“My shadow’s the only one that walks beside me/My shallow heart’s the only thing that’s beating,” sang John Wesley ’07, playing Gregor, a giant bug. Green Day has never sounded more poignant. Estranged from his family, with no one to turn to but the play’s narrator, Wesley crawls under the covers and dies alone and miserable to the laughter of the audience of the ’92 Theater.
Willie Gould ’06 directed this adaptation of Kafka’s classic “The Metamorphosis,” setting i—or what has to be the first tim—to the music of Green Day. Kafka’s story tells the tale of a traveling salesman who wakes up in his house one day to find that he has turned into a giant bug. He then loses his job, the love of his family, and is imprisoned in his room until his untimely death. Luckily, in Gould’s adaptation the giant bug gains the companionship of the story’s narrator, Eric Wdowiak ’06. He and Gregor develop a great friendship throughout the show and Wdowiak’s character, who does not appear in Kafka’s story, becomes Gregor’s only link to the world outside his bedroom. Wdowiak often provided backup vocals and instrumentals during Gregor’s mournful songs, sometimes harmonizing with Gregor’s younger sister, played by Sylvie Deutsch ’09.
“What’s funnier than a guy dressed in a large bug suit? A guy in a large bug suit playing the guitar,” Gould said. “Everything we did in this play was for pure comedic value, and the prospects of a man-sized cockroach playing guitar while harmonizing with his younger sister was too good to pass up.”
Gould’s stage design consisted of a living room interior and an adjacent bedroom that we soon learn is Gregor’s. The front of the living room houses a keyboard Deutsch uses to lament the loss of her older brother by singing such classics as Green Day’s “Brain Stew.”
Chris White ’06 and Paul McElfresh ’06 both added a dose of comedic value as Gregor’s highstrung boss and father, respectively. The boss fired Gregor after seeing his new bug form, and plummeted the family into financial insecurity. McElfresh got into a fistfight with Gregor before sentencing him to imprisonment in his room. McElfresh was happiest at the end of the play after Gregor’s death, seeming to reclaim his role as the family’s Ward Cleaver.
Gregor’s bug costume was one of the main highlights of the show. Consisting of a giant plastic shell, brown pants, and carefully spiked hair, Wesley managed to look the part of a giant bug. The costume was constructed by Judith Klausner ’07.
“[Klausner] crafted an incredible bug suit,” Wesley said. “[It] allowed for unimpeded mobility and stood up to some serious abuse, including real apples being thrown at me by Paul McElfresh, many falls off a bed, tumbles, and general rough-housing inflicted on me by the rest of the cast and sometimes the director when he thought I needed help with character development.”
The entire cast seemed at ease on stage and had the audience laughing at a story that has often been interpreted to symbolize the wrongs of capitalism, the plight of the Jews, and many other weighty issues.
“Kafka thought that everyone else took himself and his work too seriously,” Gould said. “There are stories of Kafka reading ‘The Metamorphosis’ out loud and breaking down into laughter halfway through. You can’t write a story about a dude who turns into a giant bug without having a sense of humor. For that reason, I think that Kafka would have liked our interpretation of his story.”
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