Backstage @ New Rep

"Elephant Man Startles, Disturbs"

Opening the New Rep’s fall season is the Tony-award-winning play, The Elephant Man. Tim Spears’ performance in the title role is nothing short of astonishing. Without costume or make-up, at times nearly naked, Spears persuades us that he is John Merrick and that the deformities he mimics are entirely real. He never breaks character by even the smallest gesture.

John Merrick is a mirror to each of the other characters. Each sees in him some part of his or her own spiritual deformity and longing for spiritual freedom. The prison of his body becomes a metaphor for the prison of Victorian propriety, where good conduct, gratitude and humility are the highest values, where spontaneity, creativity and original thought are suppressed and neurosis is just under the surface.

Frederick Treves (Michael Kaye), the physician who rescues Merrick from the street and from being displayed in a freak show, is a kind, intelligent and thoughtful man, a rational scientist who is attracted by the rarity of the disease and horrified by the treatment Merrick endures. He finds himself moved by the man’s stoicism and he is just sensitive enough to recognize Merrick’s talents and need for human company. He brings as a visitor an actress, Mrs. Kendal (Valerie Leonard). She is at first merely curious but is quickly enchanted by Merrick’s sharp insight into human character and his intellect. (Merrick’s interpretation of Romeo’s reaction to the death of Juliet astonishes her and is one of my favorite moments in the play.)

The production has a simplicity which allows the layered, nuanced play to unfold. The stage is bare and black with, at the center, a coffin-like black box which serves multiple purposes – bathtub, picnic table, sofa, bed. Mirrored sliding screens open to admit visitors to John’s cell. As actors enter and leave the center of the stage where Merrick lives, they move at a measured ceremonial pace. A solitary oboist, sitting at the corner of the stage provides transitional music and adds to the sense of pervasive sadness. The pace of the play is slow and meditative, but nonetheless mesmerizing.  

The meditative pace, the compassion at the heart of the play itself, and the utter lack of cynicism of the play and this production are unusual in the theater today (or perhaps at any time). Add brilliant acting from the three principal characters and you have an evening not to be missed.

~ Johanna Ettin and Shauna Shames, New Rep Reviewers