Exit the King
Reviewed by Taylor Kass
City Garage Theatre
Extended through July 21
Something is rotten in Berenger’s kingdom. The land is eroding into bottomless pits, the population is dying off, and the sun is nowhere to be seen. The Doctor (Anthony M. Sannazzaro) deduces that these signs point to the imminent demise of King Berenger (Troy Dunn). The matter-of-fact former Queen Marguerite (Natasha St. Clair-Johnson) tells Berenger , “You’re going to die in an hour and a half. You’re going to die at the end of the show.” He reacts just as you might expect he would.
At City Garage Theatre, director Frédérique Michel and producer/lighting designer Charles A. Duncombe have teamed up to stage their new translation of Exit the King. This might be one of absurdist playwright Eugène Ionesco’s most accessible and linear narratives, detailing the last hour and a half in the life of a formerly all-powerful king while his wives and servants try to quell his emotional outbursts and prepare him for the inevitable. Think King Lear if it had been written by Samuel Beckett. Troy Dunn as King Berenger delivers Lear-level tirades, madness and despair, although his petulance can become repetitive.
Queen Marguerite is fully resolute, perhaps even gleeful, at the prospect of her former husband’s death. St. Clair-Johnson has an otherworldly elegance, creating a badass villain that makes a whole lot of sense. Berenger’s second wife, Queen Marie (Lindsay Plake), is thoroughly devastated to be losing her beloved husband. Plake’s unselfconscious flirtations and angst are hilarious; her complete codependency is heartbreaking. Anthony M. Sannazaro is delightfully weird as The Doctor, with a Monty Python funny walk and a self-aware sneer.
City Garage impressively pulls off a metaphysical play without any special effects other than Michel’s staging. Her direction is simple yet stylized, with a sprinkling of heightened movement and gesture. And while Exit the King’s technical design is minimal throughout the show, its final image is arresting and haunting thanks to Duncombe’s lighting.
Yes, we all know we’re going to die someday, but are we capable of truly comprehending death when it’s only an hour and a half away? Exit the King is thoroughly disturbing and absurd, all too real but oddly comforting. Even the centuries-old inventor of the universe has to die sometime. And if a narcissistic tyrant can learn to appreciate the sky, the air, and the magic of waking up every day, then we can too.
City Garage Theatre at Bergamot Station, T1 Space, 2525 Michigan Ave., Santa Monica; Fri.-Sat., 8 p.m.; Sun., 4 p.m.; extended through Jul. 21. (310) 453-9939 or CityGarage.org. Running time: one hour and 45 minutes with no intermission.
