Shakespeare Theatre’s Frankenstein Reveals the Story Behind the Story

The Rocky Horror Picture Show, Frankenweenie, Poor Things… the story of Frankenstein has been adapted many times over and continues to find new relevance with each interpretation. Playwright David Catlin’s version, called Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, does double duty by presenting a story within a story. The show depicts both the tale of Frankenstein as well as the famous spooky storytelling competition that inspired it–giving audiences a look into the making of Victor Frankenstein's creature and the making of the novel itself.

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Chapters

• 1:38 A story within a story
• 7:21 Making the characters your own
• 16:30 Frankenstein in 2025

Transcript

Maddie Orton: 0:02

Hi, I'm Maddie Orton, and this is the Jersey Arts Podcast. The Rocky Horror Picture Show. Frankenweenie: Poor Things. The story of Frankenstein has been adapted many times over and continues to find new relevance with each interpretation. Playwright David Catelyn's version, called Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, does double duty by presenting a story within a story. The show depicts both the tale of Frankenstein as well as the famous spooky storytelling competition that inspired it, giving audiences a look into the making of Victor Frankenstein's creature and the making of the novel itself. I spoke with director Brian Crow, actor Jay Wade, who plays both Lord Byron and The Creature, and actor Shawn Michael Wilkinson, who plays both Percy Shelley and Victor Frankenstein, about their production and this timeless tale. Take a listen. Thank you so much, guys. I really appreciate you taking the time in the middle of your rehearsal process. How's it going so far?

Brian Crowe: 1:03

I think it's going great, but I'll let these guys talk.

Sean-Michael Wilkinson: 1:06

Yeah, it's trucking right along, I think. So it's it's it's a pretty quick process. So um Jay, what do you need to say?

Jay Wade: 1:13

Yeah, no, I I feel like with any like professional production, you only get so much time before you have to get into tech rehearsal and I think like three weeks. Yeah. Um and we're moving, we're moving along. We just finished blocking all of uh act one. Now we're uh moving to the stage of act two in the next second half of the show. So yeah, we're yeah, trucking along.

Maddie Orton: 1:35

Okay, fantastic. Great, great, great. I'm really excited about this adaptation of Frankenstein, which is technically called Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, because it it sounds like it's a story within a story that talks about the creation of the novel itself. Brian, can you tell me a little bit about that?

Brian Crowe: 1:53

Yeah, I mean, one of the things I love actually, one of the things that I particularly love about this production is exactly what you're pointing to, is uh we think of Frankenstein the story, and actually I also believe that no one actually really knows what that book is. We because we all know the movies and not the actual story.

Maddie Orton: 2:06

You're probably right.

Brian Crowe: 2:07

But what's so fascinating is how it was created. So um we the play actually takes place. Uh it's summer 1816, uh, a beautiful villa on the um uh shore of Lake Geneva. It's very bad weather. It's been raining and raining. It's cold, it's it's nasty outside. So you have this small group of little bohemian artists, um uh Mary uh uh Wollstonecraft uh Godwin, who's gonna be later Mary Shelley, Percy Shelley, Lord Byron, and some friends are hanging out, hiding from the rain, sharing uh German ghost stories. Um and they kind of get excited about that, and they're they're young and bohemian and they're having a good time. And then Byron uh decides to challenge his guests to a competition. Who can write the scariest ghost story? So, and besides having this great gothic masterpiece we have that is Frankenstein, the modern Prometheus, we also have this great origin story of that book, which is which is kind of fantastic. So at this event, this challenge, from this kind of uh ill-weathered Bohemian contest, uh, we have two pieces actually come out. We have John Polidori's The Vampire, uh, which is the first vampire story, and of course we have Mary Shelley's Frankenstein or the modern Prometheus, all get their start from this. Um, and it's really kind of a fascinating group of characters. There's a lot of odd relationship dynamics going on that are going on there, a lot of back history of the tragedies that that Mary has faced in her life and in her relationships. And then from all that, you have this uh epic, fantastic powerhouse of a piece from this 18-year-old young woman. Uh, it's amazing.

Maddie Orton: 3:42

That is how it actually happened in real life, right? That there was this, I guess, fantastic dinner party. I don't know, like the greatest dinner party ever of some of the people coming together and telling ghost stories. And that is this is something she came up with and then became the genesis for the actual novel that she then pens and becomes what we now know today. Is that right?

Brian Crowe: 4:06

Yeah, yeah. So so two years after this party, there was a short story she had. Um, her uh lover, later uh husband encouraged her, uh Percy Shelley, encouraged her to continue writing and expand on it. Um and so two years later, it was uh published anonymously. Um her name was not associated with it. A few years after that, her name was associated with it. And most of the information we have about how this came to be is actually in her uh 1831 reprinting of it. She wrote the whole story that I just told you about how that that summer of 1816, how it all came to be.

Maddie Orton: 4:37

So, what this means for the play is that Jay and Sean, you guys are both double cast essentially, right? So, who do you, I guess Jay, go if you could go first, who do you play in, I guess, in the story and then the story within the story?

Jay Wade: 4:51

Yeah, yeah, right. Uh so as Brian mentioned, it was kind of Lord Byron's idea to you know have his friends tell like who could tell the greatest uh horror story, right? And Lord Byron is one that's already like he's already made like a huge like standing in the in the literary form, and uh he's he's he's quite popular at this point, right? So he he kind of wants to challenge his friends to kind of get on the same level he's on, right? So who can write the best story?

Brian Crowe: 5:19

I would say popular, but very scandalous at the time, too.

Jay Wade: 5:22

Yeah, it's that I think that's a little bit of history on Lord Byron, you'll be uh you'll be appalled. Um he's a Greek hero. Yes, he is. He is a Greek hero. Uh they have statues in Greece. Yes.

Maddie Orton: 5:33

I did not know that. That's fascinating.

Jay Wade: 5:34

Yeah, and uh I kind of take on that role, but what's what's nice about it, and what's nice about this adaptation is as Mary Shelley is kind of telling the story, all of her friends, Lord Byron, uh Percy, uh Claire Claremont, John Powell Dory, they all become characters in the in the actual story that's being told. Right? So yeah, we we all play actually more than two roles. We play all three roles in the show. So yeah.

Maddie Orton: 5:58

And so who do you become then? I've become the creature ultimately, which famously people get this wrong all the time. I'm gonna be so careful not to. The creature is Frankenstein's monster because I know people will come for me if I get that wrong.

Jay Wade: 6:13

Correct.

Sean-Michael Wilkinson: 6:13

Okay.

Jay Wade: 6:15

That goes back to the adaptations that that we know traditionally, right? The the American Boris Carl, those kind of uh, but the the original adaptation is Frankenstein is the sciences and the creature is his creation.

Maddie Orton: 6:28

Okay, I'm gonna keep that straight in my head. I love that. And then Sean, who do you play?

Jay Wade: 6:34

I'm playing uh Percy Shelley. So who marry Shelley obviously eventually they become, although not at this point yet. Um so he's not as popular as Lord Byron at this point, more of like a what would you say, like a niche sort of artist at this point? His fame comes more posthumously. Yeah, it's nice because he becomes I also played Victor Frankenstein in the play within the play. So there's a lot of parallels between those two characters as Mary Shelley is narrating and kind of laying out the stories of the of her character. There's some things that relate as well to the character of Shell and certain things that are going to relationship-wise with him, too. So there's some nice things that go hand in hand.

Maddie Orton: 7:21

You're both playing characters who I think people, like you said, Jay, with the films, people are like, Oh, I know Frankenstein, but really you're right, it's the novel, I'm sure, is quite different than like the universal horror films that we're thinking of, and then all of the adaptations that have come from that. So, how do you both work on taking on these sort of well-trod characters, but finding your own voice within that or adapting it to what makes the most sense to you interpretation-wise? And Jay, you can go first.

Jay Wade: 7:56

Yeah, I think the most helpful thing for me, like when I was first presented with the script, it was it was something like, okay, I've read the book once in high school and then one other time after that. So when I was presented with the script, I was like, okay, Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, this is gonna be more true to the original story. To me, the original story is better than any adaptation that's come after it, right? Because it has a lot of tragedy in it, but also has a lot of love, has a lot of poetry, it has a lot of race in it, right? And what's really nice about this adaptation, uh David Catelyn, is he was able to stay true to the book and still have those same qualities of love, of loss, of isolation, of education, right? And finding those things that's true to the original American Shelly Hurricane. That's what I really like about it.

Maddie Orton: 8:47

Yeah, Sean.

Jay Wade: 8:48

I think for me to just come in the character, obviously, any character you can have to just sort of look at it as a human being and judge it based on stuff that's come before. But I mean, the nice thing about this story, like they were saying, is that because it's based on the original, the original story, the Shelley story, and there's so many things that's happening because it's the romantic period, you know, not like I love you, but more like, you know, the romantic nature and the world around you, and there's aspects of that in the difference between Mary Shelley's personality, but also charactership was like just the position of that versus Victor Frankenstein, and the feeling of like the industrial revolution, it's just came out from that idea of mechanization and like the mechanical world and you know, coal and burning, and just sort of versus this agrarian society that you're coming at it from. So for me, I like those things and I like history. So looking at it from that aspect with Victor, it's kind of how is that ambition drawing him forward into a diverging path, you know? So we can go the way um that we've been, but it's a sacred route, but then there's also this new way, right? And the uh pitfalls that come along with that, both personally as well as for society, what he could unleash by pursuing the unknown.

Maddie Orton: 10:00

Do you think for him there is something innately scary in that, or is it just exciting for him? Like, do you feel I guess the horror element that eventually comes from that story? Do you think your character has that sense?

Jay Wade: 10:16

I think the horror comes from realizing after the fact.

Maddie Orton: 10:21

Interesting.

Jay Wade: 10:22

It's a it's an it's a rejection of what he's created. You know, he's he's so hell-bent on finding out what it might be. It's like we were talking about the CERN or the uh oh yeah, hedge paper on collider, like trying to find dark matter and stuff. You know, things scientists still do, and like we're going to find out, or AI, even you know, like we're trying to find out, we want to see how it works, we want to know how it works, and then you sort of disregard the you let the guardrails go just in in hopes of finding that thing. And the horror is realizing that it's too late. Horror is realizing we've gone too far and we can't go back.

Maddie Orton: 10:56

Yeah. And then Jay, I feel like, especially for Frankenstein's monster, anytime there's a new version of it, the onus is sort of on that actor more than anybody else, to sort of say, like, this is what my monster looks like. Because in my head, when I think Frankenstein monster, I think, you know, the original Universal, I think young Frankenstein. And then there's like the new adaptations, like Poor Things, or even like uh I think there's a Frankenweenie, you know.

Brian Crowe: 11:33

I will say, I will say just one thing before takes it up. Uh, you keep referring to it as Frankenstein's monster. And one thing that we've been very adamant about conversal is Mary Shelley doesn't refer to it as a monster. Sometimes uh Victor will say it's monstrous. Oh, interesting. It's Frankenstein's creature. Um, and so we at least internally are trying to not put the judgment of what that is on that character because there's so much more, and Jay alluded to this earlier, there's so much more to this story than mad scientists and crazy quote unquote monster. Right. Much more going on there. But I'll let Jay talk about that. That's actually it's the monster term that I want to catch.

Maddie Orton: 12:09

No, I think that's important though, because that's also sort of the like as an actor not judging your character, like why, and certainly I'm sure Victor would not actively create a monster, if that makes sense. He's creating a creature that becomes, I suppose, monstrous, which is what this is.

Jay Wade: 12:25

Well, it's actually partially Victor's view of him that causes him to be monster perception. Yeah, so treatment more than anything.

Maddie Orton: 12:32

Right, right. Which I which is the human story in all of this.

Jay Wade: 12:36

So, but Jay, so how do you I are you throwing on like bolts on your neck, or is this sort of so it it it it goes back to that thing of like trying to stay true to the original story, right? In the original story, we don't get this this bo Boris Karloff green guy with with the flat head and the bolts coming out of his neck, right? Uh it's it's it's palette limbs and singing muscles, right? But it's it's something that is grotesquely beautiful, if that makes sense, right? Just just how this mad scientist was able to kind of sculpt this human being from different kinds of body parts, right? But what we kind of learn from him is there's a sort of menu, like even though he's just this this new creation, right? And that's what we like to refer to him as well as the the creation. Like I try not to call him the creature because he that denotes like monsters, right? And the only thing that's monstrous about him is just how you put it together, it's just his physical physical attributes, right? Like you see through his growth, you see through his story, like there's a there's a there's a communaire essentially, right? There's there's a being with feelings and also like to be isolated and abandoned and want a little bit of uh companionship, right? We all want I think like the important thing to know is uh everyone wants to feel love and no one wants to be alone, right? And I think that's the like the ultimate thing that we get from the original and not so much from adaptation.

Maddie Orton: 14:10

Yeah, yeah, that makes a lot of sense.

Jay Wade: 14:11

And when you so when you embody this character, is there like a physicality change that you're absolutely it's it's something that Brian and I are still working on uh throughout the rehearsal process, but it's finding ways to put it into my body, right? Creating something from scratch, like how does this this thing who's essentially put together with different kinds of body parts, different kinds of uh organs, right? How does this person doesn't move like a uh being usually, right? He's trying to find that comfort in his own body in his own skin, right? So it's a process, yeah. It's it's yeah, it's an interesting we're we're essentially creating something out of plate, right? Um where they go.

Brian Crowe: 14:56

Yeah, it's also interesting. I mean, uh uh the the play has a moment, and the story does this as well, kind of talks about kind of the quote unquote birth of the creation and then kind of this progression. It only takes about two years for him to be uh for his real encounter with with Victor uh later in the story. But we we track through kind of from birth and kind of growing up and where's the adolescence and learning language and all these kind of great things, and this kind of rapid progression there. And so there's been some uh looking at videos of of uh animals that kind of go to moving right away, not babies, because you know, human babies they just hang out there for like months and months and months. Um, but like like um horses and uh giraffes and and then they just kind of come out and then like within minutes are kind of up and moving, and how their bodies kind of work and find themselves has been something kind of interesting to explore uh on that. Uh, and especially then also uh, I mean, I was looking at some stuff early on about you know animals that have had some kind of disfigurement or something like that, and how they just kind of start working, you know, a a wing that's broken on a bird, or or you know, uh, uh a dog that's lost its leg but still kind of managed to get through. There's a great video of uh uh of a cat that has no front paws and just kind of runs around. It's fantastic. It figures that nature finds a way always, yeah. And it winds up being in many cases beautiful and graceful. We talked about that from uh that in the end there is a grace to this amazing being, despite the quote unquote monstrous uh word that that Victor puts up. So interesting. But it doesn't start that way.

Maddie Orton: 16:31

Brian, you're artistic director as well of Shakespeare Theater of New Jersey. So I assume you also you know selected this play. What made you think about the Frankenstein story for this period in time?

Brian Crowe: 16:44

Um a few things. Um I've been wanting to do a Frankenstein sorry. I I love horror, I love this romantic and gothic era as well. Um, but I've been wanting to do a Frankenstein story for quite some time and haven't found a script that I was excited about until we came across this Catelyn, um, uh uh uh David Catelyn's adaptation uh of the script was what we're what we're doing for this. So I'm very excited about the script. I'm very excited about the inclusion of uh Mary Shelley in the story and creating the story. It still keeps, as Jay was saying, so much that's core to this to the to Mary Shelley's novel that is not what most of us know from the films uh on that, but you still get elements of that. It's still frightening. You still have a mad scientist creating a body out of dead parts, you know, all that stuff is still happening. Um but as far as why now, uh uh, I think, and I'll go back to the AI reference that came up earlier, there is a moral responsibility that is examined, not answered, but examined in this book that I think is really important. We as human beings, as artists, as scientists, as who we are as at our core, there's something about creating things bigger and better than ourselves. And we don't always look at what the next ramifications might be. So I've I'm excited about it, especially at this point in time where we're looking at AI and many other things going on in the world, um, to kind of re-examine what it is to have responsibility then. I also think that this play has a very, this story has a very different resonance to me as a father now. I have two teenagers at home. Um the first time I read it was in high school, as most people did. I had no recollection of what the parenting, I mean, it's a whole uh component of this, is like the father figure that Victor could be uh and isn't, and the child that the creature is inherently. And so I think that that changes the kind of point of view too. So it's been really exciting kind of examining it again now, the story now, at this point in my life.

Maddie Orton: 18:36

Yeah, that is very heart-wrenching, I would imagine, as a parent, looking at it through that lens. Yeah. And I mean, Sean, you mentioned the sort of the industrial revolution aspect of this. And then I guess Victor is in this period where he's seeing, you know, the agrarian society and the industrial revolution and sort of moving that direction, which to me also really does mirror this moment in time with AI, right?

Jay Wade: 19:00

Yeah, I think so. And just that I think it's like a do the ends justify the means sort of question. Like, yes, I can do what should I do? You know, like it I have the power and I have the mental ability. You can think of that with just in terms it I do really like because there's a lot of scenes, uh, there's a character that Mary Shelley plays in the play that is his sister, his sort of is more than sister, yeah. And she is much more associated with nature. He says the, you know, there's no other creature in the world or person in the world so in tune with the natural world, poetry, the natural world around her. And that just almost makes me take a toll to me, you know, as well. That sort of like that constant human feeling of balancing what we come from with where we think we might want to go, um, and the dangers of disassociating from where we've been, you know. And then with the monster, with the preacher, excuse me, with the creation, the nature versus nurture aspect of that as well. Like, are you born evil? Are you born with these traits? Or do you just the society around you create them in you, you know? So yeah, uh that was me rambling.

Maddie Orton: 20:08

But um no, I I think it's really interesting. I mean, it it does. I hadn't thought about that comparison, but the second I saw that the theater was doing this show, I thought, oh man, AI is like the first thing I thought of. And it does really to me mirror that in the way that like maybe a West world sort of touches on from a futuristic perspective.

Jay Wade: 20:31

Well, then what do you do when your creation becomes more powerful than you?

Maddie Orton: 20:34

I don't know. I'm terrified, guys. I'm not gonna lie. I I'm thinking about it now.

Brian Crowe: 20:39

That goes to AI, certainly, but that goes to children. I mean, that goes to the parenting thing too. What happens when your child becomes more than you are? Which is what every parent I hope hopes for. That your child will be more. But then when they are, what happens? That that becomes a very interesting component of this story.

Maddie Orton: 20:55

Yeah, absolutely. And so for people who come to see the show, I mean, what are you most excited about them experiencing with this production?

Brian Crowe: 21:04

I think that for uh for me, I I'm gonna have a fun, fun time at theater. I mean, we we we go to theater, yes, you you'll have some uh uh moral dilemmas that are thrown at you that the characters are struggling with. That's great. Um, but really it's to have a great time at the theater, despite everything we're saying, or not despite in in in concert with everything we're saying about all the deep elements of longing and love, and there's lots of humor in this product in this script, uh, especially early on, which is great, and lots of humanity in this in this production, there's still a lot of great, terrifying moments. So, people, if you want, if you want to see something moving and romantic and elegant and terrifying and fun uh and exciting, perfectly timed, I think, for Halloween and the fall season, uh, then this is a show to see. If you're looking for flatheads and bolts in next, you're not gonna see that. Um, after the show.

Maddie Orton: 21:51

Okay, great. Sean will deliver that at the stage door. I appreciate that.

Brian Crowe: 21:55

After the show, yeah, yeah. So yeah. So but yeah, I think I think people to have a re-examining of uh of a piece that they think they know and have fun with it.

Jay Wade: 22:03

So I'm still aiming for like, you know, we get some we get some tarps for the front row. I said the first day, it was like a Gallagher show, but what? Yeah. And I'm all I'm with showing.

Maddie Orton: 22:19

Isn't that what everybody's looking for? Is to get really dressed up for a night at the theater and then just be in a splash zone. Love that. Oh my gosh. Well, guys, it sounds so fantastic, and I'm so excited for you. Really terrific concept, really terrific show, and uh, I hope it does well by you guys. I hope you enjoy yourselves. Thank you. Thanks so much for taking the time. Appreciate it.

Brian Crowe: 22:40

Thanks, Mary.

Maddie Orton: 22:43

Thanks to Brian Crow, Jay Wade, and Sean Michael Wilkinson for joining me. Mary Shelley's Frankenstein will run at the Shakespeare Theater of New Jersey from October 22nd through November 16th. For more information, visit shakespeernj.org. If you like this episode, be sure to give us a review, subscribe, and tell your friends. A transcript of this podcast, as well as links to related content and more about the arts in New Jersey, can be found on jerseyarts.com. The JerseyArts podcast is presented by Art Pride New Jersey, advancing a state of creativity since 1986. The show is co-founded by and currently supported by funds from the New Jersey State Council on the Arts. This episode was hosted, produced, and edited by yours truly, Maddie Orton. Executive producers are Jim Atkinson and Isaac Cernadiaz. Special thanks to the Shakespeare Theater of New Jersey. I'm Maddie Orton for the Jersey Arts Podcast. Thanks for listening.