{"id":1748,"date":"2019-03-10T19:25:51","date_gmt":"2019-03-10T19:25:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/performancemonkey\/?p=1748"},"modified":"2019-03-11T12:15:04","modified_gmt":"2019-03-11T12:15:04","slug":"propwatch-the-tooth-in-dinomania","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/performancemonkey\/2019\/03\/propwatch-the-tooth-in-dinomania.html","title":{"rendered":"Propwatch: the tooth in Dinomania"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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It\u2019s not a real iguanodon tooth, I don\u2019t think. Though in a story about how to interpret the material world and humanity\u2019s place within it, identification is an unusually fraught subject. Dinomania<\/em> by Kandinsky<\/a> at New Diorama<\/a> is a brilliantly theatrical tour of the fossil frenzy and dino debates of the mid-19th century. A project of deep research and wanton invention, of feeling and flair, it\u2019s much like the fossil hunters it portrays.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Pioneering Georgian geologists paddled through a bone-cold mess of curiosity, class and theology. Gentlemen with leisure to prod and pontificate looked down on amateurs who fitted excavations around work and family. (There were female fossilers, too, absent from this tale of strictly masculine hubris \u2013 wait for Kate Winslet as Mary Anning in the forthcoming film Ammonite<\/a><\/em>.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The more compelling the discoveries, the greater the\nchallenge to Anglican certainties. Can scientists square theology with evidence\nprised from the rocks? Everyone guards their pet theories, their foothold on\nscientific respectability \u2013 Kandinsky stages these debates with pugilist vigour,\nmarking each discredited theory with implacable force \u2013 a duellist\u2019s bullet consigns\nthe loser to dust.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Non-posh Sussex surgeon Gideon Mantell<\/a> is desperate to dodge the bullet. He (or possibly his wife) found the first fossil tooth and argued that it belonged to an early reptile, but it was dismissed it as belonging to a fish or rhino. His reputation was contested, then buried, by his rival Richard Owen<\/a>. History ran him over.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the brilliant custard-draped design by Joshua Gadsby\nand Naomi Kuyck-Cohen, organic matter is represented by clothing \u2013 a lovely,\nhomely reminder that these debates are all, really, about us, our sense of\ncomfort and feeling at home in the vast sweep of history. Gideon\u2019s patients\n(mostly in the throes of childbirth or cholera) are jumpers and trousers stuffed\nlike cushions. The fossils he finds in his spare hours look like the same\ngarments but oddly flattened and freeze-dried \u2013 life with the life sucked out\nof it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And then there\u2019s the tooth \u2013 the object that ignited his quest to find what initially seemed a giant lizard (hence the name iguanodon<\/a>) and that he treasures even after everything else slips away. Unlike everything else in the show, it\u2019s weightily, stubbornly realistic. Grey as extinction, heavy as lost hope. Poignantly, amidst all the witty invention, it stands for something that can\u2019t be argued away, that can be held feelingly in the hand.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Three of the four terrific actors are women, throwing into relief that masculine pride is on the line. Janet Etuk\u2019s spry Gideon (light on her feet, with a delighted, nervous smile that dims with her character\u2019s fortunes) combats Harriet Webb\u2019s brutally assured Owen. (After her contemptuous rapist in It\u2019s True, It\u2019s True, It\u2019s True<\/a><\/em> last year, Webb has found a rare niche in viciously privileged blokes. Confident stride, basso bark, swathe of blonde hair to shake in derision: it\u2019s intimidating and superbly satirical.) Sophie Steer is Gideon\u2019s pained wife, Hamish MacDougall a succession of flare-nostrilled sceptics \u2013 and everyone also plays everyone, everything else.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The cast devised the show with writers Lauren Mooney, Al Smith and James Yeatman. From the audience, you couldn\u2019t tease apart their input. It\u2019s a unique mix \u2013 everything\u2019s Kandinsky. And similarly, all the fossils and the theories about them don\u2019t belong to anyone, because they\u2019re the history of our planet \u2013 they\u2019re our story. Even as Owen reads from his work, assuming he gets the last word, Darwin\u2019s On the Origin of Species<\/em> looms. An electric fan blows Owen\u2019s pages away, their worth forgotten as he insists on it. History moves on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There\u2019s a real profundity to Dinomania<\/em>, which begins light and ends in gravity. Thinking of your ages-to-come legacy isn\u2019t worth it. Betting present pleasure against future fame isn\u2019t clever. Time makes fools of us all. Look at the dinosaurs. Consider the tooth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Photo of Sophie Steer and Janet Etuk, by The Other Richard<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Follow David on Twitter: @mrdavidjays<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It\u2019s not a real iguanodon tooth, I don\u2019t think. Though in a story about how to interpret the material world and humanity\u2019s place within it, identification is an unusually fraught subject. Dinomania by Kandinsky at New Diorama is a brilliantly theatrical tour of the fossil frenzy and dino debates of the mid-19th century. A project […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":1749,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[322,321,34],"class_list":{"0":"post-1748","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-uncategorized","8":"tag-props","9":"tag-propwatch","10":"tag-theatre","11":"entry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/performancemonkey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1748","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/performancemonkey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/performancemonkey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/performancemonkey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/performancemonkey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1748"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/performancemonkey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1748\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1753,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/performancemonkey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1748\/revisions\/1753"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/performancemonkey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1749"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/performancemonkey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1748"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/performancemonkey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1748"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/performancemonkey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1748"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}