Picturing a morph from ape into man
into cross, the art on Geva’s program for Inherit
the Wind speaks volumes about the raging debate over evolution. The play is
loosely based on the1925 Scopes Monkey Trial, which took place in rural Dayton,
Tennessee. The state’s Butler Act forbade
public schools from teaching any theory denying divine creation or that
preached man was descendent from animals.
Once the act passed, the ACLU
searched for a teacher who would buck the law, offering to defend the accused.
The trial was set up. The town of Dayton,
in rough economic shape, believed the publicity would bring fortune. So,
24-year-old John Scopes, a first-year teacher, was recruited as defendant.
In fact, Scopes couldn’t remember if
he had actually taught the chapter from Hunter’s
Civic Biology that endorsed Darwin’s
theory. But that wasn’t going to stop this industrious little town. Brought in
to defend Scopes, Clarence Darrow, an agnostic and arguably America’s
greatest legal mind, was pitted against prosecutor William Jennings Bryan,
famous statesman and devout Christian.
Inherit
the Wind premiered in 1955. Playwrights Jerome Lawrence and Robert E. Lee
were inspired by McCarthyism, but, with current dispute over the Patriot Act
intensifying, the play is certainly relevant. And the debate between evolution
and “intelligent design” has recently found its way into both school board
meetings and a federal courtroom.
“There Ain’t No Monkey in Me,” a
twangy Americana tune, opens the
show, setting the field for battle. Teacher Bertram Cates, the accused, is
ready to face this fight, proclaiming, “Man wasn’t just stuck here like a
geranium in a flower pot.” His trial will bring famous politician and Bible
scholar Matthew Harrison Brady to “defend the living truth of the scripture.”
Lucky for Cates, Henry Drummond, the fictionalized Darrow, is on his side.
Prosecutor Brady, played by John
Pribnyl, is a godly man, fallible to the sins of gluttony and ego. Worshipped
by the townspeople, he is greeted with pomp and grandeur. Defense attorney
Drummond, played with brilliance by J.G. Hertzler, receives no such welcome.
His entrance, up from the bowels of the stage, backlit, face cloaked in
darkness, forces the audience to question whether he is of the devil or the
hero come to save the day. Hertzler plays Drummond sarcastic and growling —
Archie Bunker in a courthouse — but manages to make the character loveable.
Director Skip Greer creates a
contradictory relationship between the men, contentious yet affectionate. In
one interaction, Brady and Drummond lean into each other, literally head to
head. Another scene sets the men on a bench. Brady, in a three-piece suit, is a
contrast to the disheveled Drummond. As they discuss the changes they’ve seen
throughout their friendship, the actors’ faces and voices demonstrate their
characters’ fondness.
The play’s humor comes thanks to
Hertzler’s timing and his interaction with James Michael Riley, playing oily
reporter E.K. Hornbeck. Riley’s interpretation is devilish, his lithe body,
suited in shining gold, slips into nooks, making him a constant observer.
At the end of this performance, the
drama overwhelms. After a trying experience, Brady stands at the verge of
breakdown; Pribnyl brings his character to tears. His mind having failed him,
Brady descends into desperation.
The play leans toward the liberal,
vilifying Brady and implying he is ignorant and too caught up in religious
fervor to realize that science must, inevitably, replace God. But the final
stage picture leaves room for individual interpretation. Drummond stands with
his back to the audience, gripping the arm of the witness stand. He turns to
contemplate the Bible, weighing it against Darwin’s
Origin of the Species. He smacks the
two together, throwing them into his briefcase. With this, the audience is
left, without definitive answers.
You
should go if you’re want to see a historic drama infused with new
significance — one that leaves the raging evolution debate open to
interpretation.
Inherit the Wind at the GevaTheatreCenter
through April 2 | 75 Woodbury Boulevard
| $13.50-$48.50 | 232-4382, www.gevatheatre.org
This article appears in Mar 1-7, 2006.
