Ending things on a good and high note – The essentials of a Drama Ending

The biggest challenge for the playwright is to find a crisis with an ending which is acceptable to his artistic conscience and the dramatic effect he requires. It is more challenging to write a good last act as a good first one. Likewise it is easier to dramatize the moment of the birth of a crisis than to come to a definite and intensely dramatic conclusion for it. Lack of a good ending leaves the audience unsatisfied and disappointed. The dramatist’s range of choice is unlimited, and
the difficulty of wise choice has become infinitely greater, since the traditional fixed moulds or pre-ordained outcomes of tragedies and comedies have been broken. Comedies now tend much more to begin than to end with marriage, and death has come a “boring” way to escape from life or its troubles. The nearer the story is to reality, the greater the challenge becomes.

As indicated by the name, a blind-alley theme is one from which there is no exit. It is a problem incapable of solution, or of which all possible
solutions are equally unsatisfactory and undesirable. The dramatist should make very sure not to be caught in this situation of equally unacceptable alternatives. Such a play wears and bores the spirit and is an artistic blunder.

The end of a play should satisfy us inside – like our experience of truth, justice, humor, vanity of aspiration, etc. If it does not, it leaves one unfulfilled and without closure – and dissatisfied.

There are themes in which tension can be maintained and heightened to the end. Tragedy has always been regarded as higher form than comedy. It may be due to the tradition to round off human destiny in death if, after all the crises that life could throw at him, the hero can look destiny in the face and “go home” honorably. Sophocles regarded it as “ Call no man happy till his life be ended.” As a form of art, maybe tragedy lets us appreciate “being alive” to a deeper extent, after having lived through this experience. Life may now seem more significant than ever before. The tragic ending is also prone to be misused. Great plays often end in the hero’s death, but to kill your hero doesn’t make the play great. Tension can be maintained with the presence of a threatening sword, gun or poison. Tragic endings were not always popular with audiences during some times in history – but it seemed to be the only way to avoid an anticlimax.