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print thisTheater
Manatee Players' 'Elephant Man' stirs heart and mind
DAVID ROBINSON
Special to The Herald
In his program notes, director Rick Kerby says "celebrating the Elephant Man's humanity may uplift you or you may be devastated." While it is certainly not "feel good" material, the Manatee Players' production of Bernard Pomerance's "The Elephant Man" is truly as capable of inspiring rejoice as it is inspiring profound sadness.
The play is the well-known dramatization of the life of John Merrick (actually named Joseph), a man of Victorian England who suffered from what was later dubbed "Proteus Syndrome." The disorder left Merrick with a monstrously large head and atypical skin and bone formations throughout his body. Abandoned by his father, he was forced to seek refuge as a carnival attraction until he was found by Dr. Frederick Treves.
Taken in and befriended by the good doctor, Merrick is given a suitable home at London Hospital where the remainder of his life was graced by visitors from English royalty, abundant leisure reading and peaceful freedom from stares and scorn. While the play does not have much in the way of a conventional plot, each scene is a tight work of engrossing concepts that give formation to the tragic and deftly rendered figure of Merrick.
Anchoring the show is Dean Chandler Bowden's performance as the eponymous hero, a feat of acting and technical command of the body. Without the contrivance of gaudy prosthetics or make-up, he establishes Merrick's deformity through posture, movement and facial expression. It's an amazingly effective and tasteful evocation of Merrick's appearance.
His voice acting is equally impressive, layering the pain of clogged and obstructed speech over Merrick's thoughtful and sensitive dialogue. Though his speech expresses a convincing degree of impediment, he is always perfectly understandable and able to both articulate Merrick's words and wield them into a personality both sad and beautiful.
The believability of this physical rendering is established in an excellent scene in which Bowden's silhouette can be seen standing behind a translucent sheet bearing the image of Da Vinci's Vitruvius Man. The contrast between this ideal image of the body and the form of Merrick is teamed with a meticulous and vivid medical description of Merrick's various deformities, creating a rather indelible mental picture to complement Bowden's performance.
This is but one moment in the uniformly inspired technically direction and scenic design of Stan Koci and Marc Lalosh, each of whom inhabit their well-crafted stage as members of a capable cast.
As I was entering the theater, I heard a woman in the audience wondering aloud how the actors could walk on the stage. Indeed, the set was something to see. Commensurate with the play's often dreamy and surreal aspects, the set is a construction without perspective. With numerous forward-tilting tiers, none agreeing to the same vanishing point, it makes for a terrifically versatile apparatus.
At one point in the play, there is action in three different pockets of the stage, none of them feeling quite concurrent. This is all complemented by long strips of fabric and the concealed on-stage musicians. The net result is one of eerie discord appropriate to the tragic and isolated mental state of both Merrick and Treves, both of whom are, in their own way, emotionally cloistered from the rest of the world.
Kerby projects titles for each scene onto his stage to create specific points of focus within each chunk of the play. I found this to be a pretty canny move given how the cryptic nature of some of Pomerance's scenes can be. Kerby He uses this tactic to hone in on Pomerance's interesting ideas about fantasy, dreams and illusions while still allowing the play's competing themes of otherness and sexuality to breathe.
Accompanying all of this is a three-piece string section that is used sparingly and makes for excellent tone-setting and transition music.
I left the theater in much the same conflicted emotional state as I did upon leaving the Manatee Players' production of "Amadeus." This was not only because of the contending sentiments of hope and despair aroused by the play itself. It was also because I had again seen a classy production of a well-chosen play performed for a much smaller audience than was deserved. Tasteful and moving, "The Elephant Man" is another Manatee Players Production worthy of your patronage.
David Robinson is a graduate of New College of Florida where he studied literature and theater.
If you go
What: "The Elephant Man"
When: through March 12. Performances at 8 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday with 2 p.m. matinees on Sundays
Where: The Riverfront Theatre, 102 Old Main St. in Bradenton
Admission: $20
Box office: 748-5875
