"Come to this play with an open and pure sense of imagination, and it will embrace you."
Since its first performance in 1953, Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot has generated controversy with its unconventional plot and disturbing themes. Audiences have reacted strongly, with many embracing the play, others rejecting it, but all debating its meaning. The play, which interweaves a tragic sense with circus-like elements, remains popular and influential decades later as a piece of puzzling literature, an example of unusual staging, and also an expression of the thinking of its time.
This in-depth discussion, recorded during the run of The Gate Theatre's production of Waiting for Godot at the Kennedy Center in Washington, DC, features the four adult actors (Alan Stanford, Barry McGovern, Johnny Murphy and Stephen Brennan) and the director of the production, Walter D. Asmus. This podcast features excerpts from the complete discussion program, which will be made available by the Kennedy Center Education Department in the future.
ArtsEdge, the Kennedy Center's arts education network, supports the creative use of technology to enhance teaching and learning in, through, and about the arts, offering free, standards-based teaching materials for use in and out of the classroom, media-rich interactive experiences, professional development resources, and guidelines for arts-based instruction and assessment. Visit ArtsEdge at artsedge.kennedy-center.org.