Dickens and The Brutality of The Victorian Age

Subject: Dickens and The Brutality of The Victorian Age Wed Feb 24, 2010 1:41 am

Dickens Shows the Brutality of a Gentle Age

By DANIEL M. GOLD
February 17, 2010

FROM THE NEW YORK TIMES

“Hard Times” does not make many lists of Charles Dickens’s
best novels — it’s too preachy, too harsh in its vision of a society
that trades joy or individuality for materialism and mass production.
Yet, as the excellent Pearl Theater Company production that opened at
City Center on Sunday night shows, those very qualities make it well
suited to the stage.

Dickens draped his tale of Coketown, a fictional Victorian factory
city, with contempt for a wide range of societal ills: rampant
industrialization and pollution, worker exploitation and widening
income gaps, even England’s rigid divorce laws. In an adaptation that
is remarkable for how true it remains to the book, Stephen Jeffreys has
pared away much of the commentary, letting the critique emerge in the
actions and attitudes of characters as memorable as any in the Dickens
pantheon.

Chief among them is Josiah Bounderby (Bradford Cover), the ruthless
banker and factory owner, a “bully of humility” always preening. His
friend, Thomas Gradgrind (T. J. Edwards), a schoolmaster and supreme
“utilitarian,” insists that his students consume an endless diet of
facts, facts, facts — “nothing else will be of any service to them” —
with no regard for wonder or creativity.

Gradgrind raises his own children that way, and it leads them to
disaster. Louisa (Rachel Botchan) is married off to the much older
Bounderby — “What does it matter?” she asks listlessly — while Tom
(Sean McNall), who works in Bounderby’s bank, falls into drink and
debt. Among other plotlines, their paths cross that of the weaver
Stephen Blackpool (Mr. Edwards), a downtrodden “hand” at Bounderby’s
factory. What follows is vintage Dickens, with heart, humor and twists
that keep the audience engaged until the final resolution.
Originally produced in the 1980s, this version drew notice for its
leanness — four actors portrayed as many as 20 roles. But it’s more
than a trick: “Hard Times” is a microcosm of the bleak Coketown life.
Its small scale feels right.

Small, yes, but sleek. Directed with a sure command by J. R.
Sullivan, this production would delight any utilitarian: seamless and
well paced, “Hard Times” runs more than three hours yet never lags. Jo
Winiarski’s Spartan set is defined by its back wall of brick, dimmed by
smoke and ash, and its high glass panes, murky with soot. The costumes
by Devon Painter — well-worn top hats and suit jackets, bonnets and
petticoats — suggest the tired souls they clothe.

The Pearl, which first presented “Hard Times” in 1997, has swelled
the cast: six actors now play three or four roles each, as well as
provide narration. Mr. Cover makes Bounderby a memorable prig while
avoiding the cheap laugh; Mr. Edwards brings out Gradgrind’s integrity
as a loving father who changes his ways when he sees how miserable his
daughter has become. Ms. Botchan and Mr. McNall deliver solid
performances as the distressed siblings. Also of note are Jolly
Abraham, as the forever good-hearted Sissy Jupe, and Robin Leslie
Brown, who feasts on the comic role of Mrs. Sparsit, Bounderby’s
housekeeper.

In all, the production is an ensemble triumph. Among the other
virtues of “Hard Times,” we are reminded how less can often be more.