A SEARCH FOR MEANING BROUGHT
TO GLORIOUS LIFE BY A PUPPET
Based on the Booker-prize winning novel by Nobel-laureate South African J.M. Coetzee and adapted and directed by Lara Foot in collaboration with Handspring Puppet Company, Life and Times of Michael K tells a simple story: a man born with a cleft lip who was rejected by his mother and the world around him attempts to fulfill his mother’s dying wish to return to the isolated farm where she was born. Michael, who has been working as a gardener and landscaper in a Cape Town park, leaves his job to make the journey with his mother Anna, but obtaining the travel permits that would allow train tickets will take too long, given Anna’s failing health. He constructs a make-shift cart; he plans to make the trip on foot, pushing his mother himself.
The journey through a war-torn land is arduous. Michael and his mother face exhaustion, assault, and robbery. His mother does not survive, but after her death Michael K continues his pilgrimage, overcoming numerous obstacles to bring his mother’s ashes to the farm.
The story is told against the backdrop of a predominantly gray set (Patrick Curtis) that evokes a world of violence in the cracked façade of a generic building. Movable props become bus seats, a bureaucrat’s desk, a bed, and numerous other bits of furniture as needed. An impressive water pump designed to operate by wind power is wheeled onto the stage, an essential piece of equipment for Michael K’s effort to irrigate his garden once he arrives at the farm.
But most important to making this stage adaptation so affecting are Handspring’s remarkable puppets and their handling by the members of the predominantly South African Baxter Theatre Center crew. Realistic movements of the skillfully designed near-human-sized puppets keep our attention on them and away from the puppeteers and human actors who manipulate and voice them (Craig Leo, Roshina Ratnam, Markus Schabbing; Faniswa Yisa, Carlo Daniels, Billy Langa, Nolufefe Ntshuntshe).
Despite their unchanging facial expressions, puppets Michael K and Anna K convey a range of human emotions and reactions through the subtle positioning of their bodies, limbs, and heads. A goat and three children are also depicted with puppets, while human actors (Andrew Buckland, Sandra Prinsloo as well as those previously listed) fill the roles of bureaucrats, police, soldiers, prisoners, a nurse, and a landowner. Projections offer close-ups of Michael and Anna’s puppet faces—unchanging, yet so well designed that they seem to express myriad feelings of loss and triumph.
The marvel of Michael K’s story is that he finds beauty and contentment in the midst of tragedy, oppression, and injustice. The story does not end with his arrival at the now-deserted farm and the scattering of his mother’s ashes. Michael continues his quest for meaning and connection despite further challenges. It’s not a happy story, and yet what might be painful to watch becomes an aesthetically fascinating experience.
One of the most beautiful scenes is one in which a hungry Michael K attempts to capture a goat by drowning it. Along with human cast members rhythmically moving pieces of the set to suggest moving water, puppets Michael K and the goat bob and sway across the perfectly dry stage to mimic the motion of swirling waters.
Music and sound (Kyle Sheperd, composer; Simon Kohler, sound design) range from ominous electronic tones to beautiful choral melodies to further carry the emotional weight of the story.
Michael K is alone through much of his tale, and most of the other characters treat him badly, yet the presence of the puppeteers and actors who surround him suggests otherwise. There is nothing in the play to evoke a divine being—too many bad things happen to Michael to make that plausible—but the actors who support Michael imply sources of strength that allow him to transcend the limitations and suffering of his physical being.
Like all of us, he is more than his body with its requirements and imperfections. In the midst of hunger and danger, of thwarted plans and disappointments, perhaps, in fact, because of these challenges, Michael K ultimately finds meaning—meaning that is effectively conveyed through the artistry of these puppets and those who bring them to the stage.
photos by Fiona McPherson and Richard Termine
Life & Times of Michael K
Handspring Puppet Company and Cape Town’s Baxter Theatre
Emerson Paramount Center
Robert J. Orchard Stage, 559 Washington Street in Boston
115 minutes, no intermission (ages 12+ recommended)
ends on February 09, 2025
for tickets, visit Emerson
for more shows, visit Theatre in Boston
