On All Things Pachyderm
If I’ve made one thing clear to the recent readers of this blog, I hope it’s this: I am spending all my grocery money on theatre tickets. Somebody stop me. No, really. This afternoon, I saw another Canstage production, The Elephant Man, starring Brent Carver and a whole bunch of other awesome Canadian performers.
Often, when I go to see plays, I either have no idea what they’re about or have read the script. Happily, The Elephant Man is one of those rare shows about the plot of which I have more than a vague idea without having read the script. This, no doubt, is because it’s based on a true story. (Hollywood’s favourite five words. No, second-favourite, after “top at the box office”).
The real-life Joseph “John” Merrick, aka the Elephant Man, was a Victorian man born with severe physical disfigurements. He went from sideshow freak to high-society social butterfly after a curious doctor took him under his wing. I’m sure Wikipedia can fill you in further than I can. (Incidentally, Merrick also makes an appearance in Alan Moore’s graphic novel From Hell. And the Barenaked Ladies’ song “If I Had a Million Dollars”. Now. You. Know.)
The most interesting aspect of the show is the way in which Merrick is presented: he is usually played by a relatively young, handsome actor with no make-up or prosthesis. Instead, his supposed deformity comes out in the way he moves and, most importantly, in the way other people treat him. So, yeah, after seeing the show, I feel I am completely justified in concluding that Brent Carver is a genius.
The Elephant Man does feel somewhat abrupt at points, but it’s a thought-provoking and emotion-stirring ride. Perhaps it feels so disjointed because, not only does it offer no easy answers, it poses no easy questions. At its very core, it examines our emotions and cultural baggage toward people who are different – whether physically different, like Merrick, mentally different, or culturally different. It examines what happens to the relationship between two adult human beings when one physically requires the help of the other. What is dignity? What is individuality? What is normal? I bet you can figure out the entire plot of the show after reading this mini-review; but I bet you’ll still be pondering these questions after the final curtain.
Now hold on, you may be thinking, you promised me “all things”, Kriger! Where’s the rest of the pachyderm at?
Well, you know what television has nothing whatsoever to do with The Elephant Man except that they both have “elephant” in the title? The Elephant Show, that’s what. Who could forget Sharon, Lois, and Bram singing songs with their entourage of kids and strange elephant companion? Who was named, fortunately enough, “Elephant”* and made tuba-like noises to express her feelings.
When I was a kid, it didn’t seem odd that Sharon, Lois, and Bram were friends with an unspeaking person in an elephant costume. True, I never saw my parents doing it, but, then, my parents didn’t run around singing with a bunch of kids I’d never met, either. (Well… not most of the time.) But Sharon, Lois, and Bram were different from the other children’s show hosts, and, looking back now, I think I know why.
Despite all the singing and hanging-out-with-elephants, Sharon, Lois, and Bram acted like ordinary adults. It was always very clear that they were the children’s caretakers as well as friends – not their peers, like Steve from Blue’s Clues or the Teletubbies. And they treated Elephant the way parents might treat an adult friend who’s being silly with their kids. On other shows, like Today’s Special and Mr. Dressup, the puppets or costumed characters are supposed to be just like people; it’s never acknowledged that, you know, Casey and Finnegan are socks on someone’s hand. (Not that I’m knocking Mr. Dressup – believe me, I’m all about the Tickle Trunk. Word.)
Also, Elephant and the others did all sorts of cool things, like wander around Toronto. And perform shows in Toronto. And that was kind of fun, because, hey! I lived in Toronto.
Speaking of Toronto, you know what else has the word “elephant” in the title? The 2003 film Elephant, directed by Gus van Sant. It wasn’t filmed in Toronto. I’m just funny that way about segues.
Although, I guess you could sort of connect Elephant with The Elephant Show in that both were dedicated to showing realistic relationships between realistic people and to making you feel like part of the action even though you’re safely at home in front of a screen. However, one of the two is definitely not for three-year-olds.
Elephant is a fictional account of a high-school shooting, clearly based on real-life tragedies like the events at Columbine. According to different sources (because you better believed I spent about half an hour after I saw it scouring the Internet trying to figure this out), the title refers to either the idiom “elephant in the room” (ie something really obvious that everyone pretends doesn’t exist) or the analogy of the blind men feelin’ up an elephant: each touches a different bit (tusk, ear, trunk, tail), and none realizes that what he’s grasped is only part of the elephant.
It’s a strange movie: there’s no plot, the action is slow, the timeline is confusing. Most of the film recreates the feeling of wandering through a regular high school, getting to listen in on the everyday conversations of ordinary teenagers. We’re not talking Archie comics; these kids have their problems, and that makes them interesting to watch. Also, the actors are almost entirely non-professionals, and their dialogue is ad-libbed. But it’s that ho-hum feeling of “this could be any day at my school” that’s key to the way van Sant shatters everything when, in the last part, he brings in the two killers loaded up with firearms, explosives, and ammunition.
In conclusion, a lot of interesting things have the word “elephant” in their titles. Maybe I should remember that when I think about what to call my next story.
* At least it wasn’t “Rhinoceros” or something confusing like that.