“The Look”

Rogue Theater will once again present Jean-Paul Sartre’s existential play “No Exit” at The Depot through Nov. 2.

For the second time this year, Rogue Theater will bring the 1944 existentialist play No Exit by French philosopher and playwright (and novelist, screenwriter, political activist, biography and literary critic) Jean-Paul Sartre to the stage of The Depot Performing Arts Center in Sturgeon Bay.

Bill Bauernfeind will once again direct the thought provoking play while Marcel Bruyere, Carrie Counihan, Pam Johnson and Renee Kujawski again assume their roles in the cast.

The story follows two women and a man in a sparsely furnished room with lights, no mirrors and plenty of heat. There is a door, but the damned souls are destined to spend their lives in the room for eternity, wondering why they received their sentence. The only thing to do is interact with each other and in the process, the characters’ darkest secrets are exposed. The ultimate conclusion of the play? “L’enfer, c’est les autres,” or, in English, “Hell is other people.”

That quote references Sartre’s idea on “the look,” as presented in Being and Nothingness: An Essay on Phenomenological Ontology. The book is the study of the consciousness of being and “the look” visits the idea that the presence of another individual often causes an individual to look at themselves objectively, rather than subjectively, and to see their own world as it appears to the other.

The French title of the play is the equivalent of the legal term “in camera,” which refers to a private discussion behind closed doors. No Exit has also been performed under several other titles, including In Camera, No Way Out, Vicious Cycle, Behind Closed Doors and Dead End.

No Exit is showing at The Depot Performing Arts Center, 341 N. 3rd Avenue, Sturgeon Bay, Oct. 23 – Nov. 2. Friday and Saturday performances begin at 7:30pm and Sunday performances begin at 2 pm. Tickets are $15 and can be purchased by calling The Depot at 920.818.0816.