Theater Review: Frankenstein
Just got back from the Frankenstein reverse casting, and while I haven’t seen any of the other nominees for the Olivier Best Actor award, Benedict Cumberbatch and Jonny Lee Miller are incredible actors and really worked hard to get that thing.
I JUST HAVE A LOT OF FEELINGS ABOUT THIS PRODUCTION. I’ll put them under a cut for everyone’s sanity.
Two thematic questions I see this play as dealing with are:
-How much would you be willing to pay for the chance to become God?
-If you were in hell and had the chance to confront God and ask him to help you, what would you say?
The first of these questions is the arc of Dr. Victor Frankenstein, and the other is that of his Creature. Both are fascinating. The second question is interesting because this production aimed, I believe, to finally give a voice to a character that has in previous adaptations has been rendered inexplicably voiceless. As Danny Boyle, the director, said in the little explanatory documentary preceding the screening, previous adaptions have tended to snatch the Creature’s voice away with no real explanation.
But the explanation, at least in my opinion, is that it is really, really hard to get inside the Creature’s head and have him still be a sympathetic character considering the events that must take place.
In the play, the Creature is treated with cruelty (by Victor abandoning him), cruelty (by all the villagers hating him), kindness (by the old blind man), cruelty (the DeLaceys screaming and kicking him out), neutral (by little William Frankenstein), neutral (by Victor agreeing to make him a wife), massive cruelty (by Victor reneging on their deal), and kindness (by Elizabeth’s attempts to understand him and offer to be his friend).
In return, he does some good deeds for the DeLaceys by clearing up their plot of land and chopping firewood and such-oh, and then he freakin’ sets their house on fire and leaves them to burn, including the old man. Then he wanders around and freakin’ murders a little boy to get his brother to come out and play (hey, does this sound like anybody to you? Because to me it sounds like criminal mastermind Moriarty). Then he blackmails and pressures Victor into making a female creature who in all likelihood would turn out just as miserable as himself, just so he can feel happy. Then he freakin’ rapes and murders Elizabeth after she promised to intercede on his behalf to Victor.
You know what? I get it. The Creature had a really hard life, full of undeserved cruelty and pain, and all because his creator is pretty much the coldest-hearted bastard in existence. But the two people who did the Creature the most kindness, one of whom drastically changed his life for the better (I guess?) by teaching him how to read and the other of whom would have at least tried to help him had he let her, he ends up deliberately and-here’s what really gets me-unnecessarily murdering horribly.
Sure, he murdered them in emotionally motivated, retaliatory fits of rage, and maybe if he were tried, a court would let him off. But that’s just not a character I feel I can realistically sympathize with, no matter how cute he was trying to eat Victor’s notebook or playing in the rain and snow. Because surely as humans, we are defined not by what is done to us but by how we react to that (thanks, Dumbledore). Surely our capacities for overcoming hardship and forgiving those who have wronged us are what make us special?
So as for the acting on the part of the Creature, I am just floored by actors who can bring that character to life. The sheer amount of bravery it must have taken to essentially writhe around on the floor alone and naked for about 10 minutes while making guttural noises and learning how to take control of one’s own body while a live audience looks on…But ultimately, for me the Creature’s character and journey are just not as interesting as Frankenstein’s. Because in short, Frankenstein can be seen as a horrible AU in which Sherlock never meets John and goes way overboard with one of his experiments.
I love that first thematic question, obviously, because it’s basically Sherlock’s character pre-John. I refer yet again to Steven Moffat’s quote regarding his two shows: “The Doctor is an angel trying to be a man; Sherlock is a man trying to be a god.” Post-Season 2, though, I would say that Sherlock is a man trying to be a god who realizes that he should instead be trying to become a better man, and that he has friends who will help him do that.
I have not read Mary Shelley’s novel. But in the play, Victor Frankenstein is a man who succeeded in becoming a god and didn’t realize until too late what a great tragedy that was, how many lives he had ruined, including his own, to do that. The play has to be about the Creature’s quest for his ideal of happiness because Victor will never be able to find any; his own ambition destroyed any hope of it he had. Victor, like Sherlock, has a John Watson (his fiancée, Elizabeth), but unlike Sherlock, he does not acknowledge her until it is too late, and he spends the rest of his life trying to undo his actions. His only purpose, he says at the end of the play, is to destroy the Creature.
But to me, Victor is a series of contradictions and second-guessing himself. He’s completely convinced of something one moment (that he is a god, that he has overcome death), and then the next he can look back and see how horrible and destructive that idea was (looking at the trail of dead bodies his Creature has left behind him). But then he can’t help himself and does it again-but better (with the female Creature). And then again has second thoughts and kills her. By the end of the play, his health has deteriorated, he’s torturing himself while being tortured by the Creature, and basically his entire family is destroyed because he played too much with his scientific experimentation. And maybe the Creature killing Elizabeth was the last straw for him and he won’t ever experiment again. Or maybe for him there is no rock bottom, no depth he can sink to where he wouldn’t still be interested in seeing if he can overcome death again. It depends on the actor-for me, Jonny’s Victor has hit rock bottom, but Benedict’s Victor will never stop, can never stop, no matter the personal risk or who else gets destroyed in the process. It’s an addiction.
The best line in the entire production for me was when Victor is explaining everything he has done to Elizabeth and she just responds simply, “Why?” And you look at Victor and see that the obvious answer is “Because I could. Because I wanted to see what would happen.” And then back to her, because she’s kind of going, “But you already could have done that, with me. We could have made something joyful and precious together in the form of a baby to love. Wasn’t it obvious to you that messing with death in this way would cause nothing but pain and destruction? Because it was obvious to me.” And of course he won’t see it until it is too late.
The production and design of this play was phenomenal, particularly the music and special effects, but that’s not really what this post is about, which is obviously the acting. (Little shout out to Naomie Harris, who was just wonderful and totally convincing.) The play was most riveting to me, though, when it was just Frankenstein and his Creature onstage together talking.
I have seen both productions, so what is my verdict on the casting vs. reverse casting? First of all, it was a real treat to see both actors in both roles, and I wouldn’t have this production done in any other way. I think the humiliation of doing certain aspects of the Creature-writhing around naked/partially clothed, his speech impediments, his twitching and drooling and learning to use his body-is lessened when everyone knows that you are sharing both these roles, that you own both of them. And it’s a brilliant metaphor that the Creator and Created are two sides of the same coin, that they know each other and need each other.
Another caveat: I know Benedict Cumberbatch’s work; I don’t know Jonny Lee Miller’s nearly as much. Therefore I’m clearly biased towards Benedict, but I’ve done my best in keeping my fangirling under wraps when attempting to analyze this play as objectively as I can (though, sorry, I do give out quite a few backhanded compliments). And I conclude that both actors are really, really superb in both roles-I mean, these are two guys at the top of their games-but to me the play was most convincing with Jonny as the Creature and Benedict as Dr. Victor Frankenstein.
Jonny is fantastic as the Creature. Less awkward, less gangly and agile and graceful and theatrical, more solid. He makes me believe that he has the physical power to intimidate and do horrible things but is choosing to hold back (er, other than during the times he is killing people). The scene when he rapes and murders Elizabeth, then, felt so much more brutal and shocking and disturbing because I totally believed it, whereas with Benedict’s Creature, it felt more random because the physical menace and threat wasn’t as obvious. Jonny’s Creature is forceful as hell-compare that lovingly-gifed hand-shaking scene from this trailer where Jonny’s Creature jerks Victor forward-I was thinking, “God, be careful, you’ll wrench his arm out of its socket.” At the same time, Jonny’s Creature seems more childlike to me, laughing more, a tad more playful, less unearthly, more realistic. He moves past all the awkward twitching a bit more quickly, which is a relief. Jonny doesn’t have Benedict’s vocal range-and that actually works in his favor here as the Creature when Jonny adopts a kind of harsh, gruff, almost monotone lower pitch that I would believe of a being with somewhat less developed vocal cords.
Here’s the thing, though: Benedict Cumberbatch doesn’t make many “safe” acting choices. In the words of Martin Freeman, he commits. And sometimes it doesn’t quite work, and sometimes it’s perceived as overacting, and sometimes it’s too good when others around him aren’t putting in the same amount of energy and zest. But most of the time it makes him impossible to look away from. And whatever the role is, Benedict unquestionably shows up, throws himself into it, and works the hell out of it. It’s very hard for him to just fade into the background; to quote Mark Gatiss, he trails stardust. But with a character as frankly horrible to look at and awkward as the Creature, whom I found it difficult to empathize with because he keeps horribly murdering people, I kind of wanted him to fade into the background a little more to make room for Victor’s more interesting story and characterization.
Johnny’s Victor lacks that energy and that light in his eyes that Benedict’s Victor gets when he thinks about all the scientific marvels he can do. Honestly, I never quite believed that Johnny’s Victor was actually a genius/madman because he didn’t seem to enjoy his work; he just kind of plowed steadily along, sinking further into sickness and depression. He very convincingly conveys Victor’s horror at what he has done, but not the curiosity that led him to do it in the first place or the delight that he was actually successful. I totally believed that Jonny’s Victor actually loves Elizabeth; I don’t really buy that Benedict’s Victor loves her. I never quite believed that Jonny’s character would have the motivation or capability to do the horrible things that Victor Frankenstein needed to do. Whereas Benedict’s Victor has that clear, skirting on manic, sociopathic energy, that drive to surpass and to move forward, never backward, that need to be God-no, to surpass God.
The best scene where their different approaches to Victor come off well is when Victor and the Creature meet and make their bargain. When Jonny’s Victor circles the Creature and lists off all his traits, you kind of feel his awe, but it’s tinged with quite a bit of horror at what he’s done; he very clearly regrets making the Creature in the first place. Benedict’s Victor, on the other hand, is stunned at how amazing the Creature is in a kind of, “Wow, I’m fantastic, look at this brilliant thing I’ve created,” sort of way. Maybe it’s a tiny bit tempered by horror, but much more by sheer awe bordering on delight. Therefore when he agrees to do it again and create a female Creature, it tortures Jonny’s Victor but for Benedict’s Victor is a challenge that he secretly really wants to do, to see if he can surpass himself. But if it would torture him, it didn’t seem reasonable to me that Jonny’s Victor would actually make that deal to give a female to his Creature. With Benedict’s Victor, though, you can see his curiosity has been piqued; he wants to know if he can do it again, but better this time. You can feel him itching to get away to Scotland. You get the feeling that Benedict’s Victor is actually having fun (at least before the full implications of what he’s done hit him).
This leads to Benedict’s Victor having some interactions that the audience initially reads as humorous but actually are quite terrifying when you think about them. He holds onto Elizabeth’s hand/arm a bit too long, and it’s so clear he’s thinking about her bodily proportions for his experiments. Earlier, Elizabeth says he needs to talk to her because they’re going to be married, and he says, “Oh,” as if that had never before occurred to him.
Another thing is that while both the actors were sweating rather a lot (hey, you try wearing a parka onstage under all the heat from those lights!), Benedict actually incorporated that into his character as Victor, frequently rubbing at his head and mouth, making it seem more and more like Victor’s on edge, losing it, having more headaches, actually needing the medicine he takes.
His disturbed mental state really came through well in the scene where William’s ghost/hallucination visits Victor and makes him determined that he will not give his Creature the female he has created. With Benedict’s Victor, I could clearly see that point where he realized what a bad idea this was and changed his mind; with Jonny’s, I thought it should have been clear to him that he wouldn’t be able to go through with it from the start and that he shouldn’t have agreed to the bargain with the Creature. With Jonny’s Victor, then, this scene seemed almost superfluous and was thus kind of dull; with Benedict’s Victor, this scene was totally riveting.
Hopefully they can get the rights issues worked out so we can have a DVD and I can analyze this to my heart’s content! But in the meantime, thank you so much, National Theatre Live, for streaming this in the first place (streaming live theater, what a brilliant idea-I really do feel like the world has opened up for me) and for running it again so that fans could have the chance to see both the actors in both roles.
I JUST HAVE A LOT OF FEELINGS ABOUT THIS PRODUCTION. I’ll put them under a cut for everyone’s sanity.
Two thematic questions I see this play as dealing with are:
-How much would you be willing to pay for the chance to become God?
-If you were in hell and had the chance to confront God and ask him to help you, what would you say?
The first of these questions is the arc of Dr. Victor Frankenstein, and the other is that of his Creature. Both are fascinating. The second question is interesting because this production aimed, I believe, to finally give a voice to a character that has in previous adaptations has been rendered inexplicably voiceless. As Danny Boyle, the director, said in the little explanatory documentary preceding the screening, previous adaptions have tended to snatch the Creature’s voice away with no real explanation.
But the explanation, at least in my opinion, is that it is really, really hard to get inside the Creature’s head and have him still be a sympathetic character considering the events that must take place.
In the play, the Creature is treated with cruelty (by Victor abandoning him), cruelty (by all the villagers hating him), kindness (by the old blind man), cruelty (the DeLaceys screaming and kicking him out), neutral (by little William Frankenstein), neutral (by Victor agreeing to make him a wife), massive cruelty (by Victor reneging on their deal), and kindness (by Elizabeth’s attempts to understand him and offer to be his friend).
In return, he does some good deeds for the DeLaceys by clearing up their plot of land and chopping firewood and such-oh, and then he freakin’ sets their house on fire and leaves them to burn, including the old man. Then he wanders around and freakin’ murders a little boy to get his brother to come out and play (hey, does this sound like anybody to you? Because to me it sounds like criminal mastermind Moriarty). Then he blackmails and pressures Victor into making a female creature who in all likelihood would turn out just as miserable as himself, just so he can feel happy. Then he freakin’ rapes and murders Elizabeth after she promised to intercede on his behalf to Victor.
You know what? I get it. The Creature had a really hard life, full of undeserved cruelty and pain, and all because his creator is pretty much the coldest-hearted bastard in existence. But the two people who did the Creature the most kindness, one of whom drastically changed his life for the better (I guess?) by teaching him how to read and the other of whom would have at least tried to help him had he let her, he ends up deliberately and-here’s what really gets me-unnecessarily murdering horribly.
Sure, he murdered them in emotionally motivated, retaliatory fits of rage, and maybe if he were tried, a court would let him off. But that’s just not a character I feel I can realistically sympathize with, no matter how cute he was trying to eat Victor’s notebook or playing in the rain and snow. Because surely as humans, we are defined not by what is done to us but by how we react to that (thanks, Dumbledore). Surely our capacities for overcoming hardship and forgiving those who have wronged us are what make us special?
So as for the acting on the part of the Creature, I am just floored by actors who can bring that character to life. The sheer amount of bravery it must have taken to essentially writhe around on the floor alone and naked for about 10 minutes while making guttural noises and learning how to take control of one’s own body while a live audience looks on…But ultimately, for me the Creature’s character and journey are just not as interesting as Frankenstein’s. Because in short, Frankenstein can be seen as a horrible AU in which Sherlock never meets John and goes way overboard with one of his experiments.
I love that first thematic question, obviously, because it’s basically Sherlock’s character pre-John. I refer yet again to Steven Moffat’s quote regarding his two shows: “The Doctor is an angel trying to be a man; Sherlock is a man trying to be a god.” Post-Season 2, though, I would say that Sherlock is a man trying to be a god who realizes that he should instead be trying to become a better man, and that he has friends who will help him do that.
I have not read Mary Shelley’s novel. But in the play, Victor Frankenstein is a man who succeeded in becoming a god and didn’t realize until too late what a great tragedy that was, how many lives he had ruined, including his own, to do that. The play has to be about the Creature’s quest for his ideal of happiness because Victor will never be able to find any; his own ambition destroyed any hope of it he had. Victor, like Sherlock, has a John Watson (his fiancée, Elizabeth), but unlike Sherlock, he does not acknowledge her until it is too late, and he spends the rest of his life trying to undo his actions. His only purpose, he says at the end of the play, is to destroy the Creature.
But to me, Victor is a series of contradictions and second-guessing himself. He’s completely convinced of something one moment (that he is a god, that he has overcome death), and then the next he can look back and see how horrible and destructive that idea was (looking at the trail of dead bodies his Creature has left behind him). But then he can’t help himself and does it again-but better (with the female Creature). And then again has second thoughts and kills her. By the end of the play, his health has deteriorated, he’s torturing himself while being tortured by the Creature, and basically his entire family is destroyed because he played too much with his scientific experimentation. And maybe the Creature killing Elizabeth was the last straw for him and he won’t ever experiment again. Or maybe for him there is no rock bottom, no depth he can sink to where he wouldn’t still be interested in seeing if he can overcome death again. It depends on the actor-for me, Jonny’s Victor has hit rock bottom, but Benedict’s Victor will never stop, can never stop, no matter the personal risk or who else gets destroyed in the process. It’s an addiction.
The best line in the entire production for me was when Victor is explaining everything he has done to Elizabeth and she just responds simply, “Why?” And you look at Victor and see that the obvious answer is “Because I could. Because I wanted to see what would happen.” And then back to her, because she’s kind of going, “But you already could have done that, with me. We could have made something joyful and precious together in the form of a baby to love. Wasn’t it obvious to you that messing with death in this way would cause nothing but pain and destruction? Because it was obvious to me.” And of course he won’t see it until it is too late.
The production and design of this play was phenomenal, particularly the music and special effects, but that’s not really what this post is about, which is obviously the acting. (Little shout out to Naomie Harris, who was just wonderful and totally convincing.) The play was most riveting to me, though, when it was just Frankenstein and his Creature onstage together talking.
I have seen both productions, so what is my verdict on the casting vs. reverse casting? First of all, it was a real treat to see both actors in both roles, and I wouldn’t have this production done in any other way. I think the humiliation of doing certain aspects of the Creature-writhing around naked/partially clothed, his speech impediments, his twitching and drooling and learning to use his body-is lessened when everyone knows that you are sharing both these roles, that you own both of them. And it’s a brilliant metaphor that the Creator and Created are two sides of the same coin, that they know each other and need each other.
Another caveat: I know Benedict Cumberbatch’s work; I don’t know Jonny Lee Miller’s nearly as much. Therefore I’m clearly biased towards Benedict, but I’ve done my best in keeping my fangirling under wraps when attempting to analyze this play as objectively as I can (though, sorry, I do give out quite a few backhanded compliments). And I conclude that both actors are really, really superb in both roles-I mean, these are two guys at the top of their games-but to me the play was most convincing with Jonny as the Creature and Benedict as Dr. Victor Frankenstein.
Jonny is fantastic as the Creature. Less awkward, less gangly and agile and graceful and theatrical, more solid. He makes me believe that he has the physical power to intimidate and do horrible things but is choosing to hold back (er, other than during the times he is killing people). The scene when he rapes and murders Elizabeth, then, felt so much more brutal and shocking and disturbing because I totally believed it, whereas with Benedict’s Creature, it felt more random because the physical menace and threat wasn’t as obvious. Jonny’s Creature is forceful as hell-compare that lovingly-gifed hand-shaking scene from this trailer where Jonny’s Creature jerks Victor forward-I was thinking, “God, be careful, you’ll wrench his arm out of its socket.” At the same time, Jonny’s Creature seems more childlike to me, laughing more, a tad more playful, less unearthly, more realistic. He moves past all the awkward twitching a bit more quickly, which is a relief. Jonny doesn’t have Benedict’s vocal range-and that actually works in his favor here as the Creature when Jonny adopts a kind of harsh, gruff, almost monotone lower pitch that I would believe of a being with somewhat less developed vocal cords.
Here’s the thing, though: Benedict Cumberbatch doesn’t make many “safe” acting choices. In the words of Martin Freeman, he commits. And sometimes it doesn’t quite work, and sometimes it’s perceived as overacting, and sometimes it’s too good when others around him aren’t putting in the same amount of energy and zest. But most of the time it makes him impossible to look away from. And whatever the role is, Benedict unquestionably shows up, throws himself into it, and works the hell out of it. It’s very hard for him to just fade into the background; to quote Mark Gatiss, he trails stardust. But with a character as frankly horrible to look at and awkward as the Creature, whom I found it difficult to empathize with because he keeps horribly murdering people, I kind of wanted him to fade into the background a little more to make room for Victor’s more interesting story and characterization.
Johnny’s Victor lacks that energy and that light in his eyes that Benedict’s Victor gets when he thinks about all the scientific marvels he can do. Honestly, I never quite believed that Johnny’s Victor was actually a genius/madman because he didn’t seem to enjoy his work; he just kind of plowed steadily along, sinking further into sickness and depression. He very convincingly conveys Victor’s horror at what he has done, but not the curiosity that led him to do it in the first place or the delight that he was actually successful. I totally believed that Jonny’s Victor actually loves Elizabeth; I don’t really buy that Benedict’s Victor loves her. I never quite believed that Jonny’s character would have the motivation or capability to do the horrible things that Victor Frankenstein needed to do. Whereas Benedict’s Victor has that clear, skirting on manic, sociopathic energy, that drive to surpass and to move forward, never backward, that need to be God-no, to surpass God.
The best scene where their different approaches to Victor come off well is when Victor and the Creature meet and make their bargain. When Jonny’s Victor circles the Creature and lists off all his traits, you kind of feel his awe, but it’s tinged with quite a bit of horror at what he’s done; he very clearly regrets making the Creature in the first place. Benedict’s Victor, on the other hand, is stunned at how amazing the Creature is in a kind of, “Wow, I’m fantastic, look at this brilliant thing I’ve created,” sort of way. Maybe it’s a tiny bit tempered by horror, but much more by sheer awe bordering on delight. Therefore when he agrees to do it again and create a female Creature, it tortures Jonny’s Victor but for Benedict’s Victor is a challenge that he secretly really wants to do, to see if he can surpass himself. But if it would torture him, it didn’t seem reasonable to me that Jonny’s Victor would actually make that deal to give a female to his Creature. With Benedict’s Victor, though, you can see his curiosity has been piqued; he wants to know if he can do it again, but better this time. You can feel him itching to get away to Scotland. You get the feeling that Benedict’s Victor is actually having fun (at least before the full implications of what he’s done hit him).
This leads to Benedict’s Victor having some interactions that the audience initially reads as humorous but actually are quite terrifying when you think about them. He holds onto Elizabeth’s hand/arm a bit too long, and it’s so clear he’s thinking about her bodily proportions for his experiments. Earlier, Elizabeth says he needs to talk to her because they’re going to be married, and he says, “Oh,” as if that had never before occurred to him.
Another thing is that while both the actors were sweating rather a lot (hey, you try wearing a parka onstage under all the heat from those lights!), Benedict actually incorporated that into his character as Victor, frequently rubbing at his head and mouth, making it seem more and more like Victor’s on edge, losing it, having more headaches, actually needing the medicine he takes.
His disturbed mental state really came through well in the scene where William’s ghost/hallucination visits Victor and makes him determined that he will not give his Creature the female he has created. With Benedict’s Victor, I could clearly see that point where he realized what a bad idea this was and changed his mind; with Jonny’s, I thought it should have been clear to him that he wouldn’t be able to go through with it from the start and that he shouldn’t have agreed to the bargain with the Creature. With Jonny’s Victor, then, this scene seemed almost superfluous and was thus kind of dull; with Benedict’s Victor, this scene was totally riveting.
Hopefully they can get the rights issues worked out so we can have a DVD and I can analyze this to my heart’s content! But in the meantime, thank you so much, National Theatre Live, for streaming this in the first place (streaming live theater, what a brilliant idea-I really do feel like the world has opened up for me) and for running it again so that fans could have the chance to see both the actors in both roles.