Because Charles Dickens was paid by the word—and wrote in installments— his novels tend to be dense with character, plot development, description and pointed comments about the inequities of society. When the installments appeared in the newspapers, the people usually gathered around the pater familias as he read aloud. Unfortunately, in today's busy social climate, hardly anyone reads Dickens anymore, other than high school freshmen who slog their way through Great Expectations and swear off reading any more books by the author.
Thus, it is refreshing that Neil Bartlett has turned his adaptation skills to Oliver Twist, a novel more familiar to modern readers through the stage/film musical by Lionel Bart. If that's your only experience with Dickens, I suggest you get on over to the Shakespeare Theatre of New Jersey where a very inventive production graces the Main Stage through October 7. While this literate and faithful version of the iconic tale of an orphan boy who is lost and finally found may not send you to the library, you will experience a thrilling evening of theater.
With 13 actors playing more than two dozen roles, this version of Oliver Twist uses Dickens' actual words for dialogue and narrative bridges that propel the action along, set a scene or offer Dickens' social pronouncements.
When we meet him, 10-year-old orphan Oliver has spent his entire childhood in a squalid workhouse after his unwed mother died in childbirth. Taunted and tormented by his workmates as "a naughty orphan which nobody can love," the boy is starved for food, friendship and love. His "escape" from this prison begins with his being sold by the parish beadle to a family of undertakers, continues with his running away to London where he comes under the tutelage of a fence named Fagin, and ends with his redemption in the home of a well-off family, the Brownlows. Along the way, the spunky youngster is beaten, threatened and forced to steal for his supper and well-being. This degradation visited on a boy with "a face like an angel" reveals "the best and worst shades of our natures," man at his "ugliest and loveliest," so that in the end the principle of good survives and triumphs. (Above: Eric Hoffmann as Mr. Bumble, a parish beadle and Quentin McCuiston as Oliver Twist. All photos: ©Gerry Goodstein)
Director Brian Crowe guides this small cast through superbly choreographed and complicated action and elicits performances that border on genius. Quentin McCuiston may look older than a 10-year-old Oliver, but he projects the boy's innocence and resilience while telegraphing his vulnerability and raising our sympathy without bathos. As the Artful Dodger, pickpocket extraordinaire, Robbie Collier Sublett may not be as cute as the movie musical version, but he does show a bit of humanity toward Oliver and acts as a very expressive narrator in the opening and closing scenes. His Cockney accent leads him to pronounce his v's as w's (wery instead of very), to the audience's glee.
The adults in this tale are almost uniformly nasty. Eric Hoffmann portrays Mr. Bumble, the parish beadle, as a self-righteous, cold, pompous man, so it's poetic justice that he becomes a hen-pecked husband after marrying Mrs. Corney, the matron of the workhouse, played with delicious malice by Tina Stafford, who plays a mean accordion. Any kindness exhibited toward Oliver by Mr. Sowerberry the undertaker (Andrew Boyer) is totally negated by his braying spouse, played by Jeffrey M. Bender in wig and padding. Bender is a very vicious Bill Sikes, a brutal thief and housebreaker; with his red eyes and mean glare, he's one scary dude. And the thief/prostitute Nancy, sympathetically depicted by Corey Tazmania, represents the effects of gin and drugs and a woman in thrall to an abusive man. (Left: Corey Tazmania as Nancy and Jeffrey M. Bender as Bill Sikes)
But it is Ames Adamson who turns in a masterful performance as the "covetful, avaricious" old fence Fagin. Long derided as an example of Victorian anti-Semitism, Fagin as performed by Adamson speaks in a very faint accent that is hard to place; it is neither Yiddish, Cockney, British but an amalgam of the three. Not until he recites the Kaddish (the Jewish prayer recited for the dead) just before his hanging are we sure he's Jewish. Adamson also eschews the usual lascivious behavior often ascribed to Fagin. He's more businessman than monster, which makes him all the more dangerous. (Above L-R: Quentin McCuiston as Oliver is lectured by Ames Adamson as Fagin as Jeffrey M. Bender as Bill Sikes looks on.)
Supporting roles are ably filled by John Little as the benevolent Mr. Brownlow, Meg Kiley Smith as his daughter Rose and Andrew Boyer as Mr. Brownlow's friend Grimwig ("I'll eat my head," he says repeatedly). Ditto the actors who play various thieves in Fagin's "employ."
Brian J. Ruggaber's set works for the myriad of venues and is supplemented by Steven L. Beckel's sound design (that thumping machine in the beginning is unnerving), Andrew Hungerford's atmospheric lighting and Kris Kukus's original music and musical direction. And Nancy Leary's excellent costumes are appropriate to character, social station and historical period. Kudos to the dresser backstage who helps the actors morph from one character into another in the blink of an eye!
Oliver Twist is the perfect tale for election season when we are arguing over how much government owes to the poor. Of course, we don't have workhouses for orphans in this country, but the British government allotment in 1837 to feed these creatures was too low by a half, and most of that lined the pockets of the people running the institutions. And young people turning to crime just to survive, or becoming addicted to alcohol and drugs isn't a problem inimical to 1837; it faces America today. Unfortunately, although Dickens' syntax and diction may have gone "out of style," his concerns have not. (Above: Robbie Collier Sublett as the Artful Dodger, a young pickpocket, shows off his stolen goods to the gang of thieves.)
Once again, the Shakespeare Theatre of New Jersey shows us what a class act they are. If you have seen their production of Neil Bartlett's adaptation of A Christmas Carol, you know the magic he can work with text. Add to that STNJ's wonderful way with acting and staging, and you've got a breathtaking production of Oliver Twist that should not be missed.
Oliver Twist as adapted by Neil Bartlett will be performed at the F. M. Kirby Shakespeare Theatre on the campus of Drew University, 36 Madison Avenue, Madison, through October 7. For information and tickets, call the box office at 973.408.5600 or visit www.ShakespeareNJ.org.
