“As Gregor Samsa awoke one morning from uneasy dreams, he found himself transformed in his bed into a gigantic insect-like creature.” Any questions? Gilsi Örn Gardarsson and David Farr’s stage adaptation of Metamorphosis, scurrying from a world tour onto the stage at the Royal Alex, is as astonishing and distinctive as the novella Franz Kafka wrote nearly 100 years ago. Björn Thors, as Gregor Samsa, scrambles up walls and around furnishings as your mind scrambles around Kafka’s absurdly riveting ideas.
Co-directed by Farr (Associate Director of Royal Shakespeare Company) and Gardarsson, of the award-winning Icelandic theatre company Vesturport, Metamorphosis (premiered at Lyric Hammersmith in London, 2006) is conspicuously European. Entrances are formalized and dancelike; the first several minutes of action wordlessly establish the rigidity of the family whose middle-class home we are looking into. Integral to the mood of the production—comedic and tense, disconcerting yet familiar—is original music by Nick Cave and Warren Ellis (this is one of three Gardarsson productions they have collaborated on). The artificial precision with which characters speak and move is as bizarre as the storyline. This consistency of absurdity is quintessentially Kafka; it deepens both the humour and the angst, and offers a prime example of existentialism: living absurdly makes one's existence absurd.
The Samsa family drink their tea, live by the clock, read the paper and talk about the weather. They live modestly on Gregor’s earnings as a travelling salesman. He works too hard and doesn’t sleep much, disoriented by being so often in unfamiliar places. Discovering Gregor’s shoes, they realise he has not gone to work. His manager comes to the house to complain that Gregor is one hour and eleven minutes late for work. Ill health or no, Gregor is expected to put the company’s needs before his own. They call to him but his reply that he will catch the next train, understood by the audience, is heard by the others as dreadful and incomprehensible noise. Gregor’s concern about having woken up as some sort of bug is only that he must get to work and continue taking care of his sister and parents. The family’s concern upon having discovered the hideous metamorphosis is only about how it disrupts their lives. “Questions will be asked!” rages the father. “Why us?” wails the mother, “We live quiet, ordinary lives.”
The set is two floors high, like a dollhouse—a meticulously banal living room downstairs, and Gregor’s room upstairs upended to give us a discombobulating bird’s-eye view. The stage design by Börkur Jónsson enables the athletic Thors (The Deep, 2012) to deftly climb every surface of the set with movements and postures that show us he is both human and pest.
The excellence of Thors’ acting, in no way impeded by his constant gymnastics, is matched by that of his three cast mates: Unnur Ösp Stefánsdóttir as his initially supportive sister Greta, Tom Mannion as his intolerant and brutal father Herman, Edda Arnljótsdóttir as doting but ineffectual mother Lucy, and Víkingur Kristajánsson playing the roles of oppressive outsiders.
The Samsas determine that, since Gregor can no longer be relied upon, they must find work. Herman’s militant conformity is made startlingly clear when he uses the inflammatory phrase, “Work will set us free.” The next time Herman speaks of feeling free is in conversation with the family’s new lodger who is held up to be a model citizen but is more like a brainwashed soldier. Herman and the lodger shout civilities at each other.
Whether you have read Kafka’s writings or think you never will, you must see Metamorphosis. Gardarsson and Farr’s adaptation makes exemplary use of the medium of live theatre, employing physicality, voice and dialogue to maximal effect. This startling, funny, unsettling, heartbreaking, provocative, thoughtful, and unforgettable show will make you feel everything.
$25-$99. Royal Alexandra Theatre, 260 King West, runs until Mar. 9
Evan Andrew Mackay is a Toronto playwright and humorist who writes about culture and social justice.
