At City Lit Theater in Edgewater, Bo List’s adaptation of Karel Čapek’s famously influential play R.U.R. (Rossum’s Universal Robots) humors but fails to capture the original’s point or power.
The Czech playwright’s 1920 work, which coined the term “robot,” utilizes a traditionally Russian four-act structure to chart the pride, fall, and defeat of humanity alongside a subsequent pseudo-rebirth. At Rossum’s Universal Robots, where the awkward but charismatic Harry Rossum oversees the production of a class of metal-and-plastic subhumans, change is afoot. Robots are starting to self-improve, and robot rights activist Helena Glory has accidentally handed them a manifesto for revolution against humanity. One can guess what follows.
Bo List and City Lit err in their understanding of what makes this version of a familiar story stand the test of time, and their adaptation subsequently fails to prove more than merely entertaining. It is not enough to say that Čapek’s tale of robotic uprising should be staged because it came first when others—Philip K. Dick, Steven Spielberg, etc.—have iterated on the premise many times over in the century since.
Where Čapek’s original play excels is in its humanoid depiction of the robots and its clear sense of time and place. Čapek’s robots are creations, certainly, but they are creations of flesh and blood, spun and churned into life; List’s robots are mechanical beings, devoid of real character and clearly distinct from human life, at least to the audience. This production, then, cannot quite contend with the existential question, “What makes humans human?” in the way that the original play can.
Stuck with half-compelling philosophy, City Lit dwells too long in a cartoonish void. There is nothing of Čapek’s original concern with the ways in which war and capitalism mechanize the human condition. This is no longer a play conceived in the aftermath of World War I amid the Ford Motor Company’s new assembly lines. It is a play set in make-believe land, played as a comedy and, without its original context, the stakes are lost.
Taken as a comedy, City Lit’s R.U.R. consistently charms. Bryan Breau as Harry, Madelyn Loehr as Helena, and Brian Parry as R.U.R. bookkeeper Alquist are strong comic actors. Breau, in particular, casts a peculiar spell over the audience and over Helena (whom he marries within minutes of meeting) with his mix of nervous sweating, absurd theatricality, and stop-start pacing. He and Loehr have real chemistry—a must for a play contending that love is, ultimately, what saves humanity.
Though List’s humor occasionally strays too far into the juvenile, it is sharp, witty, and appealing across generations. It develops naturally from the play’s plentiful dramatic irony and the characters’ general naivete. When Harry’s bravado melts as he and Helena approach their bridal bed, she remarks, “Perhaps we could just sit here and hold hands until things happen.” Unironically, this is advice that most of R.U.R.’s characters follow. They sit around, talking, celebrating, and philosophizing. In the background and increasingly in the foreground, robots putter around, dressed in leather or shiny silver and teal, muttering to each other forebodingly.
The audience, watching this strange ritual of humans acting more as snails on a sinking ship than as rats, cannot help but be drawn in. After all, robots can be quite silly. Death can be, too, when it is not yours. But those within this production are merely ridiculous, not meaningful. City Lit’s R.U.R. understands that robots, AI, and hubris are topics that resonate with contemporary audiences. It points, it laughs, but ultimately, it says very little.
Bo List’s adaptation of Karl Čapek’s R.U.R. (Rossum’s Universal Robots) is at City Lit Theater through June 15.
