Having tackled Bram Stoker’s Dracula a decade ago, Mark Bruce has turned his attention to Frankenstein, that other masterpiece of nineteenth-century gothic horror, giving particular attention to Mary Shelley’s sub-title of The Modern Prometheus.
The sad story of Frankenstein’s monster has become a popular subject for choreographers in recent years with the late Liam Scarlett’s full-length work for The Royal Ballet, Akram Khan's Creature for English National Ballet and Yabin Wang’s Swan – A Different Story, which premiered last year by the Swiss lake where Shelley was inspired to write her novel in 1816; and where much of the story takes place.
Rather than attempting a faithful dance theatre reconstruction of Shelley’s narrative, Bruce’s take on Frankenstein is a thematic distillation, stripped back to just one act of 50 minutes. In nine meaty scenes, Bruce weaves issues of Greek mythology, especially via the characters of Prometheus (Eleanor Duval) and Narcissus (Carina Howard), through themes of loneliness and vulnerability, which spring from the monster’s sad existence, all presented in a style that owes some further influence to Central-European cinema of the early 20th century. It is this delicate juxtaposition with Greek Tragedy and German Expressionism that gives Bruce’s production a key element of uniqueness over other danced interpretations.
Just as he had done in the title role of Dracula, Jonathan Goddard gives a forceful account of the central figure both in expression and movement. He perfectly essayed the monster’s gangly uncontrolled limbs when first rising from being brought to life by Dr Frankenstein (Dominic Rocca); and his black-eyed, doleful expressions of trying to find companionship while only attracting fear brought Karloffian meaning to one of the truly iconic sci-fi/horror roles. This duality of seeking love while attracting terror reached a climax in the monster’s finding of a bride, a captivating performance by New Adventures émigré, Cordelia Braithwaite. Speaking afterwards, Goddard revealed that he had gained some inspiration for the role from the occasional vacant expressions of Bruce’s pet dog! The final character was Victor Frankenstein’s ill-fated fiancée, Elizabeth, portrayed by Anna Daly with convincing devotion to Frankenstein and his work.
The Place’s theatre has no curtain and the proximity of stage to audience is particularly intimate. A tight row of footlights was cleverly positioned at the edge of the stage, in front of the audience, helping to conceal the transitions between scenes by enabling set and performers to move into position under the cover of darkness. When Duval (as the winged Prometheus) seemed to have magically morphed from upstage right to downstage left in the blink of an eye it was scarily reminiscent of Doctor Who’s shape-shifting Weeping Angels.
Bruce has worked with lighting designer, Guy Hoare, for 20 years and here was ample evidence of both the elite maturity of their collaboration and also how great lighting design can enrich and enliven work that is short of resource for stage backdrops and set design. Effective evocations of thunder and lightning built both mood and context superbly and, at the beginning especially, one felt transported to the eerie and misty banks of Lake Geneva sharing Mary Shelley’s stories of horror with Lord Byron, Percy Bysshe Shelley and “the other one” (John Polidori).
Great music is also vital to any work by Mark Bruce and in Frankenstein he has selected a wide array of music, beginning and ending with Chopin and taking diverse influences of Penderecki, Tchaikovsky, Pärt and David Eugene Edwards (amongst others) along the way.
Unusually, Frankenstein contained no music from the choreographer himself but devotees of Bruce’s compositions were not to be disappointed because Frankenstein was preceded by a 20-minute pure dance hors d’ouevre – entitled Liberation Day – in which his cast of six for Frankenstein introduced themselves in a mix of duets, solos, a trio and an ensemble finale to a set of vintage Americana songs penned by Bruce and sung by Eva Trodd. His distinctive music mixes influences from country & western, blues and rock in the style of something like Twin Peaks meets Fargo.
This opening night performance in London was briefly interrupted by a slight technical hitch, which the team put right expeditiously, and credit to the whole cast for not allowing the delay to lower the energy of the drama. Bruce and his outstanding team of creatives, both on and off the stage, have brought together a work of commendable brevity to articulate the beautiful but flawed creature that lives within us all.
