Commentary by Zach Dunkin
Welcoming the capacity Upperstage audience to the opening night of “The Mystery of Irma Vep: A Penny Dreadful,” Indiana Repertory Theatre artistic director Janet Allen declared: “It’s gonna be a wild night.”
And, man (or is it woman?), did Rob Johansen and Marcus Truschinski deliver on Allen’s proclamation. Strangers until rehearsals began prior Christmas, Johansen and Truschinski bonded like a pair of atoms in a chemical equation and the result is explosive. Their onstage chemistry was never more obvious than at the conclusion of their performance. With the audience standing and hooting its approval, the pair exchanged several “we-did-it!” looks and high-fives before exiting the stage with arms around each other’s shoulders.
Set in the parlor of an English estate and in an Egyptian tomb, Charles Ludham’s gender-bending romp is part satire, part comedy and part horror played by two men in seven roles. Truschinski portrays Lord Edgar, an Egyptologist who is still mourning the passing of his first wife, Irma Vep, and blames a werewolf for her death. The mustachioed Wisconsite also slips on a dress and wig to play the sinister housemaid Jane Twisden. Johansen, an Indy native and frequent IRT performer, also goes the AC/DC route, mostly as the entertaining Nicodemus Underwood, a peg-legged groundskeeper (and werewolf) and Lord Edgar’s second wife, Lady Enid.
For two hours the two men dashed in and out of three doors on scenic designer Tom Buderwitz house-built set, undergoing more than 30 quick-change costume transformations — some in less than 15 seconds – while delivering outrageous puns and asides in various voices and tortured accents at a break-neck pace. There were squeals of horror, outrageous physical comedy, ad libs and a contemporary update to the script – an uproarious rendition of Taylor Swift’s “Shake it Off.”
And, what only could be expected in the frenzy, there was a “wardrobe malfunction” that had Johansen nearly breaking out of character. It happened in the second act when Lord Edgar was on an expedition in Egypt being led by guide Alcazar, played by Johansen. When the sole of Edgar’s boot became loose, Truschinski magnified the issue by pacing about the stage with the sole flapping loudly, causing Johansen to nearly lose it. In the next scene, Truschinski returned with the sole intact. Ah, the magic of electrical tape.
In another scene in the second act, Johansen’s character was “dying” on the chaise lounge. As he was falling over backwards on the chaise, Johansen noticed an audience member leaning over to tie his shoes and ad libbed, “I’m dying here, and you’re tying your damn shoe!” It brought the house down.
Audiences should expect more surprises and “wild nights” from this high-energy twosome as the production evolves on the Upperstage through Feb. 14.
