Now that million dollar special effects extravaganzas like “The
Lion King” and “Notre Dame de Paris” have become standard theater
fare for sophisticated urban kids and their plugged-in parents,
it's reassuring to know that less can be more on stage.
Another kind of blockbuster musical, this time from Britain, owes
its success to a lost yesteryear of l9th century stage gimmicks:
trap doors, flat scenery, pop-ups and puppetry. The result is
anything but stale. “Shockheaded Peter” is a savagely delicious
retelling of Dr. Heinrich Hoffman's collection of heart-stopping
children's tales,”The Struwwelpeter,” dreamed up by the creative
team of producer Mike Morris, designer Julian Crouch, director
Phelim McDermott and musician Martyn Jacques.
A frightfully fun visual and musical feast of low-tech wizardry
and barrel-organ style toe-tappers, “Shockheaded Peter” transforms
the illustrious Salle Favart of the Opéra Comique into a Victorian
toy theater, under the auspices of the Festival d'Automne.
Children in Hoffman’s native Germany have surely spent untold
sleepless nights thanks to “The Struwwelpeter,” written in 1884
by this physician in a Frankfurt lunatic asylum out of frustration
and disgust with the moralizing literature for youngsters of the
day Instead, the good doctor imagined Conrad Suck-a-Thumb, who
gets his irresistible appendages snipped off by the Scissor-Man,
and Harriet, whose obsession with matches sends her up in flames,
among other naughty children who meet absurdly horrific ends.
Intrigued by Hoffman’s decidedly politically incorrect approach
to child development and fed up with the feel-good American musical
and big-ticket opera productions, Morris began looking to create
a show in the mid-'90s around the book that both repelled and
fascinated him as a kid. The resulting horror and chaos is both
genuinely scary and great entertainment. Termed a “junk opera
for boys and girls,” the show is, like the book that inspired
it, ostensibly for children but perhaps even more meaningful for
adults,
“It sort of pretends to be frightening but obviously isn’t and
children latch on to that very quickly,” Crouch said on the phone
from London about “Peter”’s equal parts gore and glee. “Everything
is presented with a kind of dread and a warning and pretty soon
they discover that it’s not really frightening to them. And actually
I think that what is more alarming is the underlying moral side
to it which I think parents pick up on more.”
“Peter” is the fruit of three years of live experimentation and
countless gaffs since the show premiered at the West Yorkshire
Playhouse in 1997 with only a rough storyline in place. Luckily,
Crouch and McDermott hand-picked the cast with an eye to improv
skills.
“Often our rehearsals are more like how a football team would
train,” Crouch said. “It’s about group skills and about finding
a kind of magic between people.” The gamble has paid off with
consistently exciting performances in which actors are free to
improvise at will. This is especially important in “Peter,” he
explained, which has been on the road for three years and where
consequently “[the actors] need to make it their own, which they
really have, to keep it fresh for themselves and the audience.”
Meanwhile, “Shockheaded Peter,” a pre-Improbable endeavor produced
by Morris’ production house Cultural Industry, continues to amaze
audiences while bringing its innovative creative team much deserved
attention. Plans are even underway to translate the show into
a feature film. Educational theater with a moral was never such
a romp.
“Shockheaded Peter,” Sept 28 to Oct 8, Tue-Sat 8pm (also Sept
30, 3pm), Sun 3pm, Opéra Comique, 5 rue Favart, 2e, M° Richelieu
Drouot/Quatre Septembre, 50-190F, tel: 08 25 00 00 58
