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The Rice Thresher
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Garret Merriam thresher staff
Written by British playwright Peter Shaffer (best known for his play Amadeus, the basis for the film that won the Oscar for Best Picture in 1984), Equus tells the story of unassuming 17-year-old Alan Strang, who inexplicably blinds six horses with a hoof pick one night. Alan comes under the care of Dr. Martin Dysart after being committed to a psychiatric hospital in a dissociative state, responding to questions only by singing commercial jingles. Dysart, an aging child psychiatrist who has begun to doubt the efficacy of his work, reluctantly takes the case and tries to reach the disturbed young man. Over the course of the play, Dysart slowly develops a relationship with Alan, coaxing him out of his shell and beginning to unravel his long-standing obsession with horses. Regressing through time in a series of flashbacks marvelously spliced into the present, Dysart reveals how Alan's childhood love of horses developed into an obsession. Dysart meets with the boy's parents and gradually uncovers a series of events contributing to Alan's obsession. His atheist father and devoutly religious mother create an environment of spiritual dissonance, hypocrisy and mixed messages concerning Alan's sexual development. When parental failings displace spiritual governance and sexual maturation, Alan comes to worship the horses as godlike creatures of mythic significance and raw erotic power. The story culminates as Dysart, while uncovering Alan's demons, discovers his own. Bored with his routine life of books and social norms, Dysart realizes he is just as "committed" to the mental institution as his patients. He grows to envy the vitality and intensity that characterize Alan's relationship with horses. Dysart proclaims, "I sit looking at pages of centaurs trampling the soil of Argos - and outside my window he is trying to become one in a Hampshire field!" Dysart becomes torn and wonders whether it is worth destroying the ecstasy and individuality that this infatuation endows in Alan for the sake of "normalizing" him to society's standards. As Dysart laments, "Passion . can be destroyed by a doctor. It cannot be created." The lead roles of Dysart and Alan are played magnificently by Alley veteran James Black and newcomer Ben Nordstrom. Black manages to present the subtle unraveling of Dysart's faith in his field, his self-consciousness and even reason itself while preserving the dignity expected of a psychiatrist. Nordstrom displays an impressive array of emotional states, from childlike wonder to pubescent rage and confusion, all orchestrated believably within the bounds of his character's developing neurosis. The most visually striking aspect of the play is the costuming of the horses. Actors don wire-framed horse heads and are elevated on nine-inch-high steel platform shoes, shaped to resemble hoofs and angled to induce the foreleg posture of a thoroughbred. Meticulous attention has been given to realism in the horses' movements to suggest the grace and power of the animals. The sets are mostly minimal, consisting primarily of chairs and benches. A slightly raised circular center stage demarcates the rooms. The largest part of the stage is occupied by two large balconies of on-stage audience seating. But what complexity the play lacks in setting, it more than makes up for with its remarkably affecting lighting. Through subtle shifts in intensity and hue, the lights are used to divide the simple stage into different settings. Surgical use of spotlighting allows for two events in different times and places to occur on the stage simultaneously. All in all, Stephen Rayne's direction of Equus yields a fantastic production of a provoking and engaging play.
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