When the human soul oscillates between good and evil. For the opening of its season, the Maison du concert theater in Neuchâtel is offering, from Wednesday to Sunday, an adaptation of Stevenson’s novel, The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. There are still places available.
The staging is the work of two Neuchâtelois, Yannick Merlin and Olivier Béguin, from the worlds of theatre and cinema respectively. Actor Yannick Merlin embodies Jekyll and Hyde on his own, with the help of audiovisual projections created by his sidekick. The doctor’s evil double thus comes to life on a screen that sometimes interferes between the set and the audience. The actor plays on various elements to mark the difference between the two characters, such as posture or costume. Hyde is indeed decked out in a hat, a scarf and a large dark coat. The spectators are treated to a lecture by Doctor Jekyll on his experiments in the dissociation of the soul, while the character of Hyde remains silent. Report alongside Yannick Merlin and Olivier Béguin:
Denis was in the audience at Thursday night’s performance. “I loved the mix of pure theater and special effects. The music is really good,” he said. The music is by Fabio Frizzi, an Italian composer who is “legendary for horror movie fans,” says Olivier Béguin.
The character of Jekyll expresses himself in “I”. “It allows us to identify much more and to really enter into the story and into this duality in which we all recognize ourselves a little bit”, adds Denis.
With this piece, Olivier Béguin and Yannick Merlin continue the work that they had partly shown to the NIFFF public through a photographic laboratory set in the world of Jekyll and Hyde. /sbm
