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ing up to Henry James, the subtle illuminator of sensibilities. It happens in “Signs of Life” by Canadian playwright Joan Schenkar, now in a Department of Dramatic Arts production at Durham Studio Theater on the UC campus. 

In the lobby you’re greeted by a bearded lady and a prankish ringmaster, and when you take your seat, two contortionists in tights stretch and preen, while you wait for the show to begin on Richard Olmsted’s set, decorated with a striped awning and posters for “human oddities.” 

Clearly you’re at some sort of circus, and it turns out that the human oddities that were once the highlight of sideshows are the subject at hand, two in particular: Jane Merritt, better known in the latter half of the 19th century as “The Elephant Woman” because of her grotesque physical deformities, exploited by P.T. Barnum in his American Museum; and Alice James – Henry James’s brilliant but bedridden sister. 

In the course of the evening both women are referred to as “freaks.” The play’s theme is the 19th century’s appalling attitude toward the different or deformed, especially women. 

The play takes the form of a garish vaudeville, starring the comedy duo of Dr. Simon Sloper and Henry James, a pair of prigs in gaudy vests and scarlet spats, clinking teacups to “the ladies” whom they respect only if they look nice and stay in their places. No ugliness or independent thought, please. The stage behind these elegant louts is divided into two bedrooms. The right belongs to the physically suffering Jane Merritt, who can’t sleep lying down because the weight of her head would “snap her windpipe” and the left to the self-dramatizing Alice James, with her feverish attraction to razors and knives. “What a performer she would have made,” her brother unhappily cries. 

The women are connected by Dr. Sloper, who treats them both. He’s portrayed as a boyish Nazi, gleefully ministering to his patients in order to serve “Mother Science.” In the meantime, they suffer and writhe. Harassed by her brother, Alice seeks comfort in the arms of a friend, Katherine Loring, who betrays her. Jane is abandoned to a workhouse, where she’s forced to attend “freak class” to teach her how to beg. Later P.T. Barnum wrinkles his nose at her. “You smell like you look,” he sneers. 

All this is punctuated by an octet of sideshow weirdoes, who twitch and ape and cavort, at one moment piling up to transform themselves into a giant pachyderm. 

Directors Kristina Hagstrom and Laura Levin orchestrate all this with skill and imagination, but they can’t quite forge the play’s over-the-top mechanics into a convincing vehicle for ideas. Wendy Sparks’ costumes are witty, and the young cast performs with vigor and will, but the result is a little strident. What can you do with a play that dresses up already obvious ironies in baggy pants? The audience grows tired of being told to “get it,” and some of the evening’s best scenes are quiet ones, that allow us into the suffering souls of the mistreated women who are at its heart. 

Still, there’s enough spunk and energy to make “Signs of Life” worth a visit. Jonathan Whittle-Utter and Anthony Nemirovsky portray Sloper and James, Marc Abernathy is P.T. Barnum, and Linda Blanchet and Nicole DuPort are Jane and Alice. Susannah Flood is Jane’s mother, Katherine McLeod is Katherine, Alex Teicheira is the workhouse warden, and Michelle Bonanno, Holly Chou, Trevor Claiborne, Amy Hattemer, Vanessa Rennard, Adeola Role, David Ross, and Todd Scheiperpeter comprise an agile ensemble.