Stranger Than Truth & Fiction

Louis De Rougemont, as Wikipedia tells us, was really Henri Louis Grin. Both Grin and De Rougemont were born in 1847 near Paris, both left home at the age of 16. While Grin's existence was one marred by failure--in career, relationships, finance, reputaton...well, you name it--De Rougemont's life was the stuff of which dreams are made of.

These dreams take form on stage in Pulitzer Prize winning playwright Donald Margulies' work, "Shipwrecked!  An Entertainment. The Amazing Adventures of Louis De Rougemont (As Told By Himself)" as Baltimore's Everyman Theatre opens its 20th anniversary season.

"Shipwrecked!" once more pairs actors Bruce R. Nelson and Clinton Brandhagen who thoroughly delighted audiences last season in "The Mystery of Irma Vep" of which "Shipwrecked!" is somewhat reminiscent in its frenetic pace and comic energy.  As in "Mystery," Brandhagen plays multiple roles, from a London pickpocket to an Aborigine tribal leader to an Australian miner to, what was certainly the audience's favorite, Louis' faithful canine companion, Bruno...oh, and Queen Victoria, too.

Nelson undergoes no vaudevillian "quick changes" this time, however. In the lead role of De Rougemont, Nelson (with a little audio-visual slide-show accompaniment) takes us through his days as a "pasty, sickly child" to teenager-out-to-win-the-world, to sailor to shipwrecked island denizen a la Tom Hanks in "Cast Away." "Shipwrecked!" also features a third actor, the diversely talented Tuyet Thi Pham.

It is no small feat for a diminutive young Asian woman to convincingly play an old, domineering, pearl-lusting ship captain, but Ms. Thi Pham handily accomplishes this, and much more, also playing the Aborigine woman who falls in love and marries Louis; Louis' mother; another Australian miner;  an English magazine publisher, and more.

Several young actors (not named in the playbill's cast) provide support in lighting, props and sound effects (bubble wrap is popped to create the sound of a crackling fire) which are quite amazing in their creativity.  Kudos to director Derek Goldman and his artistic team who cleverly use a bubble machine and oversized mobiles of colorful paper fish to create Louis's underwater world when he dives into "God's Aquarium."  And while it might not seem possible for a cast of three to bring a crowd of angry Aborigine tribesman on stage, they do just that.

Like "The Mystery of Irma Vep," the cast, especially Nelson, burn a calorie or two (thousand) in bringing such action as a giant octopus attack to the Everyman's intimate stage. Nelson's Louis,  for example, finds the best way to make friends and influence people is by putting on a display of gymnastics.  Nelson jumps, rolls, somersaults and even cartwheels, numerous times--not bad for a man in his mid-40s.

The Wide World Magazine, which published Grin/De Rougemont's mix of fact and fantasy, said in June 1899 that "Truth is stranger than fiction, but De Rougemont is stranger than both."  What you'll see on the Everyman's literally spinning stage reveals truth (people love to be entertained, to be deluded, to make gods so we can have the pleasure of destroying them), spins fiction (flying wombats anyone?), and is indeed strange (Brandhagen is a more convincing dog than a dog itself).

"Shipwrecked!" is smart entertainment, coming in at just over 90 minutes without intermission and was, in my regular theater companion's estimation, "the best play" she'd seen thus far. It's a Baron Munchausenesque story of a man who mined the treasure trove of his own imagination (along with some old fashioned, no-internet, gone-to-the-library research) to tell a tale which intrigued thousands of readers of 19^th century sensationalist magazines.

How much was true, how much was false (did he really ride sea turtles as he claimed? You'll want to stay til play's end to find out) is, at this point and time, immaterial.  What is material is how playwright Margulies plucked this man and his story from history to create a thoroughly enjoyable play and how expertly the cast and crew of the Everyman performed that play. As the title most accurately relates, it was very much indeed, "An Entertainment"!

"Shipwrecked! An Entertainment: The Amazing Adventures of Louis De Rougemont (As Told by Himself)" continues its run at the Everyman Theatre, 1727 North Charles Street, through October 24^th, Wednesdays through Sundays. For tickets, call the box office at 410-752-2208 or go online at www.everymantheatre.org.