When Samuel Beckett Drove Younger André the Big to College

Are your idle moments spent invent­ing imag­i­nary con­ver­sa­tions between unusual mattress­fel­lows? The type of con­ver­sa­tion which may tran­spire in a decide­up truck belong­ing to Samuel Beck­ett, say, have been the Irish play­wright to chauf­feur the kid André Rene Rous­si­moff—aka professional wrestler André the Big—to highschool?

Too sil­ly, you say? Non­sense. This isn’t some wack­adoo ran­dom pair­ing, however an actu­al his­toric meet­ing of the minds, as André’s Princess Bride co-star and soon-to-be-pub­lished movie his­to­ri­an, Cary Elwes, attests above.

In 1958, when 12-year-old André’s acromegaly pre­vent­ed him from tak­ing the varsity bus, the writer of Wait­ing for Godot, whom he knew as his dad’s card bud­dy and neigh­bor in rur­al Moulien, France, vol­un­teered for trans­port responsibility. André recalled that they most­ly talked about crick­et, however positive­ly they dis­stubborn oth­er prime­ics, too, proper? Proper!?

Even when they did­n’t, it’s deli­cious­ly enjoyable to spec­u­late.

In the  naked­bones entry above, Bing­ham­ton, New York’s Därk­horse Drä­ma­tists play­wright Ron Burch has Beck­ett dis­pens­ing roman­tic recommendation in a lot the identical means that he wrote dia­logue, to cre­ate a dialec­tic.  (“So I ought to embrace the nega­tion of the act with the intention to get the oppo­web site reac­tion?” André asks, re: a woman he’s wanting to kiss.)

Burch is just not the one drama­tist to tack­le these mys­tery rides. Chica­go play­wright Rory Job­st was impressed to put in writing Samuel Beck­ett, Andre the Big, and the Crick­ets after lis­ten­ing to They May Be Giants’ John Flans­burgh and John Lin­nell par­tic­i­pat­ing in a 3‑query André the Big triv­ia quiz on NPR’s Wait Wait…Don’t Inform Me.

Automotive­toon­ist Field Brown is anoth­er to take a stab on the not like­ly automobile­pool bud­dies’ chit chat, along with his graph­ic biog­ra­phy, Andre the Big. In his ver­sion, Beck­ett asks André why he’s so large, André asks Beck­ett if he performs foot­ball, and Beck­ett provides him his first cig­a­rette. (“Effectively, y’know, they stunt your progress so,” Beck­ett hes­i­tates, “…eh, okay.”)

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Andy Warhol’s One Minute of Professional­fes­sion­al Wrestling Fame (1985)

The Books That Samuel Beck­ett Learn and Actual­ly Preferred (1941–1956)

Neil deGrasse Tyson, Excessive College Wrestling Group Cap­tain, As soon as Invent­ed a Physics-Primarily based Wrestling Transfer

An Ani­mat­ed Intro­duc­tion to Samuel Beck­ett, Absur­dist Play­wright, Nov­el­ist & Poet

Ayun Hal­l­i­day is inter­est­ed in hear­ing about unortho­dox professional­duc­tions of Wait­ing for Godot @AyunHalliday.