{"id":21509,"date":"2021-10-01T09:00:27","date_gmt":"2021-10-01T16:00:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/?p=21509"},"modified":"2021-09-27T09:34:59","modified_gmt":"2021-09-27T16:34:59","slug":"frankenstein-comes-to-craigdarroch-castle-as-solo-performance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/2021\/10\/01\/frankenstein-comes-to-craigdarroch-castle-as-solo-performance\/","title":{"rendered":"Frankenstein<\/em> comes to Craigdarroch Castle as solo performance"},"content":{"rendered":"

It’s alive!<\/em><\/p>\n

This October, actor Jason Stevens will be regaling audiences with a live rendition of Mary Shelley\u2019s Frankenstein<\/em> at Craigdarroch Castle. Stevens has gained a reputation for his performance of Charles Dickens\u2019 A Christmas Carol<\/em> for the past 10 years, and he\u2019s excited to be telling a different sort of story as frigid fog rolls across moonlit moors.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a great story; it\u2019s not what people think it is,\u201d says Stevens. \u201cThe \u2018raging monster\u2019 is actually the sympathetic character\u2014it\u2019s Dr. Frankenstein who comes off as being more monstrous in his behaviour: he creates something and he takes no responsibility for it. He\u2019s the ultimate deadbeat dad.\u201d<\/p>\n

Stevens believes the story is about human accountability, that acting without due consideration is dangerous.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Craigdarroch Castle while being used for the movie Spooky House<\/em> (photo by Brian Davies).<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cYou have a well-intentioned scientist who is eager to expand human understanding without thinking through the consequences, which results in destruction and murder and death. There\u2019s so much going on there,\u201d he says. \u201cEverything from the Manhattan Project to modern human technology has consequences. Be aware of what you create. Just because we have the technology to do something doesn\u2019t necessarily mean we should go ahead and do it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Stevens also thinks the story touches upon the effect of neglect upon the human psyche, how instances of violence and psychopathy increase when children grow up without proper love and support.<\/p>\n

\u201cMonsters are made\u2014that’s really the underlying message. There\u2019s a lot of people who don\u2019t take responsibility for their own children. You\u2019re multiple times more likely to go to prison, get addicted to drugs, have unintended pregnancies and things like that, and the prisons are filled with failed cases of people who have been neglected by their creators,\u201d says Stevens. \u201cI think the parallels are huge. I mean, the monster doesn\u2019t even have a name\u2014the most fundamental human dignity is not afforded to him. He\u2019s also hideously ugly and repulsive to humankind, so he has no place. No one has spared a thought for his dignity and human rights.\u201d<\/p>\n

Adapting a full-length novel to an hour-long solo piece is an exercise of editorial mercilessness, according to Stevens, but if done right, it still retains the essential components of the original story.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou have to be pretty much ruthless in cutting it; you have to basically leave out every single thing you can, and only leave enough in to get the feel and flavour of the story,\u201d he says. \u201cLast year when I did this, two people in the audience had just finished reading the original version of the story, and they said I captured it for them\u2014even though it was heavily abridged, it still had the right feel.\u201d<\/p>\n

Stevens brings 10 characters to life within the performance, and he relies on various methods of acting to make them distinct to his audience.<\/p>\n

\u201cI use different voices for the various characters; they each have their own flavour,\u201d he says. \u201cIf you look up and to the right as one character, then you look down and to the left as another. Each character has a different tempo, like music, so people will be able to follow that.\u201d<\/p>\n

He believes that the power of spoken word connects with audiences on a visceral level unlike anything else.<\/p>\n

\u201cI do think that storytelling is a primal art form, it\u2019s what makes us human. We tell stories to each other; we\u2019re the only animal that can,\u201d he says. \u201cWe\u2019re so used to digital media, we\u2019re so used to being fed our stories via screens, to have something personal is generally well-received. And it\u2019s deliberately stripped down. I don\u2019t have any set, I don\u2019t have any props, I don\u2019t have any costumes, I don\u2019t have anything. I just rely on the spoken word, and in that 19th-century location [of the castle], there\u2019s something ancient about it that people really react positively to.\u201d<\/p>\n

Frankenstein<\/em>
\n6 pm October 9, 16, 23, 30
\n$30, Craigdarroch Castle
\nthecastle.ca<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It’s alive! This October, actor Jason Stevens will be regaling audiences with a live rendition of Mary Shelley\u2019s Frankenstein at Craigdarroch Castle. Stevens has gained a reputation for his performance of Charles Dickens\u2019 A Christmas Carol for the past 10 years, and he\u2019s excited to be telling a different sort of story as frigid fog […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":18344,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-21509","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-arts","category-webexclusive"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21509","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21509"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21509\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21546,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21509\/revisions\/21546"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/18344"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21509"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21509"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21509"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}