‘Nickleby’ adapter to discuss play

Thirty years ago, David Edgar adapted an 800-plus page novel into a two-part, six-and-a-half-hour play for the Royal Shakespeare Company.

Tonight he will come to the Paul Green Theatre to talk about this process with the PlayMakers Repertory Company, who are performing the play, based on Charles Dickens’ “Nicholas Nickleby,” this fall.

“An Evening with David Edgar,” will provide the inside scoop on PlayMakers’ production of “The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby” which opens in November.

Edgar and Joseph Haj, the producing artistic director of PlayMakers’ production, will both talk about the work.

With Edgar’s experience and expertise, the cast said they are excited to hear his insight and receive his feedback.

“The greatest gift is having him in the room and being able to talk to him about these characters with whom he knows so closely,” said cast member Jeff Meanza.

Working with the actors through the rehearsal process, Edgar created the script over time, rather than completing it before rehearsals began.

Tonight’s discussion will also touch on challenges of the production, such as its length, preservation of the story and use of set.

“The set has to be very versatile because we have to take the audience to so many locations,” said Hannah Grannemann, managing director of PlayMakers.

The production will have 25 actors portraying 150 characters.

The cast is learning the dialects, backgrounds and relationships of each character, as Nickleby’s travels takes him to different parts of England.

This humorous story was only Dickens’ third novel.

The story captures the struggles of its picaresque hero, Nickleby, and coverts his transformation from a naïve boy into a mature man.

Focusing on particular portraits of characters, the piece differs from Dickens’ other work, which usually include an overarching theme that unites the story.

“I’m sure there is a lot of stuff they can pull out of the book that would make great theater,” said English professor John McGowan.

Nickleby encounters many eccentric characters doing wild and crazy things throughout his adventures, McGowan said.

This is the Dickens Initiative’s first event. The Initiative seeks to include the community around it in the intricate, artistic process that goes into adapting Dickens’ classic novels.

Marc Napolitano, an English department lecturer who will be working with the cast and crew of the play, said he thinks the biggest challenge for the cast will be preserving Dickens’ narrative style in a play format.


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