Allow me to take a break from what I usually write about—or at least from how I usually start. This week I want to begin my column with something that is equally important to me: culture and art. And I promise, at the end of it I will draw the connections. So stay with me.

Last Saturday I went to Reynolds Theater to see the Classical Theatre of Harlem’s production of Samuel Beckett’s “Waiting for Godot.” During intermission I ran into someone who asked me how I found the play so far, and my response was, “it gives me shivers.” He asked me why and surprisingly, I didn’t know the reasons for my reaction. It’s hard to describe the kind of feelings the play triggered in me: a mix of profound excitement, nostalgia, fascination and distress.

In regards to the excitement, I blame it partly on the beauty of the play and partly on the fact that it was the first time I actually saw it live. The nostalgia piece comes from the fact that I had read the play three years ago in high school, and I remember being extremely fascinated by it, and all those feelings were coming back to me that night.

Fascination and distress are perhaps harder to explain. The most obvious elements that might have triggered these sentiments have to do with the content of the play: Two characters—Vladimir and Estragon—endlessly wait for a never-appearing-unknown Godot. Since its first appearance in 1953, the play has caused people to speculate and interpret it in hundreds of ways. Is Godot a metaphor for God? Do the characters really exist? What are they really waiting for, if anything? Additionally, given its historical context, the play has often been related to World War II.

What immediately caught my attention from this particular performance was the choice of actors. Vladimir and Estragon were both black. The only white character was Pozzo—a traveler who encounters these two. His cruelly mistreated and robotic server, Lucky, was also black. Similarly, all the characters, except Pozzo, wore dirty clothes. These differences were too evident for me to be interpreted as unconscious decisions of the director. Read it in any context you prefer, but the fact is that an implicit commentary was being made. Maybe about race, maybe about class, maybe about national or international dynamics; where or when, that’s for you to decide.

Another element that kept me thinking throughout the play was that the original context of this production was the New Orleans catastrophe. In 2007 the Classical Theatre of Harlem adapted Beckett’s play to this tragedy, suggesting a similarity between the waiting of the characters and the waiting of those who suffered the consequences of Katrina. Researching a little more that Saturday night, I found a short documentary where the director explained how the idea emerged and his reasons for bringing art to a place like New Orleans.

For me, that was the point where the play—and this production in particular—reinforced those feelings of fascination and distress. On one hand it implicitly deals with certain issues that are applicable to nearly every society (like race and class), and on the other, its history brought to mind the ways in which art deals with these issues. Back in 2007 the play was a major success that not only brought the New Orleans community together, but also resulted in an impressive amount of funds directed to its reconstruction.

And why should we care? In the past week I have been following the discussion about Duke Performances and the efforts being made to make it more inclusive. I believe these performances and art in general at Duke are not only a great way to bring together the Durham and Duke communities, but also to discuss issues that concern us. After having seen “Waiting for Godot” and realizing the great impact this production has had, I am even more invested in the idea that art can become a promising way for us to critically discuss, while integrating the community. So: what are we waiting for?

Andrea Patiño is a Trinity sophomore. Her column runs every other Tuesday.