January 31, 2013

Perhaps it is doubt we fear most of all. There is security in believing we’re on the right side, that we’ve discovered the truth.

“How the World Began,” the present showing at the Milwaukee Rep’s Steimke Studio, echoes the issue argued in the famous Scopes trial in Tennessee in 1925. Is evolution a valid explanation for the world’s beginning? Are religion and science compatible subjects? One would think we’d have these problems resolved by now, but the argument still rages in some school systems almost a century later.

The play begins as a student is questioning his biology teacher about a statement she made in class, apparently using the word “gobbledegook” to refer to theories that rely solely on religion for an explanation of how the world began.

Ms. Susan, a displaced, pregnant teacher from New York, is about to suffer severe culture shock as she arrives in Plainfield, Kan., to teach in a makeshift school after a tornado. Her student, Micah, a troubled teenager and his guardian, Gene Dinkel, who is temporarily raising him after Micah’s loss of his family, are the only other characters in the play, but in a sense, the whole town becomes another character as they protest again Susan and her supposed heretical teachings.

Playwright Catherine Trieschmann has created three complex, thoroughly human characters. Even though they have very strong, distinct points of view and won’t budge in their stances, they all engage our sympathies.  Each character conflicts with the other two, but they also have some respect and caring for each other, as well, which leaves us feeling in the end that perhaps with a little more personal humility and attentiveness to others’ points of view, we may learn to live together in peace or, at the very least, in tolerance.

The three actors in the cast are all well-suited for their roles. Ben Charles and Marty Lodge are both making their debut at The Rep. 

Charles as the young, anxiety-ridden Micah, conveys his anguish very convincingly. He is angry, frightened and feels isolated. He needs someone to help him work through this mishmash of emotions but can find no one. Both his guardian and his teacher care about him, but he is too blind to see it. Instead, he lashes out in the ignorance of self-righteousness and the loneliness of despair. Even the God he believes in is a vengeful one. Charles conveys Micah’s turmoil convincingly.

Dinkel, his temporary father, tries to support him according to his own lights, but fails. Lodge creates a very believable Dinkel. We’ve all met men like Dinkel - good men, hardworking, but rigid and simplistic in their thinking.  He and Susan could probably get along if they kept their conversations superficial.

Deborah Staples, with her usual inimitable skills, gives us an edgy, dedicated teacher who is dealing with her own issues, when she is suddenly thrown into a totally foreign environment, one which soon proves hostile and unforgiving. We agonize with the challenges she faces both professionally and personally.

No one wins here. Escape is the only route when every other passage is blocked. But there is that glimmer of hope as the play ends. Each character has been affected by the other two, and perhaps, in time, will move a tad toward accepting the other’s stance. Change comes slowly, but it does sometimes come. And another new life will soon join the mix, and how that person will view the world is another unknown.