In 1941 the noted German physicist Werner Heisenberg paid a visit to his mentor and friend Niels Bohr at the latter's home in occupied Denmark. The visit was brief, and resulted in a rift between the men that lasted until their deaths. Neither man ever said what took place between them, leading to decades of speculation among scientists and historians. Did Heisenberg try to warn Bohr about Nazi experiments in atomic energy? Was he trying to get information from Bohr about allied progress in this area? And what, if anything, did that meeting have to do with Germany's failure to even consider developing atomic weapons? Heisenberg was in charge of the program; did he deliberately sabotage it or did he simply fail to understand that the atomic bomb was possible?
If you think this would be great fodder for one of those literate, witty dramas that Tom Stoppard produces with such regularity, you'd be half right. Copenhagen, the Tony Award-winning drama based on that meeting, IS literate and witty. But the author isn't Tom Stoppard, but rather his fellow Briton Michael Frayn, best known for his comic novels and his light-speed farce Noises Off (now enjoying a massively successful revival on Broadway). So, while Copenhagen is chock full of psychological insight and offers a fascinating window into the usually obscure world of nuclear physics, it also offers rich comic moments, which flow logically out of Frayn's well-developed characters. As drama, Copenhagen is at once intellectually challenging and profoundly entertaining; the kind of play that benefits from repeated viewing
The Laguna Playhouse company that presented Copenhagen at the Edison Theatre this past Sunday and Monday [April 7 - 8, 2002] was fully up to the challenge presented by the script, even if there were occasional fumbled cues or inverted lines. As Heisenberg, Sean Arbuckle perfectly captured the character's anxiety and the conflict between his scientific enthusiasm and his discomfort at serving an evil regime. In contrast to William Brand the original London production, Arbuckle showed us the character's boundless energy more in retrospect than the present tense. It's an interesting choice and, as Heisenberg might say, "it works".
Substituting for William Cain, Ken Grantham was a convincing Niels Bohr, properly avuncular and stern one moment, warm and charming the next. He and Arbuckle carry the bulk of the play, orbiting around the circular stage and each other like electrons around a nucleus. Tanny McDonald rounded out this strong cast as Bohr's wife Margrethe, ultimately the most perceptive character, with a performance that was both graceful and steely.
In reducing Michael Blakemore's original "in the round" staging to proscenium dimensions, director Jennifer Uphoff Gray is occasionally forced to create some awkward stage pictures and we lose, to some extent, the image of the stage as atom, cyclotron and world globe, but that's a minor complaint. This was a strong production of a top-notch play and if the Repertory Theatre of St. Louis manages to get the rights for Copenhagen next season, I can strongly recommend that you see it.
Up next at the Edison: writer and raconteur David Sedaris at 8 PM on Friday, April 12th. Call 314-935-6543 for more information.