fearful of anyone he met. (2) There were plays about the condition of Europe in the 1950s. In these characters represented different philosophical and political positions. Pinter's The Caretaker was interpreted that way. (3) When I watch an "intelllecctual" play I ask what was the meaning that the playwrite meant to communicate. I can't say I ever sat back and had a play "wash over me." (4) Beckett's genius peaked at Godet, Happy Days, and Krapps Last Tape, in my opinion. Those who studied Beckett say his novels were his better works. I started to read Murphy (I think that was the name of it) and decided life was too short. (5) You know me as Paul Troop. Who the heck is KeymarchProductions?. .
This is a voice over by Ian McClalen. The real speaker is a Shakespearean actor named Gills Stephens. Stephens is performing a segment of Henry IV. The scene where Henry learns of his mis-spent life among the court representatives of the King of France. The punch line, in French, concerns the Jews of the Paris cloister. A young girl speaks out on the remarkable sayings of the Parisian monk Louis deMarr. DeMarr cites from Aristotle. "Socrates is a fool!" The audience laughs.
I always enjoy listening to what Ian McKellen has to say, about drama, acting, or any subject really.
i hung out with this guy when performing in Stratford. He was constantly stoned.
Please, please, please... if a recording of the performance with Sir Ian and Sir Patrick Stewart exists, release it!
So true, we wait for everything, even the addict has to wait for their supplier, the patient for the dentist, the student for the lecturer, the mother for her child, the person for their life to unfold and finally cease.
Michael Gorman waiting for a meaning or purpose that never comes.
He's so unpretentious, which I think Beckett would have loved.
This is a wonderful alternative view at the play.
I simply adore Ian Mckellen, and Patrick Stewart, but McKellen has always been at the top of my favourite actors and he seems such a wonderful man with it!
It's so nice to see the play through the eyes of Ian...i didnt understand the play at first...
Thank you for this video, he's so wonderful.
Interesting that he mentions Laurel and Hardy. The moment on the play both exchange their hats I couldn't help remembering Laurel and Hardy doing that all the time.
There's something so sad and scary about this.
How dare those RUDE people talk make noise while SUCH a great person as Ian M is speaking❗
McKellen and Stewart as Vladimir and Estragon would be amazing
Someone obviously agreed!
Jeffrey Petromilli
They were.
They were
What is....Waiting for Godot was the final question on "JEOPARDY" today, 11/14/2017
One of the 3 got it right. At 17.26 mark.
Isn't it lovely to listen to ian in his natural Lancashire accent? Would that we could speak English so splendidly. I know I can't....
Kiitos
Fascinating! And a great help for my English coursework, haha!
The script of W for G is so porous that with the phonetic mash-up of God and godot people can fill in the blanks and turn the play into many themes of a multi-faceted personal journey into their own waiting game in Life--mostly waiting for God, waiting for something that is a fiction waiting for something or someone who is a liar and waiting for some authority to give you permission to kill yourself or die or be a master or a slave--etc etc. I just like the comedy inherent in the play and the irony (not "just" but to me it's not a sad play but it's definitely an entire comic cosmic tragic human foible depicted by Beckett).
Ou, thanx for sharing, generous time, how long have u lucky guys had yr private q&a? Envious but glad 8-) cheers
Svinutka Uber Lucky!
wow!
I mean, even if Godot is a common french name, Beckett picked it as a native english speaker, so that must certainly mean something
Beckett himself would disagree, but I don’t believe him.
I think he probably did intend a resemblance to "God" but then rather some supplementary figure of power, almost like God- something of higher power that defines your life and meaning. But I think he actually did speak on it and said that it wasn't at all God so who knows I suppose :)
Didn’t Beckett say he regretted using the name Godot because people kept erroneously making that connection?
Godot means 'boots' in French!!!
Mental note 📝 your rizz is a secret mission and you take your female partner several nights early only to not get the secret message but several nights alone, and you're a writer 😅.
full play th-cam.com/video/izX5dIzI2RE/w-d-xo.html
🫰🏻🫡👍🏼😇🫰
I really don't think he gets it at all
I don't either...
McKellen has the gleam of the meaning of the play, but falls far short. The play takes place in the French countryside when Beckett was hiding from the Gestapo IN WWII. All the characters are different aspects of the same person-- him. What is the genius of Beckett is that unlike other playwrights who follow a time sequence, he examines a moment. Beckett says it well in the second act in the speech by Pozzo: "Have you not done tormenting me with your accursed time!
It's abominable. When! When! One day is that not enough for you? One day I went blind, one day we'll go deaf, one day we were born, one day we shall die, the same day, the same second. Is that not enough for you?"
I mean, that's surely one reading but I think it's a bit too psychological for Beckett. One thing I like about Beckett is how he focuses on bodies themselves, usually with a disability of some kind (think of Endgame or Happy Days). He explores the body for its own sake and in its own way, without a reduction of the body to the mind. I really hate interpretations that reduce the bodies which populate his plays to figments of the mind. It forgets their corporeal nature which is so fundamental to their character. This I think makes sense of why Beckett progressed toward mime as a form of theatre with works like Quad. You see how I disagreed with you based on what I percieve as a flaw in your argument? Thats how you show someone "falls short" in their interpretation. Not by just stating your own interpretation as if it was the fact of the matter.
@@comiclover99 The interesting thing about your criticism is you don't give al alternative explanation of what the play is about. (I've got to admit you've got me with the idea that a writer can separate mind and body.) Again, place Godet in its historiical context and it makes complete sense.. If you take the same approah with Happy Days and Krap's Last Tape the meanings jump out at you. Quod and the unfinished movie he tried to make in New York showed a once great genius fighting to keep himself relevant. But I am glad you responded to my my critique of McKellen, who like the others who appear on UTube clips, seeks too hard and misses the obvious.
@@paultroop3850 I dont think the play is "about" something in the way you seem to present it. It can't be translated into a "true" meaning where all the characters represent something more than they actually are. All attempts at saying Vladimir represents this and Estragon that end up masking the experience of actually watching and experiencing the play. Interpretation should try to enlighten our experience of the piece rather than cover it up with a layer of interpretation as yours seems to do. So my interpretation is that Beckett uses the space of Waiting for Godot to explore the deterioration of bodies in a post-war world. The ways in which the body and the mind break down just as social order does. Thats what I felt when watching it but I needed time and work to know thats what I felt. Thats what interpretation should be. Not "heres some historical detail which reveals the hidden truth of the text". I doubt Beckett would ever agree to such a proposition. Especially considering your dismissal of his later work which explores the same fundamental insighrs his early work introduces.
@@comiclover99 (1) Beckett wrote the play in 1946. Hardly time for post-war "rot." to set in. I reading of a biolgraphy of Beckett would show the link between the play and his war-time experience hiding from the Gestopo. He was alone and fearful of anyone he met. (2) There were plays about the condition of Europe in the 1950s. In these characters represented different philosophical and political positions. Pinter's The Caretaker was interpreted that way. (3) When I watch an "intelllecctual" play I ask what was the meaning that the playwrite meant to communicate. I can't say I ever sat back and had a play "wash over me." (4) Beckett's genius peaked at Godet, Happy Days, and Krapps Last Tape, in my opinion. Those who studied Beckett say his novels were his better works. I started to read Murphy (I think that was the name of it) and decided life was too short. (5) You know me as Paul Troop. Who the heck is KeymarchProductions?. .
Can't hear him well...
Turn up the volume :)
Even I can and I'm in a bloody classroom
😜🔥🥰👣🤪🤪🤪😜
it appears Beckett was not enlightened as his consciousness took him just so far, to the edge but not into illumination....
This is a voice over by Ian McClalen. The real speaker is a Shakespearean actor named Gills Stephens. Stephens is performing a segment of Henry IV. The scene where Henry learns of his mis-spent life among the court representatives of the King of France. The punch line, in French, concerns the Jews of the Paris cloister. A young girl speaks out on the remarkable sayings of the Parisian monk Louis deMarr. DeMarr cites from Aristotle. "Socrates is a fool!" The audience laughs.
Must be another video. This IS Ian McKellen, and he is speaking.