The room has no windows, no mirrors, and only one door. And it’s empty until a valet escorts in three damned souls: a man and two women.
This room and these three characters are a depiction of the afterlife in No Exit, an existentialist play by Jean Paul Sartre, being put up this month at the MITP in Valletta by Troupe 18:45 and directed by Albert Marshall.
It is a simple one-act play for four actors, with only one scene and is the source of Sartre’s most famous quotation, l’enfer, c’est les autres (‘Hell is other people’).
The three characters Joseph Garcin, Inès Serrano and Estelle Rigault all know that they are in hell, and therefore, they all expect to be tortured: but no torturer arrives. Instead, they are left to probe each other’s sins, desires, and unpleasant memories, gradually realising this is their punishment: they are each other’s torturers.
Sartre wrote the play in 1944, when the World War II was still raging. Is it still valid for today’s audiences?
“Definitely,” says director Marshall, “apart from the fact that critical acclaim deems it the best of Sartre’s work, No Exit doesn’t date because of the universality of the themes tackled: cowardice, solitude and human responsibility. It subtly draws on the fact that the more responsible we are, the more conscious we are of our existence.
The flow of the script and the dialogue ensure that the play is not abstract and it puts theatrical action before any sophisticated philosophy:
“This is not a philosophical piece of work – it’s not at all high brow, it’s pure theatre. This is simply food for thought for the man in the street,” said Marshall.
Troupe 18:45’s version is extremely faithful to the original: “I didn’t touch a word, I’ve actually added lines rather than deleted. I have been scrupulously faithful,” said Marshall.
In No Exit Sartre is not interested in the nature of sins but in their guilt which is callous enough for them to be sent to hell. “Hence the three deceased characters are punished by being locked into a room together for eternity: on the basis of their actions they suffer other people’s hell,” said Marshall.
The characters are quite straightforward: Joseph Garcin is a callous coward. He deserted the army during World War II and blatantly cheated on his wife – even bringing his affairs home and getting her to make them coffee in bed, without any sympathy.
Inèz Serrano is a lesbian clerk who manipulated her cousin’s wife into killing her husband. She is the only character who understands the power of opinion, and in ‘hell’ cruelly twists Estelle’s and Garcin’s opinions of themselves and of each other.
Estelle Rigault is a high-society woman, who married her husband for his money and had an affair with a younger man. Her lover became emotionally attached but to her it was just a fling and had no qualms about drowning the illegitamate child she bore him, leading her lover to commit suicide.
The ‘hell’ in No Exit has nothing to do with Dante’s Inferno. “There are no gruesome medieval torture instruments, just three characters tearing at each other viscously, each of them perhaps trying to gain salvation by confession,” said Marshall.
Near the end of the play, Garcin demands he be let out; at his words the door flies open, however, none of the three will leave. “They torture each other to madness for eternity – and they cannot escape because there is no escape, no exit,” said Marshall.
No Exit will be staged at the MITP in Valletta on Saturday and Sunday at 8 p.m. Produced by Troupe 18:45 and directed by Albert Marshall, under the Patronage of the Embassy of France. Booking is open at St James Cavalier.