Woman Yearns to be Free in Expressionist Drama Machinal
Lawrance Bernabo
Duluth News Tribune
March 6, 2020
6
A young woman arrives late (again) for work. Her boss talks to her, and when he puts his hand on her shoulder, her reaction is so visceral, you know more than her physical space is being violated.
Sophie Treadwell’s psychodrama Machinal plays at UMD’s Dudley Experimental Theatre the weekends before and after spring break.
This is a provocative play, confronting the audience with performances ranging from naturalistic to absurd that recalibrate characters with each episode, all progressing toward a tragic end.
The characters have names but are reduced in the program to simple archetypes. As Young Woman riding home on the subway, Madison Lang looks exactly like a beleaguered heroine from a German expressionist film by Murnau or Wiene.
Several episodes have Young Woman assaulted by voices in her head, and Lang has to use only her face and body through these extended sequences to express her inner turmoil.
The playwright suffered from anxiety and had been institutionalized, so behind the expressionist exaggerations of Young Woman’s crippling anxiety attacks, there is a cold, harsh reality.
Ian Wallin shades Husband’s words ever so slightly, conveying a malevolent entitlement. Anna Matthes’s Mother is stuck in perpetual nag mode, hearing but not listening to her daughter.
As soon as we see Eukariah Tabaka as First Man, his plaid flannel shirt and jeans signify he is different from the other characters, especially since he speaks like a human being.
The baker’s dozen ensemble play multiple supporting roles and help change the sets, marching through their paces with metronomic precision. Director William Payne, along with the cast and crew, make each of the nine episodes a unique combination of expressionist elements.
The opening episode is driven by the rhythms of the workplace: an adding machine, typewriter, switchboard and filing cabinet. Each worker’s costume is accented by a tie, vest, hem, or scarf covered in letters and numbers. Their harsh barking laughter signifies something darker than humor.
In stark contrast, another episode takes place in the dark, light provided momentarily by a struck match and then a dim streetlight. Projections on a distant back wall are used to establish a sense of place for most of the episodes or to present constantly shifting inky images that become almost recognizable at times.
Chris Harwood’s sound design is a critical component throughout the show, and the strategic selection of period songs is most obvious with “The Wedding of the Painted Doll” before the honeymoon episode.
The scenic design by Stella Vatnsdal is such that you really want to be sitting in the center or left of center, to be able to see everything that is happening down the corridor.
Treadwell wrote Machinal in 1928, and a literate audience of that time would have recognized Young Woman’s plight in the stories of Emma Bovary, Anna Karenina, and Edna Pontellier. Not surprisingly, Treadwell had a different endgame in mind.
The expressionist elements give Machinal its theatricality, but Young Woman’s story and Lang’s performance provide its dramatic weight as a tragic tale.
