Red Herring opened Athol Fugard’s ’80s hit The Road to Mecca last weekend in a superlative production directed by Michael Garrett Herring who also designed the sets.
The Road to Mecca tells the story of Miss Helen Martins (Josie Merkle) at a point of crisis when her immaculately crafted estate full of art is under fire from bigotry and small-minded fellow townspeople. Miss Elsa Barlow (Jordan Davis), a young schoolteacher who’s given up the small town in South Africa for Capetown, comes in like a hurricane for a surprise visit. The personification of the concerned voices that want to put Miss Helen in a home “for her own good” is Pastor Marius Byleveld (Verne Hendrick).
The first act is entirely Miss Elsa dancing around Miss Helen, trying to get at the letter she sent that made her young friend drive 800 miles out of concern. Merkle’s portrayal of a strong person on the verge of giving up is heartbreaking and watching she and Davis roam over the intricate, realistic set (designed by Herring) is riveting. Merkle throughout is a masterclass in how to imply a whole life in a few gestures, just watching her look at Davis and say “Are we going to have that argument again” without quite eye-rolling but with a shift in energy, drew me to the edge of my seat. Merkle’s perfect sense of quiet draws shades out of Davis and Davis matches her beat for beat.
Davis implies the pain that always seems to be at the root of people judging others by the harshest of standards well before she cracks and lets that volcanic pain out. Even with what could easily be a “type,” Davis finds unexpected physical ways to get to and establish the cracking ground her character stands on without ever seeming one dimensional. When the audience gets to see her light up, describing the first time she saw Helen’s sculptures, “My God, what am I looking at? Not three but dozens of Wise Men? Owls with old motorcar headlights for eyes? Peacocks with more glitter and color than real birds,” the audience seems Helen through her eyes and chills rippled my spine. Hendricks’ appearance after being spoken of – in particular and as a synecdoche for bigoted Afrikaners – at the end of the first act is remarkably effective. Just as we never see Helen’s art – so we have to see it through discussion – by the time we meet Pastor Marius we already know him in that same deep-but-shallow way.
The second act deepens and complicates all three characters. Even as I empathized with Miss Helen’s terror and passivity, I found my sympathies going toward Miss Elsa’s acerbic “if you won’t help yourself” taunts that provoke her to action. Hendrick masterfully shows the love for Helen and the love for his town in a way that’s not just a faux “Aw, shucks,” preacher routine. At the same time, he never shirks from the character’s representation of the evil of oppression; he knows the mix of good and bad intentions aren’t any more separable than the oxygen and hydrogen in water.
The centerpiece of the second act is Miss Helen’s triumphant speech not just laying out why self-determination is a human right but fiercely staking a claim for it. Merkle delivers these searing words in a glittering torrent of light that lifts the audience clean off their seats. It’s the culmination of one of the finest performances I’ve ever seen. The denouement like a cauterizing of wounds, with a sweet goodbye between her and Hendrick’s pastor and Elsa coming to grips with her rage, doesn’t wrap it up too neatly but feels like air being poured back into your lungs. Herring’s direction uses the different styles and physicality of the actors to optimal effect throughout. Invisible except when it makes you sit up a little straighter.
The Road to Mecca is a fresh, near-perfect look at a rarely-performed classic.
The Road to Mecca runs through April 23 with performances at 8:00 p.m. Thursday through Saturday and 2:00 p.m. Sunday at the Franklinton Playhouse. For more information, visit redherring.info.