Terry Morgan
“Why was I born if it wasn’t forever?” In case anyone is ever in need of a reminder of their mortality, Eugène Ionesco’s 1962 play, Exit the King, has helpfully been provided to the world as a reminder. It’s a theatrical memento mori taken to extremes (when the king dies, the universe literally dies with him), but doesn’t everyone’s world figuratively die with them? Great actors have essayed the lead role, from Alec Guinness to Geoffrey Rush, to portray a character who begins as seemingly larger than life but ends as just a person. The current production at A Noise Within is superb, featuring outstanding performances from a very talented cast.
King Berenger the First (Henri Lubatti) is four hundred years old. When he commands, the clouds disperse and the sun comes out. He wins all his battles, and his commands are always obeyed. Except… not today. Today he’s been informed by his first queen, Marguerite (Joy DeMichelle), and his Doctor (Ralph Cole Jr.) that he is going to die. In the next ninety minutes, in fact. He doesn’t believe this, and his second queen, Marie (Erika Soto), encourages his resistance to the idea. But as the minutes tick past, he begins to feel weaker. His orders stop being obeyed. The clouds refuse to part. Gradually he begins to realize his life is indeed ending.
The king may be dying, but Lubatti’s performance is full of life. His use of slapstick and physical pratfalls is expert and impressive, and he makes a full comedic meal of just trying to stand up at one point. His delivery is Shakespearean in tone, but Berenger is cowardly, selfish (“Let every human creature die that I might live forever”) and finally, stripped away of everything, human.
DeMichelle is appropriately regal and forbidding, amusingly breaking the fourth wall to comment dismissively on all the old people in the audience. She attempts to hold Marie in check, but her frequent reminders to the king on his oncoming demise turn out, in the end, to be kindness. Cole Jr. is all silky smoothness as the Doctor, Lynn Robert Berg is reliably funny as the Guard, and KT Vogt is entertainingly tired and irascible as the overworked Juliette. Finally, Erika Soto is hilarious as younger queen Marie, desperately trying to convince the king that he’s fine and thus hang on to her current lifestyle. Her performance is skilled and energetic as she flirts, pouts and pleads to forestall the inevitable – she’s terrific.
Director Michael Michetti does an estimable job of taking what, in the wrong hands, could be a slow and talky piece and instead shines up every aspect of the play to give it an ideal presentation. The performances, the tricky balance between laughs and existentialism and especially the concluding quarter of the show (in which the set and characters begin to disappear) are beautifully done. Tesshi Nakagawa’s imposing throne room set – cracks running down the walls, tattered red curtains and a large EXIT sign over the doors – creates an effectively symbolic location, and Angela Balogh Calin’s costumes (especially Marie’s explosion of pink tutu) capture the mood of a declining kingdom.
I think one has to be in the right state of mind to fully appreciate Exit the King – it’s not a typical entertainment. It’s a comedy, but a dark one. Ionesco has crafted a piece which examines the fall of the high and mighty, people who proclaim “L’État, c’est moi” with no sense of irony. When they falter, the Milky Way curdles. But it’s also about anyone’s death. It’s modern – a character pronounces to Berenger, “You’re going to die at the end of this show” – but nothing is more ageless than the life cycle. It’s Theatre of the Absurd with plenty of humor, but finally it’s solemn, and the audience goes silent as the veil is drawn.
This production by A Noise Within is extraordinary, and it’s a must-see for lovers of classic theatre.
Exit the King is presented by and at A Noise Within and plays through May 31, 2026. Tickets are available at https://www.anoisewithin.org/
Pauline Adamek
