As the title suggests, Jean Paul Sartre’s No Exit suggests a place that someone would very much like to leave. In this powerful one-act, Sartre explores his own version of hell. Milwaukee’s Off the Wall Theater is staging the 1944 play in its intimate, 50-seat theater. Directed by company founder Dale Gutzman, the play unfolds on a set that is wrapped, almost mummy-like, in thick plastic sheeting. The props, mostly just a few seats for the actors to sit on, also are wrapped in plastic. In fact, the plastic extends towards the audience and even towards the lobby. To enter the theater, audiences must move aside a plastic sheet suspended from the ceiling.
This inhospitable lodging is eventually filled by three people – a man and two women. They are individually escorted through the room’s blood-red door by a bellhop, which in this production is dressed like an auto mechanic, complete with overalls and a baseball cap. The threesome do not know one another, and it takes the rest of the play for them to fully realize why they have been imprisoned together.
But Sartre’s hell, as the characters eventually discover, is far worse a place than any prison. The “inmates” in hell neither eat nor sleep. Initially, the characters are surprised to discover that no hellish torturer awaits them. It is hot, a fact that they comment on from time to time. (The Milwaukee version debuted during the summer’s worst heat wave; audiences may have been more sympathetic to the characters’ discomfort.)
In Sartre’s hell, people see themselves through other people’s eyes. There are no mirrors here; there is nothing but blank walls to stare at (the exception is a statue of a detailed angel’s wing. It may be a biblical reminder that Satan was a fallen angel). Furthermore, the characters have a keen ability to know what the others fail to disclose. Once this is revealed, one of the women still clings to her “version” of a past that put her squarely where she ends up. An older woman, a lesbian, tries to cajole the other woman into a sexual tryst. But the younger woman basically throws herself at the man, whom she hopes will deliver a sense of redemption rather than sexual satisfaction.
All three actors do a terrific job, despite some unevenness in acting styles. The man (Patrick McCann) has the most physical role. He doesn’t have much to say once the women arrive. But he is adept at using his facial features to communicate the character’s feelings. In one scene, he gazes silently at something the audience cannot see – a long hallway beyond a door that is typically locked. Lighting and cacophonous music suggest what he sees beyond their room (it isn’t pretty). Our only clues to deciding why the man doesn’t enter the hallway exist in McCann’s changing facial features.
Alicia Rice is riveting as Inez. At first, she convincingly assumes the air of a socialite. During the play, she (figuratively) lets down her neatly coiffed red hair to reveal the predatory monster she is. Her transformation is nothing less than brilliant. Rice allows her character to be somewhat more animated than Cradeau (the man). She displays an insatiable desire to sexually arouse the other woman, the young and pretty Estelle.
Once Estelle realizes Inez’s intentions, she reacts by basically flinging herself at the man. At first, he wants no part of her. But, unfazed, Zoe Schwartz skillfully tries to seduce him anyway. She nearly succeeds.
Schwartz takes her animated gestures and dialogue to the point where she needs to tone things down a bit. She speaks and gestures as if performing in a large auditorium, not a tiny theater, sacrificing some of her character’s credibility. Her energy level, however, is superb. She convincingly plays up her youth and looks to achieve her goals. As the doorman, James Strange adds a brief bit of humor to the few scenes in which he appears. His disaffected style says much about his indifferent attitude to the new inmates. One wishes the actors lurking behind the curtain were more clearly defined, but that is perhaps a directorial choice.
No Exit is more than an intriguing look at the afterlife. It demands that the audience reflects on our own lives, weighing the good behaviors against the bad. Even if none of us commits murder or some other horrible crime, Sartre’s point is well taken. Unlike the characters in No Exit, our lives are not over. We have the power to change.
