Deliberations laid wide open during 12 Angry Jurors
The 12 jurors may be angry, but 12 actors are thrilled.
The play 12 Angry Men was first produced in 1954 and although it has been adapted in modern times to 12 Angry Jurors by local director Anna Russell, it is still the same formidable drama, the same “actor’s script” it was when it became one of the most seminal plays in the English language.
Original playwright Reginald Rose spotted a winning vehicle for a stage performance. There’s nothing more efficient in theatre than all the action taking place in a single room. There’s nothing more compelling for an audience than highstakes human conflict measured out in spoonfuls. What’s more meaningful in human drama than the accused and the victims at the centre of a jury trial? And juries are confined to a single room for their deliberations.
But what are those deliberations? Courtroom discourse is there for all to see, out in public, naked, on display as a matter of democratic imperative. However, the dialogue around the jury table has only ever been experienced by those called to jury duty, and it is rarely discussed afterward.
Twelve Angry Jurors takes us inside that mysterious conversation that decides fates and metes out justice.
“We had an interesting meeting with someone who’d been on a jury. We wanted to hear about the process, the way that conversation unfolded, so the actors could develop their sense of those realities,” said Russell.
Only one of the dozen local actors in the cast had ever been on a jury. Another had twice been part of the customary mass callout but didn’t make the final 12 either time. It’s a rare and unpredictable aspect of being a Canadian.
It’s even more rare for women to be involved, when looked at historically. When the play was written, only two years had elapsed from the first women in Canada allowed to be jurors. Married women weren’t allowed in Canada until 1964. In America, women were given permission to be on federal juries in 1957 and it wasn’t until 1973 that all 50 states gave female jurors the go-ahead.
That urged theatre directors like Russell to adapt the script to bring a female presence into the theatrical deliberations.
After all, the play was never written to be literally about the court system; it was intended all along to be a judicial examination of culture itself, each character representing a segment of society and the cross-conversation representing the dynamic scenarios within society.
“It’s topical right now because a number of high-profile trials have caused us to look at what justice means in Canada today, what our system represents,” said Russell. “This play stays relevant because the jury system is still used, so it remains a familiar part of how we do things in our legal system, and lately that has gotten racially charged and politically charged so it’s easy to connect the dots to what we’re talking about in the play.”
Russell has worked most notably on musical theatre and comedy productions in Prince George, and the same can be said for most stage performers in the city in recent years. Few dramas have been produced at the community level. But actors have an appetite for darker themes, and Russell had no trouble attracting a cast with whom she was familiar, and the parts fit the actors, even though the atmosphere of the script is chewier than recent fare.
“It was a yes for me right away,” said Sandra Clermont. “While I’ve done a lot of musicals, I did (drama) Marion Bridge last year and loved the experience. I love being able to sink my teeth into a character.”
Furthermore, all the cast are sinking their teeth in, so it is a sumptuous meal of theatre, where the themes are dark and meaningful.
“Let’s face it,” Clermont said. “It isn’t often that 12 people will look at the same piece of evidence and all agree on it. Things aren’t usually that cut and dried, there’s room to interpret, and whatever your own biases and personal histories are will dictate how you see it. That’s what this play is all about.”
Jim Anderson is another with a long list of musical theatre credits but “strictly dramatic theatre was really intriguing” especially since he had on-stage experience with at least half the cast. “I knew it was a good way to stretch myself.”
He wasn’t sure at first how the direction was going to feel, since the play’s cadence wasn’t dictated by song cycles and Broadway tropes, but Russell gave a lot of rein to each actor to devise the personalities of the characters.
“I like that organic way she’s let us work it out ourselves, as a group. It’s more fun for me and more true to life, I think, if we can bring some of ourselves into the characters. I’m becoming my own juror, not trying to emulate Anna’s version of who this is.”
The casual direction style is appreciated particularly by Melissa Glover who has been more of a director than an actor herself in the past few years. Glover is a speech arts and drama coach, runs the annual Shakespeare camp for youth at Theatre NorthWest, as well as works on TNW’s direction support team. Twelve Angry Jurors allows her to ply her original trade: acting.
“I was hesitant,” she confessed when the part was offered to her. “My mother, the lawyer, put a lot of pressure on me to say yes. I think lawyers are basically acting in courtroom dramas all day long; she just wanted me to see what her workday was like.
“And then when I found out which juror I got to be, I was really excited because it’s a personality type so far removed from my actual self, I had to challenge myself towards that. How do I get there? I’ve created an elaborate backstory for my juror, so I can make it as lifelike as possible. And now that we’re into the process, I am feeling really good about it because Prince George hasn’t really seen me act in the past four years. I haven’t had a chance to exercise those muscles.”
The other actors in the cast include Hailey Smith, Katherine Trepanier, Bradley Charles, Adam Harasimiuk, Dave Leach, Tracy Summerville, and Mark Wheeler as the jurors. Dwight Wolfe plays the guard and Catherine Hansen plays the judge.
Twelve Angry Men (Jurors) runs May 4-6 at the Prince George Playhouse. Tickets are on sale now at the Central Interior Tickets website and at the CIT ticket desk inside Enchainement Dance Centre (on Opie Crescent).