LSU director takes brainy approach to Waiting for Godot

• By ROBIN MILLER
• Arts writer
• Published: Apr 13, 2008 - UPDATED: 12:05 a.m.

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Maybe Mickey Gray shouldn’t have waited so long. Then again, the idea didn’t occur to him right away.

So, while Vladimir and Estragon spend their days waiting for some guy named Godot in LSU’s Hatcher Hall Theatre, Gray spent his time thinking of a special way to interpret their waiting.

It’s been done so many ways. There was even a time in New Orleans when Vladimir and Estragon sat atop a roof waiting for Godot. Of course, the roof top was on stage, and it was a symbol for the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.

And Godot was a metaphor of sorts for FEMA. And Godot never came.

He never does.

It’s how Samuel Beckett wrote his play, Waiting for Godot, in 1948. The story isn’t really about Godot, but the conversation between Vladimir and Estragon while waiting for him.

Beckett also is a minimalist in setting up scenes.

“He just basically gives you a tree as a set, and that’s it,” Gray said. “The rest can be interpreted, and it has been interpreted in hundreds of ways.”

And as the LSU Studio Theatre’s director for this play, Gray has come up with his own interpretation.

“I should have come up with it earlier,” he said.

So, maybe his waiting went on a little too long. Maybe it didn’t.

Because the past month has been intense for Gray. He’s a senior in the LSU Department of Theatre, and this is his directorial debut within the department. He and his cast have had only a month to rehearse, which means practice sessions are intense.

Which also means everyone’s focus is sharp.