In a Room Full of Empty Chairs, a Couple Grapples With Nothingness

Mary Wisniewski, NewCity Stage

Described by playwright Eugène Ionesco as a “a tragic farce,” “The Chairs” is a 1952 absurdist play about a couple grappling with nothingness—the end of their lives, the end of the world and a stage full of empty chairs.

And yet, it’s so funny. The philosophy is bleak, but the feeling is vaudeville, circus and cabaret. American Players Theatre veterans James Ridge and Colleen Madden deliver astounding performances as Old Man and Old Woman—hilarious, energetic and touching. It’s a brilliant tight-rope act—Ridge and Madden carry the audience through ninety-five minutes of absurdity and complex wordplay without missing a step.

Directed by Vanessa Stalling, former associate artistic director of Chicago’s Redmoon Theatre, “The Chairs” opens with the sounds of the sea. The lights come up on a few overturned chairs, a battered trunk, a dim lightbulb on a stand and a backdrop of raggedy curtains in dirty seafoam green (Courtney O’Neill designed the set and Ethan Korvne did the sound).

The Old Woman emerges in a mish-mash of clothing—an elegant, green 1920s-style drop-waist gown with a plaid underskirt, red stockings and dirty white shoes (costume design by Robert Morgan). She wears clown makeup and a skull cap over wispy white hair. She pulls a brown wig out of the trunk and puts it on, miming flirtatious poses. Then she sees the Old Man, in a shabby suit with oversized buttons, standing on an unseen balcony among the curtains, looking at the sea. She warns him that he might fall.We learn the outlines of their relationship—they’ve been together seventy-five years, maybe more. They love each other, contradict each other and nag at each other. Time doesn’t matter, except that it’s running out. “Time has raced by like a train, engraving its lines on our skin,” the Old Man muses. The Old Woman rebukes him repeatedly for not making more of himself—he could have been master of anything, but is only a janitor, master of the mop.

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