Stage Production of "Minority Report" in Nottingham

A Nottingham Playhouse, Birmingham Rep and Lyric Hammersmith Theatre Co-Production In Association with Simon Friend Entertainment and by arrangement with Electric Shepherd Productions are staging a production of PKD's short story, "Minority Report." Check out the website here. 

Looks like they've tweaked the story a bit:

"In 2050, neuroscientist Dame Julia Anderton is about to launch the next phase of her pioneering Pre-Crime programme, detaining people for crimes before they are committed. But when Julia is accused of pre-murder, she’s in a race against time to save herself from her own system."

Sounds promising.. 

"Minority Report sees award-winning director Max Webster re-united with the producers of the globally successful stage version of Life of Pi (‘It will make you believe in theatre. A triumph’ The Sunday Times). This incredible theatrical experience creates a world at the borders of science fiction and reality."

Webster also staged a production of "Back to the Future" last year. 

There's a Financial Times write up, but it's behind a paywall. So I grabbed that shot above and here are some quotes:

“What’s brilliant about the Philip K Dick story is it’s got a psychological conundrum in the centre of it,” says Webster. “But it’s not a philosophical exercise or lecture; it’s a crime thriller. It’s a person who’s caught by their own system and then is on the run.”

This next one is a great quote: 

“The wildness and extremeness that sci-fi allows you to think about possible futures might actually be a good match for the kind of extremity of the times in which we find ourselves.”

The final quote comes from writer David Haig: 

"Haig’s Minority Report touches on this 'deprivation of free will, free choice, free thought', he says. 'The fear of a dystopian society controlling our minds is a very powerful one. I think there’s always room for material that projects into the future to comment on the present.”

I think the reason mind-controlling dystopian futures are so common in science fiction is that they express an anxiety that we are currently under the control of a beyond saturated media society that not only feeds us an endless series of things to purchase, but also the necessary mindset of passive consumption (which of course has to simultaneously perceive itself as vital and necessary). 

The play runs February 16 to March 9 at Nottingham Playhouse, nottinghamplayhouse.co.uk, then touring to the Birmingham Repertory Theatre (March 22-April 6) and the Lyric Hammersmith (April 19-May 18), London. 

Tip o' the hat to star Dick-student Al Berg! 

New York Times Reviews Androids Stage Adaptation

There was an interesting review of the staged adaptation of Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? in Dec 3rd's New York Times - usually a very trustworthy source. Here's the line that should indicate to readers that this writer has no idea what he's talking about:

"Ridley Scott’s 1982 “Blade Runner” is a stylish action movie starring Harrison Ford as Deckard, a bounty hunter in pursuit of coolly attractive androids. Philip K. Dick’s “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?,” the 1968 book it’s based on, is a very different novel of ideas, at its essence about an unhappily married man." The emphasis is mine, the knumbskullery is all theirs.

If that didn't dissuade you from reading the review, go here.

What to Expect From the Androids Onstage

As you regulars know, there is currently a stage adaptation of Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? Alas, I have not been able to procure transit to the New York area, and in these troubled economic times no funding seems forthcoming. Luckily, reader Mark Rowe has generously offered an account of his experience seeing the play. Without further ado, here's Mark:

"I went to see it Saturday and thought I'd fill you in in case no one else had.

[SPOILERS AHEAD!!]

I've read the book twice and its been a year or so since the last time so some of my details on the book may be sketchy. The play is significantly closer to the book than Blade Runner, however does definitely veer from it.

The play opens with Luna (not Luba) Luft singing. While I did really like the play the music was way out there and I did not dig it.

Luna Luft is the primary android in the play. Roy Batty and Pris are in there as well but 'Luna' is the primary concern. Her being a celebrity also becomes a factor. She is seen singing on a number of occasions on the Buster Friendly show. She sings 'Mercer hymns', which I don't recall from the book. [and which is kind of weird since Buster is dedicated to Mercerism's undoing -ed]

Then the scene turns to Deckard, upset after just killing his electric sheep. I don't think he really gave a reason for killing it. He and his wife talk about the emotions they've dialed (with little gadgets around their heads). He calls Isidore at the Happy Dog Pet Shop and they talk prices for a real animal. And Bryant calls Deckard about the androids. They also have a version of the empathy box, where they open a large door with a screen on the front of it - so when they're inside you can see the actor along with projections of Mercer being stoned, walking with a tattered bloody shirt (the actor pretends to be dodging stones left and right).

Bryant has Deckard meet Rachel, Tyrell Corp is called Rosen Corp in the play. I think she said her father was Jeffery Rosen. She mentions her uncle Eldon Tyrell but they eliminate him as a character. Deckard gives her the Voigt Kampf test and asks the same questions regarding boiled dog, the poster of the naked lady etc...

I may be forgetting the order of things... But I think next was Isidore Pris meeting at JR's apartment. He talks about being a chickenhead and about all the androids being created on Mars - the media says "Everything's better on mars" but Pris says otherwise... at some point she gives herself away (fairly easily) as being an android. OH! and Pris is played by the same actress as Rachel. (I had hoped they'd come out with twin actresses towards the end but alas).

Deckard goes to meet Luna Luft (does not pretend to be someone else); he tries to give her the test but she distracts him and calls a cop (Bryant) and Bryant sends Phillipa Ryan. I was trying to recall the name Phillipa Ryan from the book but i couldn't find anything online...[sounds like a feminization of Phil Resch to me - ed]. I don't have my copy of the book readily available to flip through. She is the cop who arrests Deckard from Luna Luft's dressing room. She takes Deckard back to Bryant's office... Bryant says she's an andy and wants Deckard to kill her....[not in the book] in a standoff Bryant is killed and Phillipa reveals Bryant to be the android... There was also a blood test to prove who is and who isn't an android. I didn't recall that one in the book either. [That's the boneli test which can be performed only after the man/machine is dead]."

So at the point Bryant is revealed as an android - I'm hooked. But Luna Luft's singing keeps returning and that puts me off (even though her voice wasn't bad). So Isidore and Pris finally meet Roy Baty. Deckard kills Luna Luft whilst she is singing on TV, seemingly out of revenge for having gotten away from him the first time. Deckard's motive - while still regarding the $3k and his live animal is less driven by the 'law' with Bryant gone.

Buster Friendly is played by an actor (always while actually doing the show in studio with a camera). The fact that he kills her while on TV is made a big deal... Deckard is turned into a villian of sorts (a minor subplot) after killing everyone's favorite singer.

Deckard and Rachel meet up again and Rachel offers him money to kill Baty. There were a few 'fake' plot twists here and there that I can't recall - but something Rachel said to Deckard - which I can't completely remember - ended up not having anything to do with the actual plot. Another was when Pris I think mentioned Luna Luft to Isidore saying "I heard there are three (andys) of her around." Which wasn't true.

Deckard goes to Isidore's apt and finds Baty. Rachel also turns up. Baty and Rachel talk about a revolution and I'm sketchy on the details of the conversation, but it was as if Rachel was trying to fake out Baty ...Rachel then kills Baty.

There was another scene where Deckard comes back to kill Pris but Pris comes out dressed as Rachel (played by the same actress). He ends up killing Pris and is now distraught by having to do so. A kiss between Deckard and Rachel earlier in the play takes the place of their relationship and signifies the empathy Deckard has for the androids.

Deckard goes into Isidore's empathy box and two weeks later comes out of the empathy box at his home with a real turtle. Once his wife sees he's alive they talk about Mercerism a bit and wrap up the plot. Buster Friendly revealed Mercer to be an actor (I'm going out of order here sorry this was earlier). At the end Deckard's wife says Buster Friendly presented android parts belonging to Deckard, telling the world that Luna Luft's killer was Deckard, an andy. So Deckard is off the hook.

All in all I really liked it - there was some dialogue that hit you over the head a little hard regarding empathy and the book's message. But I loved seeing it presented on stage. My wife enjoyed it as well and she won't read an entire PKD novel (I've tried to get her to)."

Thanks Mark! This certainly sounds interesting, and no I'm not being evasive at all.
All you NYC locals, keep us posted!
I found this slide-show on the production company's website. Check it out.

Interview with Androids Stage Director

Tor.com has posted an interview with Edward Einhorn, the director of the stage adaptation of Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? currently running in New York City. In a recent post I may have hinted that the producers of this were on a different page, what with the mock 'Save the Androids Fundraiser', but even a cursory glance at this interview reveals that Einhorn has zeroed in on the book's central theme. Here's an important excerpt:

DB: What drew you to Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? And what inspired you to adapt it for the stage?

EE: I read the book after I had already seen Blade Runner, and I was struck by how different it was—and to my mind, better. The thing that intrigued me about it was Mercerism, empathy, and their relationship to the symbol of the electric sheep—none of which appeared in the movie at all. The movie is of course an entity in itself, and groundbreaking in its own way, but it didn’t capture the heart of what the book said to me.

Then I read about one of Dick’s inspirations—he had read a Nazi journal in which an SS officer complained about not being able to sleep because the crying of the children in the concentration camps kept him awake. Instead of empathizing with the suffering of the children, the officer only saw them as a nuisance that disturbed his sleep. Dick started thinking of people who lacked any sort of empathy as androids. To me, the book is all about how the process of war and killing (or being enslaved) makes people into androids, and Mercerism is all about resurrecting that spirit inside. Deckard is a character who is losing his own humanity because of his job.

This theme seemed to resonate perfectly with our mission, which as I said, is to be a Theater of Ideas. It also reminded me of Ionesco’s Rhinoceros, which I staged some years ago. During World War II, as Ionesco saw fellow colleagues succumb to anti-Semitism, he started envisioning those people as rhinoceroses, losing their humanity to a herd instinct. That connection made Do Androids Dream… seem all the more perfect material for us."

Make sure to read the rest here.

I talk about that concentration camp journal too, where does PKD discuss that, is it mentioned in Sutin?

Stay tuned, in the coming days we will have a sort of a preview/review of the show written by one of our faithful readers!

Save the Androids Fundraiser

Pictured: "Deckard Retires Polokov" by Mark G Taber

I got this email today from the folks putting on the stage production of Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?. There was no plane ticket enclosed for me - sad. But of course I understand in these troubled times just putting on a show can tap anybody out - just ask Meg Whitman.

Anyhoo, the press release is about a fundraiser and reads, in part:

"UNTITLED THEATER COMPANY #61 TO HOST FUNDRAISER
TO FREE ANDROID SLAVES ON MARS

...

On December 4th, 2010 Untitled Theater Company #61 (UTC61) will host a benefit for the Free the Androids movement, a movement devoted to the plight of the enslaved androids on Mars. UTC61’s current production of Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, a stage adaption of the Philip K Dick novel, which runs at 3-Legged Dog November 18th through December 12th was the inspiration for the fundraiser. Proceeds may also be used to help benefit the theater company.
When asked what first led him to consider the plight of artificial intelligence, Artistic Director Edward Einhorn said, “The more I dug into the material, the more aware I became of the plight of androids on Mars. We on Earth know only those androids who have escaped and gone rogue--driven rogue, I should say, by their enslavement. Mercer teaches us empathy for sheep, but what of electric sheep? What of electric humans? Empathy should extend to all.” When asked to comment on the rumor that Buster Friendly himself would leave his studio to appear at the event, Einhorn declined to respond but did note that “This will be a bounty hunter free zone. Androids can feel free to attend with an assurance of their own safety." All androids and sympathizers are welcome to come dressed for the occasion."

Are other readers getting the distinct impression these guys aren't exactly on the same page? I mean, yes, the androids in the novel tug occasionally at the heart strings, but should we, as future humans, be spending our hard-earned status rations on saving these guys and gals? We suddenly find ourselves awash in the complexity and moral ambiguity of Dick's novel. Sure the androids got it bad, but Deckard's got it worse. I mean really, the fundraiser ought to be raising money to pay for Deckard's future therapy. After realizing "the electric things have their lives, too," surely Deckard will need to spend some serious couch time coming to grips with all the andys he's retired in the past.

What good are these funds raised for the androids? Are you going to buy the robot slaves from their masters and set them free to amputate spider legs from the Shoulder of Orion to Tannhauser Gate? Seems like a bad idea.

Even though this staged production is supposed to be more faithful to the book than the cinematic adaptation Blade Runner, these folks seem to be inverting the book's moral much the way Ridley Scott changed the film to reflect his optimism about robots (rather than Dick's cynicism about humanity). Sure, the androids are victims. Of course Rosen/Tyrell are selfish capitalists, blind to the plight of their creations (symbolized brilliantly in the film by Tyrell's thick glasses), but the novel is not, for instance, a civil-rights novel like Invisible Man (it is that, in part, but more). The goal of the novel is not just to identify with the robotic otherness of the androids, but to see the way using something's 'otherness' to justify an action erodes our humanity. Part of the subtle irony of the novel is that the androids serve to illustrate Deckard's apathy, his lack of empathy, rather than telling us anything about the nature of artificial intelligence. Instead of focusing on the victimization of the slave, the novel explores the dehumanizing effect of being a master.

Don't get me wrong. I think this stage production looks interesting. We should feel sorry for the androids. They are pathetic. But Deckard's pathos is worse; his moral identity was forged in the fires of an apathetic culture and his dehumanization is worse, for he was, once, human.

Exit Dreaming Androids, Stage Left

Our old friend anonymous dropped this bombshell of a link in our comments section the other day. A theatrical production of Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? Looks like this'll have about a three-week run in New York from November 18th to December 11. Dear production people, you should fly me out for this. I could probably get you some good press. Hopefully, if you're in the New York area, you can check this out, and write it up for us not privileged to live in the center of the free world.

From the production's website:

An adaptation of Philip K. Dick's sci-fi classic about androids and a bounty hunter, Rick Deckard, who loves them/loves to kill them. The book inspired the film Blade Runner, but this adaptation returns to the original novel's ideas about a post-apocalyptic world seeking resurrection through the rediscovery of empathy. The production uses innovative video techniques to blur the lines between humanity and technology, finding the soul within the machine..

'800 Words' Hyped in Minnesota Star Tribune

Interesting article here, about playwright Victoria Stewart's 80o Words: The Transmigration of Philip K Dick, a play about the writer's 'mystical experiences.' Steward says, ""I was interested in how that religious experience made his life branch off into a new direction."

My favorite quote from the article is Stewart's who gives me hope. She's asked, "Is this crazy stuff?" (note to reporter Graydon Royce: the probity of your question is only surpassed by your specificity!). To which, she responds, "I wouldn't be surprised if in 50-plus years, we don't find that he wasn't so crazy. His understanding of quantum physics and being in someone else's dream, someone else's mind, may not be so far-fetched. So I'm slowly becoming convinced of his theories as I play the part."

The play is playing this weekend in Minneapolis. If you're a reader and live in the area, how about checking the play out, and then telling us what you thought?

More info here.

Pictured below the cast from 800 Words.