Documente Academic
Documente Profesional
Documente Cultură
Vertigo Mystery
Theatre Season
Sponsor
403.221.3708
Production
Sponsor
Government
Funders
www.vertigotheatre.com
Media
Sponsor
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Credits Page
p.2
p.3
p.4
p.5
p.6
p.6
p.7
p.7
p.9
Pre-show Activities
The Victorian Era
The Who Meet Robert Louis Stevenson
Set Design Challenges
The Nature of Man
p.10
p.11
p.11
p.12
p.13
p.14
p.15
p.15
p.17
Post-show Activities
Sponsor Information
p.18
Teacher Evaluation
p.19
Vertigo Theatre operates out of Vertigo Theatre Centre and is located in the heart
of downtown at the Calgary Tower.
Housing two performing spaces, The Playhouse and The Studio, Vertigo Theatre
produces a mystery series (Vertigo Mystery Theatre) and presents theatre-foryoung-audience productions from across the country (Y Stage).
Elizabeth Jelkess character does not appear in the original story by Robert Louis
Stevenson. She is a chambermaid who develops a relationship with Mr. Hyde after he
pays off her family for knocking her young sister over in an alley. Hyde actually falls in
love with Elizabeth, showing one human aspect of his multi-faceted personality. She, in
turn, falls in love with him, despite her eventual discovery of his evil ways. Dr. Jekyll
begs her to stay away from Hyde; however, it is Jekyll she fears and runs from.
Dr. Lanyon is a colleague and friend to Dr. Jekyll even though he does not necessarily
agree with his friends scientific research. When Jekyll comes to him asking for
confidential advice about a patient (Hyde), Dr. Lanyon warns him that his patient sounds
mad and should be confined to an asylum since he sounds capable of harming himself
and others. Dr. Lanyon is the first to realize that Jekyll and Hyde are one.
Sir Danvers Carew is Chief Surgeon at the College of London Hospital. A pompous,
domineering man, there is no love lost between him and Dr. Henry Jekyll. When Jekyll is
incensed by Carews actions to dissect a young female murder victims body in a crude,
disrespectful manner in front of an entire class of surgical students, Hyde steals the
cadaver and replaced it with a freshly slaughtered pig. Jekyll describes Carew as, a
fraud and a sadist, a corrupt and evil man who disgraced the medical profession.
Poole is Dr. Jekylls butler, serving him faithfully and attempting to do a good job and be
efficient and loyal. Poole worries as Jekyll changes and becomes more and more
mysterious and reclusive.
Mr. O. F. Sanderson is the private detective Dr. Jekyll hires to follow Mr. Hyde. Since
he has been suffering from black outs during Hydes exploits, Jekyll wants Sanderson to
find out, Where he lives, where he banks, where youre apt to see him next emerge. I
want to know his movements, his affairs, friends. Those he meets are of particular
interest. Especially one individual. A woman. Jekyll is referring to Elizabeth, with
whom he is also quite taken.
Mr. Richard Enfield, a relation of Mr. Gabriel Utterson, witnesses Hyde knocking over
a young girl in the street and tells the puzzling story to his cousin. Hyde had given the
girl a cheque for twenty pounds for her trouble. Enfield noted that the cheque was signed
by Henry Jekyll, with whom they will be dining that evening.
What advice can you offer to young people who are interested in directing?
Hmmmm. Well first off as a director you should have a good base of knowledge about all
the aspects that are involved in creating a play. I think directors should try acting, try
designing, try stage-managing so that they have a better understanding of everyones job.
Its also really important to create an atmosphere of trust when you are rehearsing,
allowing everyone in the room to contribute and be part of the process. Directing isnt
telling people where to go, or how to act, or how to talk, its about guiding and enabling
artists to do their best work. If youre interested in directing take advantage of every
experience you have in the theatre to watch other directors watch what works and what
doesnt how do different actors respond to different approaches? Remember that its
okay to say I dont know the answer as long as you are willing to work collaboratively
to find the solution to the problem. Theatre is a team sport.
PRE-SHOW ACTIVITIES
The Victorian Era
The play, DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE is set in London, England in the year 1883.
The Victorian Era of the United Kingdom was the period of Queen Victorias reign from
June, 1837 until her death in January, 1901. Victoria reigned for 63 years and 216 days,
longer than any other British monarch. The era was a period of industrial, cultural,
political, scientific and military change within the United Kingdom. It was an extremely
diverse and complex period that could be considered the precursor of the modern era.
In order to become familiar with the world of the play, research some of the following
topics.
Arts and Culture
Literature
Entertainment
Technology
Engineering
Health and Medicine
Poverty and the Lower Class
Child Labour and Prostitution
The Emergence of the Middle Class
Clothing and Fashion
Darwin and his Theory of Evolution
The Industrial Revolution
Jack the Ripper
Keeping all these factors in mind, challenge students to come up with their own creative
versions of possible set designs that fulfill some or all of the necessary requirements.
The Nature of Man
In order to acquaint students with the language and one of the main themes in the play,
examine the following script excerpt from DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE between Dr.
Henry Jekyll and his lawyer/friend Mr. Gabriel Utterson. It begins with Jekyll railing
against Sir Danvers Carew, Chief Surgeon at the College of London Hospital and goes on
to reveal Jekylls tortured view of what he calls the nature of man.
JEKYLL
Sir Danvers. The fool! If he cant cut into it, he cant fathom it. He rails against
voodoo and savages, then stands before a hundred students and gives credence to all
manner of superstitious Utterson, I have seen in jungle clearings and island shores
levels of understanding advanced beyond anything contemplated in a college lecture
hall! I met a diviner in Suriname once who could calm his nerves by closing his eyes and
humming a birds song. A priest in a south seas hut who, with one draw of a pipe of
yellow smoke, left this reality for another plane, serene and at peace. There is a
distinction between the brain and the mind!
UTTERSON
Yes, but how do you get to the mind without going through the brain?
JEKYLL
You find an open door. One no one knows about. And once youve crossed its threshold,
you will find not one mind but two. Two streams within the consciousness, one on the
surface, the other subterranean. . . Think on your fear when a hansom cab comes
barreling round a corner, and you dash for safety faster than you thought possible.
Our minds are fueled by blood and bile and secretions triggered by all manner of stimuli.
Coursing through our veins is the river of our old ways, before man created morality, in
the time when human hunted for food, killed for dominance, and copulated for pleasure.
Morality harnassed our bestial instincts, but it did not kill them. If it had, thered be no
Empire. Theyre all still deep inside us. We see hints, though, in the madmans eyes, the
killers glint, the rage of the drunken father who beats his child. If we could find the
chemical balance that would isolate these rages, these horrors, wouldnt we pursue their
cure?
UTTERSON
Youre talking about good and evil.
JEKYLL
Im talking the nature of man.
UTTERSON
So you mix your powders, concoct your potions, banish ill-temper, anger, perversity
what do you put in its place?
JEKYLL
Serenity You dont know what peace of mind means until youve been tortured by its
opposite.
Ask students what the script excerpt means to them and whether they are able to simplify
the text into their own words. What is each characters position? Which character do
students agree or side with? Is there good and evil in us all? Do these qualities impact our
own lives on a daily basis, and, if so, how?
Ask students what the script excerpt means to them and whether they are able to simplify
the text into their own words. What is each characters position? Which character do
students agree or side with? Is there good and evil in us all? Do these qualities impact our
own lives on a daily basis, and, if so, how?
POST-SHOW ACTIVITIES
Good and Evil
Examine the following quotations about the nature of good and evil.
What can we know? What are we all? Poor silly half-brained things peering out at the
infinite, with the aspirations of angels and the instincts of beasts.
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle The Stark Munro Letters
Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a
monster. And when you look long into an abyss, the abyss also looks into you.
Frederick Nietzsche
All things truly wicked start from an innocence.
Ernest Hemmingway A Moveable Feast
There is no good and evil. There is only power, and those too weak to seek it.
Lord Voldemort Harry Potter and the Sorcerers Stone
Man is, on the whole, less good than he imagines himself or wants to be. Everyone
carries a shadow, and the less it is embodied in the individuals conscious life, the blacker
and denser it is.
C.G. Jung
Have students each select one of the above quotes and write a brief essay relating it to the
play, DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE. Encourage them to recall moments in the play that
best fit their interpretations of the meaning of the chosen quote. Ask students to also
decide whether they agree or disagree with what the quote means to them.
Dear Diary
In the play, DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE, some of the story and characters feelings
are expressed through diary entries.
A relation of mine, name of Enfield, we meet for dinner once, twice a year to discuss
legal business. On one of those occasions we decided to visit a friend after and somehow
allowed our conversation to take us from the route. A wrong turn, a narrow lane, and
suddenly we came upon a door.
Utterson
Why could I not tell them there is no soul? Tell them that and the word gets round I am
Jekyll the Agnostic, Jekyll the Atheist, the God Nay-Sayer. More fuel for the fire. More
ammunition for Sir Danvers Carew, the pornographer of death, the corrupt charlatan
who holds sway over idealistic young men who would be healers! And tomorrow morning
he wields his butcher blade again!
Jekyll
I went to see the fiend.
Elizabeth
I have instructed the servants that I may have to be away for a few days on business.
Jekyll
I came home by way of Regents Park. I dont know why, it was out of the way, but it was
Sunday, late in the afternoon, and I had spent Saturday with my mother and sister, as
always, and thats never pleasant, so perhaps I just wanted a bit of green and bird song
before I went back to Charing Cross. I stopped at a bench just off the path. And I saw
him.
Elizabeth
Previous entrythree days ago. I have lost three days. I do not know my self.
Jekyll
This shall be the last entry regarding the case of Mr. Edward Hyde. It is almost a full
year since the first successful manifestation. A year since the correct balance was found.
The perfect tincture capable of engendering both the transformation and its opposite.
Isolate the essence of the being, then reverse it back to its former state. Start the
blazethen put it out.
Jekyll
On the basis of what students remember about the story told in the play, ask them to
select one of the entries and expand upon it as if they were that character in those
circumstances. If none of the suggested diary entries interest some students, perhaps they
might create one of their own from the point of view of one of the characters in the play.
Adaptations
There have been countless adaptations of Robert Louis Stevensons novella, Strange
Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, first published in 1886. Some omit the character of the
lawyer, Gabriel Utterson, and tell the story from Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hydes point of view.
Often these are played by the same actor. Other adaptations include a romantic element
which does not exist in the original story. Vertigo Theatres production of Jeffrey
Hatchers version does include that element, embodied by the character of Elizabeth
Jelkes.
Some notable adaptations include:
- the 1941 American film which was a remake of a 1931 version and starred Spencer
Tracy, Ingrid Bergman and Lana Turner.
- the 1996 American film, Mary Reilly, starring Julia Roberts and John Malkovich, based
on the novel by the same name which was a reworking of Stevensons plot centred
around a maid in Jekylls household named Mary Reilly.
- the 1997 American musical, Jekyll and Hyde with music by Frank Wildhorn, book and
lyrics by Leslie Bricusse.
- the 2007 British TV series included a contemporary Jekyll whose Hyde wreaks havoc in
modern London.
Divide students into small groups. Their task is to come up with a pitch for a film,
television or stage version of the Jekyll and Hyde story. Each group must decide what
their project would be like. Some questions to answer might be:
- Will this be a period or modern-day piece?
- Where will it be set?
- In an ideal world, who would star?
- Would they keep the story the same, use it as a guideline for the script, or come up with
their own adaptation? What might that be?
- Would their version be a drama, comedy, or perhaps a spoof or animation?
Once all the groups have their ideas together, they can then take turns pitching their
project to the rest of the class, followed by a brief question and answer session.
Actor Homework
When working on a scene in any play, actors are challenged to do their own homework.
Some of the questions they need to ask themselves are:
- What does my character really want and why?
- How far will my character go to get what he/she wants?
- What does my character know or need to find out?
- What does my character say or not say and why?
- What is my character thinking and feeling from moment to moment in the scene?
In the play, DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE, the scene in which Jekyll goes to the
Charing Cross Hotel to meet Elizabeth Jelkes is a pivotal one. Here are a couple of
excerpts, minus the stage directions.
JEKYLL
Are you on duty all evening, Elizabeth?
ELIZABETH
No, sir, the other chambermaid comes on til morning.
JEKYLL
So do you have a room here you sleep in, or are you going forth tonight?
ELIZABETH
Sir, I am expected below. If I do not go below, the Housekeeper will come looking for me.
JEKYLL
You misunderstand me. My intentions. I have no designs, no impropriety of any sort. Ill
pay you.
ELIZABETH
Sir, I must - JEKYLL
NO!
JEKYLL
Do you have a husband?
ELIZABETH
No
JEKYLL
A gentleman friend, though, surely Yes I can see you do. Its him youre going to this
evening, isnt it? Does he wait for you?
ELIZABETH
I never make him wait.
JEKYLL
Does he threaten you if you dont do what he tells you?
ELIZABETH
Open the door
JEKYLL
Dont go to him tonight - ELIZABETH
Ill scream
JEKYLL
- - not tonight, I beg you!
He wont be there!
Hell never come again.
ELIZABETH
Who are you?
Ask students to prepare their actor homework for each character, beginning with why
Jekyll goes to the Charing Cross Hotel followed by answering the other questions
suggested in this activity as well as filling in any other details they are able to come up
with.
2010/11 SPONSORS
Sponsors
Beacon Martinizing
by Dan and The Gang
13
Evaluation Form
Your Feedback is very important to us! Our series are growing rapidly and the
information you provide will help us to determine future programming, booking
procedures and educational content. Return by fax to 403-263-1611
SHOW:
TEACHER NAME:
SCHOOL:
GRADE:
10 (excellent)
10
10
10
10