Guy Willoughby
‘I saw this medieval woodcut of Adam and Eve at the tree of knowledge. Beneath the tree there’s an ape picking up an apple, a windfall, wanting to eat of the tree as well … Is this inexcusable, or ghastly and bizarre? That is the moment in which our play takes shape.”
Basil Jones, with Adrian Kohler the director of the Handspring Puppet Company, is reflecting on their new multimedia theatre event The Chimp Project, which has its South African premiere at the National Arts Festival in Grahamstown this weekend. This ambitious play explores the interface between chimpanzees and human beings, in particular signage – the growing exchange of language and knowledge across the species line:
“Primatologists are now able to teach 120 to 150 gestural signs to chimps, and the most advanced can command up to 2E000 words,” says Jones. “Genetically, there is a very small difference between us. Think of the complex emotional make-up of dogs, for instance; imagine how much stronger this is in chimpanzees. In our own dealings with wild chimps in Tanzania, doing research, we sensed a poignant hunger for knowledge.”
How did such an unusual subject for theatre come about? Peter Esterhuysen, who collaborated with Jones and Kohler on an innovative science-education TV project 10 years ago, approached them in early 1998: “He introduced us to Dr Barak Morgan, a psychologist and amateur primatologist, who has worked extensively with signage. We were intrigued by the idea, and in July 1998 went to the shores of Lake Tanganyika to spend time with chimps.”
Their highly revealing sojourn was a forcible reminder of the less savoury aspects of their own kind: “While we were there Barak saved a woman in the camp from suicide – a criminal offence in Tanzania – which impacted on us all. Then we were nearly stranded by the outbreak of the war in the DRC [Democratic Republic of Congo], as all planes out were commandeered by the army. Chaotic circumstances in which to interact with those across the species line!”
The play that gestated is based on the true story of a chimp, acclimatised to living with humans, being returned to the wild. “The show we presented at the Market Laboratory with two prototype puppets was incredibly raw, and far too long: we are now 90 minutes, though my ideal is 84! We have been true to actuality, avoiding fantastical elements. A great bonus for us was that British director Peter Brooke, who is very interested in signing, visited our Jo’burg studio and gave valuable input.”
Jones and master puppet-maker Kohler believe that their puppets get round the awkwardness that can mar stage representation of animals: “The act of signage itself involves a rich interplay between the actors’ hands and their creations. It’s done so deftly the audience will be entirely caught up.”
Following its tentative beginnings, the show has just returned from touring Germany – Hanover’s Big World Expo, the Reklinghausen Festival, Weimar (“one of the world’s great cities”) and Munich – and it has been received with great enthusiasm. “We’ve had full houses from beginning to end and feel confirmed in the choices we’ve made.”
Brooke reconnected with The Chimp Project in Germany. “He happened to be in Hanover and came unexpectedly to a matine: he was charmed by what we’d done and regards it as the most original theatre piece he’s seen in some years. He has invited us to bring the show to Les Bouffes du Nord, his wonderful burnt-out baroque theatre in Paris, next June.”
The latest Handspring project is the first for several years that does not include artist and animator William Kentridge: “This was very difficult. It is as if the grand organist is gone, and now we can hear the tympani … It is wonderful, though, to hear the inside of our own heads.”
The implications of The Chimp Project tease and excite Jones: “Some people want to retreat from this moment of interface between the species; I don’t want to answer whether it’s for good or bad. I think it’s an interesting question for us as we pass from one big time-zone to another. Like our first attempts to fly in hot-air balloons, this is the beginning of a process that could last 300 years.
“Our show is part of a very ancient desire to communicate with other species; the exploration of space is part of that. Our existential loneliness makes us ask these questions. And isn’t it quite neat, that the first living beings we put into space were, indeed, chimpanzees?”
The Chimp Project plays in Grahamstown on July 6, 7 and 8 at 2pm and 7pm, and then opens at the Market Theatre on July 18 with previews from July14