I'm struck by the on the page mirror image of this line. On the left, "a wink to Mr. Lincolns pasteboard cutout." On the right "a nod to the bust of Mr. Lincoln". It's a simple piece of repetition, relatively small, but important. The foundling father absolutely idolizes Abraham Lincoln, from talking about him and saluting him to impersonating him. In this moment, Suzan-Lori Parks gives him a bit of repeated stage action. There's a pasteboard cutout of Lincoln, and there's a bust of Lincoln.There's a wink to the former, and a nod to the latter. The first is conspiratorial, friendly, mischevious. He's referencing a cutout, a simulacrum. There's an implied familiarity in a wink, especially to something as mundane as a cardboard cutout. But then, it appears again, but different. This time, it's more respectful. A nod. A bust. A bust is a significant upgrade over a pasteboard cutout, status wise. Similarly, a nod is a status update. Over the course a page, the Foundling Father has gone from conspiratorial freidn to patriotic admirer.

I don't know if Fefu and her friends is a tragedy, but it ends in a death. It actually ends in a sort of mirrored set of deaths. Fefu shoots the white rabbit, but at the same time through some sort of spiritual or thematic connection. This is also a sort of call back to the injury that caused Julia to be in a wheelchair, some sort of mysterious head wound. Throughout the play, Fefu and Julia but heads about the events of the evening, as well as the way that the women should live their lives. Julia's death could be seen as a sort concession of victory on behalf of the play to Fefu's perspective, or a symbolic martyrdom of Julia's cause. Of course, the stage directions are a little vague, and it's certainly possible that Fefu simply murdered Julia. Fefu's reaction, however, belies that she doesn't entirely understand the circumstances. This moment feels more absurd than a lot of the play, as it leans out of realism into a darker, more metaphorical world.

This reference to balance reveals a certain perspective: the idea that our society is inherently balanced. Everyone in society has a social role, characteristics that are associated with them due to a variety of factors. Society is balanced when everyone acts in accordance with their roles. It doesn't matter that drunks stay drunk: in fact, that's one of the things balancing the world. Everything is thrown off balance when things change, social relationships. The balance in this play is so delicate because things can't stay as they have been. There are too many people all shoving against each other, and as soon as something changes, the balance is gone.

Sayings have a sort of power, as they're often accepted to contain wisdom. Agnes' saying, of course, is bogus. Agnes modifies the Shakespeare quote to go from an thankless child to a ungrateful sister. This could be a bit of a witty observation, but Tobias interprets it literally, saying that that's not what the saying actually says. He's taking it seriously and confronting her on it. Agnes' response reveals loads about her character. She doesn't try to fight him on it, but she also doesn't concede the wisdom. In one word, she says "yes, that is not the literal meaning of the saying but also my version of the saying is what it should be, therefore I believe it to be wiser". Then, she changes the subject.

The set is a room. That is the entirety of the set. The set extends, however, to the dumbwaiter. This is, of course, revealed. It expands the world, but just a little. When it first appears it only has one direction. It brings objects and messages into the world. This stage direction pushes it even further, adding in the mystery of what is on the other end of the dumbwaiter. It flows in both directions. We learn about more than the existence of this upstairs, however. Ben flings Gus away in alarm. Whoever, whatever is up there, doesn't like them peering in. The hierarchy doesn't allow for questioning, a common source of conflict between the two in the play.

I figure this might be a good time to talk about a production I saw and how they did this moment. Basically, they had a backdrop that functioned as the back wall of the office, and the staircase was in the middle of the room coming up through the floor. Characters would walk up through it on their entrances. When the rhino is hard, the railings at the top shattered and fell down through. The characters acted as if the stair case itself was destroyed but the audience couldn't see it. Then later in the scene, when they acknowledge the rhino is real, the rhino's horn emerges from the hole in the floor and moves around a little bit. It's literalized very early on, which has a mixed effect. It really does make it impossible to deny, which takes away some of the tension. The audience knows what the rhino's are now. It's like how in horror movies you're supposed to wait as long as possible to reveal your monsters because it takes away their scariness.

A subtle thing to notice about when the rhinoceri appear is that they tend to interrupt people. They don't really come in at an opportune time of line endings. Rather, they cause a disruption in the dialogue itself. This whole sequence involves the sound of the rhino causing the conversation to become wholly unproductive.

This moment is an example of the physical implications on characters that can be seen by audiences that can't be seen. These characters are supposed to be ancient, and they're toiling away setting up for an event that we as an audience will never truly see the results of that they desire. We, as the audience, can't even see the object, but it's causing the old man to subject himself to pain to please this invisible young woman. We don't even know why she's dropped it. Her lack of presence gives a sense that these elders are working hard for an unappreciative and unattentive audience. It makes us feel sorry for them.

This brief exchange illuminates Clov's view of the environment beautifully. The weather, symptomatic of the outside world, is irrelevant to him. The casual weather small talk of the past is gone, because in this new apocalyptic world the weather is always the same. At least, it's the same to Clov's eyes. He dismisses the need to look at it with a looking glass, and while he ultimately gives in to Ham's request, his reluctance shows his acceptance of what the world has become. This mirrors Clov's continuing desire to leave, but seeming unwillingness to. He doesn't care about what's going on outside, only knows that he doesn't want to be there.

The boy fascinates me. Whether you assume that Godot is never going to show up, or you think that he definitely is going to show up, the boy reverses both those. He both reveals that Godot is not coming (that day) and that he will be coming (at some point). He serves a fairly conventional messenger role who appears at the end of most tragedies to provide the last piece of information to wrap up the plot. In this case though, the boy delivers the first plot relevant information since the beginning of the show, but all it does is extend the waiting period further. Of course he reappears, but that's a story for another comment.

This section shows Mr. Antrobus' journey of understanding. Throughout the play,he is constantly inventing new technologies to try and improve human life, and yet the world keeps falling apart.This is the moment where he connects human life to the world of a play. God isn't letting them literally build new worlds, but rather build fictional worlds comprised of voices in order to guide. This follows the tradition of morality plays, where the lives of saints were turned into staged moral tales for the current generations to learn from. These are the voices Antrobus says have been sent to guide us. It is these memories, immortalized on on stage, that are able to warn humans so effectively. This is one of the reasons that the way to improve human life is not through science, but rather through art.

These two lines establish the atmosphere at Joan's new place of work. This is when the world turns sinister for Joan. She's able to seemingly maintain her innocence for the majority of the first, and now she's a full fledged citizen of the world. She's been to college, studying something that she believes to be one of the best jobs. Her co-worker reveals the extent to which the hat making job is awful, but despite that it's still one of the better jobs. There must be pretty slim pickings in this city. This lends a bleak atmosphere to their world. As Todd says a little earlier, grey for the sky.