Lake Dillon Theatre Company 

No Exit Delivers Punch

SUMMIT DAILY NEWS-June 5, 1998-Black Coffee's 'No Exit' depicts a disturbing taste of eternity-Characters in Sartre's play discover three's a crowd---By Mandi Bollinger, Daily News Staff Writer

Imagine spending eternity with three self-centered sinners who seemingly vie for position as the greatest scoundrel with continuous shocking revelations about their lives on Earth.

That's what "No Exit," presented this weekend by Lake Dillon Theatre Company's Black Coffee Theatre, is like--a little taste of eternity. Three recently deceased reprobates discover themselves in a sparse room with three black-and-white checkered couches. The three nervously expect to encounter torturers. Instead, they discover that they are their own torturers.

If "No Exit" is hell, then hell is vastly entertaining, at least for the audience, which gets to witness the three condemned attack, make love and reveal their secrets to one another--often at the same time.

"No Exit's" hell may be frightening for the play's participants, who make little effort to conceal their distaste for one another, but for the audience, the plot is like a one-hour live version of a made-for-TV movie: "Hell: The Miniseries." It's got a cheating husband, a murderous lesbian femme fatale and a baby-killer, but these revelations are just the tip of the iceberg for three people who seem to have no redeeming qualities.

"No Exit," like Socrates, asks the audience to consider whether the unexamined life is worth living.

As Garcin, Poke Keithley asks many questions, is introspective and the most repentant. His rubbery facial features, which in the past have inspired laughter with a raised eyebrow or smirk with characters like a William Shatner-inspired Hamlet in the Backstage Theatre's "The Compleat Works of Wm. Shakespeare, Abridged" last summer, and Hook in the Backstage's "Peter Pan" last fall, here display mostly anguish and frustration.

At one point, he attempts to win the love of Bonnie DeChant's Estelle.

"Will you trust me?" he beseeches her. "If you had faith in me, I'd love you forever."

Later he discovers that his only redemption lies in Inez.

Jean Williams' Inez is perhaps the opposite of Garcin, a woman who revels in her sin. While at one point both Garcin and Estelle lose control and pound on the door to escape, Inez not only accepts her fate but seems to enjoy manipulating her companions' fear.

"We're all tarred by the same brush," Inez tells th two when they question their destiny. "We're in hell, my pets, and here they never make mistakes."

Williams played the title role in "Peter Pan" last year, portraying the young boy as almost fairy-like, a happy creature from another world. If so, Inez is Pan's antithesis--alike in that she is from another world, but more like a demon than a pixie. Williams' sleek movements contributed to her success in creating the Pan character, and here again they add to Inez, only making her more like a snake ready to strike.

When Estelle says, "Human feeling is beyond me; I'm rotten to the core," the audience believes her.

Especially compelling is the scene between Inez and Estelle, with Estelle seeking approval from Inez, who acts like a mirror for the hysterical girl. Inez draws her hand softly across Estelle's face, calming her--but the audience is aware, from Inez's cooing voice, deliberate motions, tense smile and slitted eyes that Estelle should be more afraid than ever.

Though calmed, Estelle realizes the danger.

"I am going to smile and my smile will sink down into your pupils and who knows what it will become," she murmurs dreamily. Later, she resists against the control Inez seeks to impose by throwing herself into Garcin's arms.

While Garcin and Inez are on opposite ends of the redemption spectrum, Estelle is right in the middle, not realizing that she's done wrong--and not caring. She insists her arrival is a "ghastly mistake," and, unlike Garcin and Inez, doesn't attempt to explain her past or future. Rather, she serves as a pawn between the two.

The play ends with a bit of hope.

"Alone, none of us can save him or herself," Garcin says near the beginning of the play. By the end, no hint of cooperation is in the trio's future. Then again, they have forever to work it out.

Sartre's vision of hell

Director Richard Kuebler wasn't exactly going for entertainment with his version of Jean paul Sartre's "No Exit." Instead, he wants this play to be thought-provoking, which, as a Black Coffee Theatre production, the piece is supposed to be.

"Too many people think plays should be entertaining," Kuebler said. "Perhaps it's more important to be challenged on an intellectual level...plays like this force you to question. Not necessarily change your mind, but to examine, to think. That's something TV doesn't do."

Written by Sartre soon after World War II, "No Exit" depicts the playwright's vision of hell.

"Sartre grew up in Europe witnessing the horrors of war," Kuebler said. "He is one of the foremost existential artists, and "No Exit" is his view of hell, inspired by his observations of the war."

Kuebler is the director of theater at Northeastern Junior College in Sterling. He directed the Backstage Theatre's "A Few Good Men" in the summer of 1996 and the Backstage at the Riverwalk's musical "Peter Pan" in 1997.

Besides "No Exit," Kuebler is also directing Tina Howe's "Painting Churches" and Beth Henley's "The Miss Firecracker Contest," both for the Backstage.

"No Exit" is Kuebler's first experience directing for Black Coffee Theatre, a division of lake Dillon Theatre Company that invites audience reaction after the production.

"It's a very interesting experience, and one way I learn whether people saw what I wanted them to see," Kuebler said. "It's interesting to watch the play and consider what you think."

Lake Dillon Theatre Company's Black Coffee Theatre is scheduled to present "No Exit" at 8 p.m. Friday and Saturday.

The Lake Dillon Theatre is located next to the Texaco Station on Lake Dillon Drive in Dillon. Tickets for "No Exit" are $8 per person. For information or reservations, call 513-9386.

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Copyright © 1999 Lake Dillon Theatre Company
Last modified: March 14, 1999