The Great Divide: Fighting
Big Energy, now and then
The process of Hydraulic
Fracturing, or “fracking” — extracting gas or
petroleum from rock layers by boring deeply underground and pumping
water, sand and other chemicals into fissures — is making
news headlines. It also forms the vortex of "The Great Divide”
an adaptation of Henrik Ibsen’s “Enemy of the People”
produced by Berkeley’s Shotgun Players. Below, Lou Fancher
reviews the play, and Adam Tolbert interviews the play’s
playwright, Adam Chanzit.
Playwright Henrik Ibsen’s
Dr. Thomas Stockmann was an “enemy of the people”,
a medical man who in 1882 discovered tainted water in his small
Norwegian village’s popular medicinal baths. Transposed
to the 21st century by playwright Adam Chanzit, a female doctor,
hellbent on revealing water contamination in her Colorado town,
bears the same mantle in Shotgun Players’ production of
Chanzit’s “The Great Divide”, where truth’s
bony finger is pointed at the energy industry.
Doctor Katherine Stockmann,
played with impressive command by Heather Robison, is a medical
vigilante. Prone to protect and protest in support of disadvantaged
populations across the globe, she has mired herself and her family
in trouble. Escape comes in the form of a fragile homecoming.
Stockmann’s brother,
Peter (Scott Phillips), is mayor of the struggling Colorado town
to which she returns with husband and two children in tow. The
community has only recently been made flush by an infusion of
cash from a large natural-gas company.
If there’s no army
behind Stockmann, who battles journalists, town councilmembers,
and her own maternal instincts after discovering contaminants
in the town’s water, “The Great Divide” makes
clear the vast array of forces behind the energy industry’s
giants.
Whether facing the tight
grin and even tighter grip Phillips applies to his role as the
gas company’s enthused advocate or the elder in the Stockman
family, the grandmother/mother portrayed elegantly and laced with
delicious, lethal intent by Michaela Greeley, the great divide
is heavily weighted against the good doctor’s efforts.
Director Mina Morita wastes
no time raising the curtain on the play’s internal debate.
In fact, if there’s a flaw in the production, it’s
the force applied to pound home the message that fracking is releasing
more than just petroleum. It’s not a simple thing to address
weighty environmental hazards without wielding too heavy a hand,
and Morita finds better balance in the play’s second half.
Here, the nonchalance of
actor Joe Estlack’s Brent has simmered long enough to carry
a stench. And Hovstad (Ryan Tasker), the journalist turned flip-flop-artist
after his pursuit of the truth causes him to reverse positions,
has stiff-necked his way through the arguments on either side,
causing viewers to think, “Enough!” The explosion
at the end of Act I is the perfect incendiary for the casts’
high voltage delivery and near total disintegration in Act II.
Martin Flynn’s graphic
sets and the production’s sigh-themed sound design are used
to great effect. As always with Shotgun Players, economy is the
perfect editor and simple, straight-backed chairs become symbols,
tools, adornments and even musical accompaniment.
“The Great Divide”
ends without resolving the turmoil or answering the questions
it raises. Appropriately, the shreds it leaves behind —
a community divided, impoverished, floundering to recover—
resonate more than a tidy bundling of the characters’ futures.
Interview with playwright
Adam Chanzit by Adam Tolbert
Why were you drawn to this project?
Ibsen’s “Enemy of the People” is a compelling
and problematic play for today’s audience. On the one hand,
its central conflict of truth versus economic interest has become
so familiar as to feel dated. And yet it always seems prescient,
relevant for each generation.
Having growing up in Denver,
I was familiar with hydraulic fracturing and thought the situation
could easily parallel “Enemy” but also complicate
it in useful ways. In Ibsen, the tourists who visit the new spa
in town would be the ones to suffer. In “The Great Divide”,
the ill are local homeowners. Thus prosperity and illness are
intertwined. The answers aren’t easy: industry transforms
families, relationships, a whole structure of life – for
better and worse.
It was also exciting to
have the chance to work with Mina Morita and the Shotgun Players,
a daring company that encourages large-cast, epic work.
How did you wrestle with
Henrik Ibsen’s original text?
Ibsen and I had a rocky relationship that changed over the course
of the process. At the outset, it was infatuation. I read the
original over and over. I’d look at different translations
and speak them out loud in my room.
Then when Shotgun did a
reading of the earliest draft of “The Great Divide,”
we all felt it remained too close to the Ibsen. The play yearned
for a life of its own and so, gradually, I kept Ibsen farther
and farther from my desk. I had to listen to the new characters,
the new material trying to be born. Though Ibsen is classic, you
just can’t be too reverent. You have to listen to what’s
in front of you.
What were the most challenging
aspects of this process?
The subject matter of hydraulic fracturing and the weight of “Enemy
of the People” proved a real challenge. A lot of heavy (and
multi-syllabic) information needs to come out to drive the plot.
Plus in “Enemy”, the characters can feel like spokespeople
for ideas. So crafting emotionally compelling and complex characters
was trickier than usual. Ironically, with the stakes so high in
the play, I also found it hard to use much of the dark and irreverent
humor I enjoy writing.
Ultimately, while the intertwining
of the personal and the political was the most challenging aspect,
I believe the moments when they’re in perfect balance are
thrilling to watch.
What were your favorite
aspects of this process?
It’s been an honor and privilege to work with director Mina
Morita. She’s been heavily involved from day one, suggesting
ideas and giving insight. And the folks at Shotgun Players helped
organize workshops so we could hear drafts with actors.
I also thoroughly enjoyed
my trips to Western Colorado. I went during periods of boom as
well as bust. I tried to go with an open mind, but I had preconceptions
and most of them were bunk. During interviews, I could feel my
own belief systems shifting.
What do you want audiences
to come away with after seeing “The Great Divide”?
First, I hope it’s an entertaining, provocative, and emotionally
resonant night of theater. I also hope audience sympathy shifts
over the course of the show and perhaps lands for a moment on
an unexpected character or a new train of thought.
