The Man Who at Lilly Hall Studio Theatre

Butler University Theatre closes its 2018-2019 season with The Man Who, a play inspired by Oliver Sackss best-selling book The Man Who Mistook his Wife for a Hat, April 17-27.Showtimes are 7:00 PM April 17-20 and April 25-26, and 2:00 PM April 27. Tickets are $5-$15 at ButlerArtsCenter.org. Following the April 18 performance, Indianapolis psychiatrist John Plewes and Butler Professors Tara Lineweaver (Psychology), Tim Brimmer (Music), and Steve Nyktas (Art) will hold a panel discussion.The Man Who, written by famed theater director Peter Brook and his partner in the Paris-based International Centre for Theatre Research, Marie-Helene Estienne, centers on the interactions between doctors and patients. When the play opened in New York in 1995, The New York Times described it as being as vast and mysterious as the human imagination, and as commonplace as the image of a man trying to shave himself, but failing.Its a subject were all interested inthe mind and the brain, says Theatre Professor William Fisher, who is directing the production. There are 17 or 18 scenes, most of them fairly short, that are based on people who have neurological or other kinds of cognitive challenges. The other thing is, while examining the relationship between patient and doctor, we are also looking at the relationship between performer and audience. The stage is in a traverse configuration, meaning the audience facing each other on each side, like an alley. In watching the interaction of the actors, one cannot avoid observing other members of the audience.Seven student-actors perform multiple roles in the show, serving both as doctors and patients at various times. Fisher says its rare in the play that anyone directly discusses or even names the condition they have. The interactions take place ostensibly in a clinic, but we prefer to deemphasize that idea in favor of the shared experience and common humanity.Our production is neither presentation nor interpretation of Sacks work, Fisher says. Ours is a theater research. Oliver Sacks is present as a source and inspiration, but we are especially interested in our own exploration of what it means for us and for you, dear spectator, to be present.