Review - Of Human Bondage - Soulpepper, Toronto

✭✭✭✭✩

by Vern Thiessen, directed by Albert Schultz

Soulpepper Theatre Company, Young Centre, Toronto

April 24-May 24, 2014;

May 2-June 27, 2015;

February 23-March 11, 2017

“Happiness mattered as little as pain. They came in, both of them, as all the other details of his life came in, to the elaboration of the design,” Of Human Bondage, Ch. CVI

With Vern Theissen’s Of Human Bondage, Soulpepper has achieved that rare thing – a fine stage adaptation of a complex novel. Too often adaptors of novels have difficulty transforming a narrative medium into a dramatic one. But that is not the case here. In Soulpepper’s production Theissen’s text is only one component along with Albert Schultz’s brilliant staging and Lorenzo Savoini’s design that makes W. Somerset Maugham’s greatest novel come alive in the theatre.

Thiessen omits the first 53 of the 122 chapters of Maugham’s semi-autobiographical novel that concern its main character’s early youth and life in Paris. He thus begins the action when Maugham’s alter-ego Philip Carey (Gregor Prest) enters medical school in London. Carey had studied painting but felt he had achieved only mediocrity. He is generally hard on himself. Having grown up with a club foot, he has convinced himself he is unloveable.

Thiessen gives structure to the play by focussing on the three main women in Carey’s life. The first, Mildred (Michelle Monteith), is also the one who causes him the most pain. When Philip meets her she is a waitress in a tea shop. Philip is overjoyed that she allows him to take her out even though she does not love him and is always on the lookout for someone with more money to help her rise in the world. Though his love for her causes him to fail his first medical exam, he proposes to her only to be turned down. Thereafter, every time she finds herself in difficulties, he takes her back. Each time her gratitude turns to disdain, they row and she leaves, each time inflicting greater emotional wounds on Philip and each time sinking lower in the world herself.

After Philip’s first breakup with Mildred, he meets Norah (Sarah Wilson), a self-made woman and author of penny novelettes. She falls in love with Philip but he does not truly love her. When Mildred returns after her disastrous marriage to a German businessman (Dan Chameroy), Philip breaks up with Norah and takes Mildred back.

Following his next breakup with Mildred, he becomes friends with a former patient Thorpe Athelny (John Jarvis) and comes to like Athelny’s eldest daughter Sally (Courtney Ch’ng Lancaster). Once the Boer War breaks out, he loses all his money in poor investments, cannot afford to attend medical and cannot even pay his rent. When he reaches the nadir of his life, we wonders how he can ever recover.

One theme of Maugham’s novel is free will and fate, and what the play, like the novel, shows us is that Philip has already unconsciously sown the seeds for his own rehabilitation. Thiessen has fully perceived this theme and uses it to tie together the vagaries that involve the three women in Philip’s life. A second theme is the contrast between art and science or the subjective versus the objective manner of looking at reality, in particular at looking at the human body. Thiessen follows Maugham in giving Philip two sets of friends on either side of the divide. Cronshaw (Dan Chameroy) and Lawson (Oliver Dennis) are a poet and a painter from his old days in Paris. Griffiths (Jeff Lillico) and Dunford (Paolo Santalucia) are his new friends at medical school. Significantly, the more carefree of both pairs also has tendencies toward self-destruction – Griffiths through drugs, Cronshaw through absinthe. The contrast and similarities suggest that an artist-doctor like Philip is would ideally combine both worlds, if only he could keep them in balance.

While Thiessen has provided a concise, insightful text, what takes this production out of the ordinary is Albert Schultz’s remarkable direction. In fact, in this production Schultz shows a greater command of stagecraft than he has ever shown before. This results from completely integrating his direction with the use of Savoini’s set and lighting design. Savoini has created a large red square as a playing area on an otherwise bare stage. Actors sit in the shadows left and right of the square when they are not in a scene and provide background sounds of the tearooms or back gardens or occasionally get together to stage a number from one of the musical comedies Mildred so likes.

The staging is thus non-naturalistic but highly theatrical, rather like the built-in theatricality of Thornton Wilder’s Our Town (1938) except even more pervasive. If actors hold up a picture frames close to themselves, they become a painting. If they hold them out at arms length, we construe the frames as mirrors. Schultz uses this simple technique to clever effect as when Mildred, contemplating an affair with Griffiths, looks in a “mirror” held by Jeff Lillico, who plays Griffiths and interacts with him. Onstage throughout the action is a full skeleton, a reminder not just of Philip’s profession but of the characters’ preoccupation with death. The contrast to the skeleton is the Persian carpet that Cronshaw gives Philip. To us it is only a spotted rectangle of canvas, thus reinforcing the theme that life is what you see it. Cronshaw says the carpet holds the meaning of life and, indeed, it is only at the end of the play that Philip deciphers that meaning with the carpet itself as his central image.

Savoini has also designed the lighting which, given the bare stage, is key to signifying time, place and atmosphere. It’s the most advanced use of lighting ever in a Soulpepper show. Scenes shift instantly just by a change of lighting cue. In an unusual move Savoini frequently turns figures at the edge of the stage into silhouettes, thus echoing the imagery of painting and reflections that runs through the play.

For his part, Albert Schultz shows greater invention than he ever has before in this highly theatrical minimalist staging, with the smallest gesture acquiring the greatest meaning. A chair knocked over signifies a suicide by hanging. Light fading on a character conveys a death. Characters can begin a new scene simply by a change of posture.

Gregory Prest and Michelle Monteith both play extremely difficult characters. Philip Carey is difficult to like because of his own self-hatred and because of his continued trust in an habitual liar like Mildred. Prest brings off the character by establishing a depressive side to his nature which helps explain why he would fall in thrall to a mercenary woman like Mildred. Prest does show how Philip’s attitude towards her gradually hardens, though not enough to eradicate her influence on him completely. Prest helps us see that Philip’s story is one of a weak man who only grows strong after a series of trials.

Monteith at first seduces us with Mildred’s restraint. Her answer of “I don’t mind” instead of yes or no and first seems charming. Her refrain of “If it gives you pleasure” at first seems harmless. As the action progresses we gradually see that both of her catchphrases reflect a lack of commitment or purpose. This lack eventually manifests itself in a series of disastrous decisions. Monteith can never make us like someone like Mildred, but she does succeed finally in arousing our pity. She gradually reveals Mildred as a profoundly disturbed young woman who self-destructively turns against any security she is offered. The role gives Monteith a chance to display her command of a wide emotional range.

As Philip’s medical friends Jeff Lillico and Paolo Santalucia present a fine contrast. Lillico clearly details how the self-confident Griffiths gradually falls into drug-abuse and despair. Santalucia shows Dunsford’s growth from a comically naive figure into a morally earnest young man.

As Philip’s artistic friends, Dan Chameroy and Oliver Dennis also offer an excellent contrast. The devil-may-care attitude of Chameroy’s Cronshaw hides a tendency toward nihilism. Chameroy makes Cronshaw’s last interview with Philip the most moving scene in the play. The good cheer of Dennis’s Lawson remains a welcome beacon in the growing gloom of Philip’s life. Both actors play other roles. Dennis’s Dr. Tyrell is warm study of a teacher who deeply cares for his students’ welfare. Chameroy’s portrait of the fussy department store buyer Mr. Sampson, however, is far too over the top, very nearly one of Chameroy’s pantomime dames.

Sarah Wilson gives us a welcome vision of clear thinking and feeling in her sensitive portrayal of Norah. John Jarvis gives the good-humoured Mr. Athelny a warm Dickensian glow. And Courtney Ch’ng Lancaster is delightful as Athelny’s bright daughter Sally, whose new ideas and new feelings roil under the surface until she has someone like Philip to share them with.

Through its skillful blending of text, direction and design, Soulpepper has brought a difficult novel successfully to the stage. Schultz’s experimental approach reaps enormous benefits not only by showcasing the versatility of his cast but by transforming a narrative into a visually exciting, consistently imaginative theatrical experience.

Note: This review is a Stage Door exclusive.

For tickets, visit www.soulpepper.ca.

2014-04-25

Of Human Bondage