- OTHER MEDIA
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- A Theatrical Personality
By Nirmala Nataraj
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- The catchphrase of Precarious Theatre's Fringe Festival smash hit Chemical
Imbalance is "Murder. Mayhem. Crumpets." If that doesn't
intrigue you, perhaps the play's classic retelling of the Dr. Jekyll and
Mr. Hyde experiment gone awry will. Director David Robertson and playwright
Lauren Wilson spit-shine their reputation for farcical kitchen-sink melodrama
and Grand Guignol antics with their cast of imbred dandies, nested references
to Victorian-era repression, and arch commentary on a fallen empire. Dr.
Jekell is a gray eminence poking his kid gloves in matters best left alone
(that is, the nature of good and evil), while his Mr. Hyde is the animus
whose killing spree gives us a portal into the languishing aristocracy.
But it's the secondary bits, not the smart societal revelations, that make
this play a delight. They include a couple of house-proud yet ham-fisted
serving girls, Dr. Jekell's venal, name-dropping mom, and a vapid damsel
intent on marrying the mad scientist. Sure, some of the humor comes from
those characters in perfectly coiffed drag (cross-dressing is an essential
component of period pieces, after all), but the cast's comedic timing helps,
too. And even with their kill-the-father adaptation, they prune back superfluous
plotlines and spotlight peripheral characters just enough to make the witticisms
warranted.
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