Pinchbeck, M., Smith, O., 2025.

Between an Ellipsis and an Ouroboros: Reflections on, and repetitions of, The End

From 2010 to 2016, artist-researchers Michael Pinchbeck and Ollie Smith toured The End, a postdramatic performance about Pinchbeck's purported resignation from theatre. This so-called swansong explored endings, exits, death and rebirth, intertextually referencing the bear from A Winter's Tale and repeating imagery of a blindfolded man facing a firing squad - a man forced to play and replay his last words ad inifinitum. The work was a playfully melancholic piece of metatheatre, which persistently pointed towards the artifice of its own conceit: how can a performer's 'last ever show' possibly go on tour? As Lyn Gardner wrote for The Guardian, The End was 'in service of the illusion that Pinchbeck has finally reached a full stop in his career rather than an ellipsis' (Gardner 2011). Total Theatre magazine suggested, 'This show is an Ouroboros serpent' (Smith 2011) as it imagined its own end, its post-show discussion and a future beyond its tour, when the pair fell out.

Now, 15 years later, many venues to which the piece toured have closed. The industry itself seems to be facing its own form of execution. The ambiguous ellipsis at the show's conclusion places it into thematic dialogue with other contemporary works such as Goat Island's The Lastmaker, Ivana Müller's Playing Ensemble Again and Again and Tim Crouch's Truth's a Dog, Must to Kennel. As such, this article might be considered as the 'post-show-that-never-was', reflecting on how the piece still resonates, and critically and creatively appraising why artists are so often fascinated by their own demise and dénouement whilst perhaps grasping towards revival (or remembrance). Still caught between the competing metaphors of ellipsis and ouroboros, the two artist-researchers consider how the looping ceremony of performance ultimately means The End remains ephemeral. It refuses to leave the stage; a dot dot dot, not a full stop ...