‘Proof’ makes math and problems of the heart simple
Before “A Beautiful Mind” turned the story of a mentally ill math genius into Oscar gold, David Auburn’s play “Proof” had performed similar alchemy, winning both the Pulitzer and a Tony for the tale about a mentally ill math genius’s daughter. Like its film successor, “Proof” skirts the mathematics in favor of accessibility and emotion, which has certainly proved to be a commercial formula.
The beauty of mathematics lies in its ability to prove that something is absolutely true – absolutely. How comforting that is when the rest of our lives are fraught with such uncertainties.
The Walnut Street Theatre – Studio 3; has mounted a marvelous production of David Aubun’s prize winning drama. The play deals with mathematical genius, madness, filial devotion, personal doubt and that maze of ambivalent and contradictory attractions, empathies and motivations that draw us into love.
Auburn turns the esoteric world of higher mathematics literally into a back porch drama, one that is as accessible and compelling as a detective story. The play is fundamentally a mystery about the authorship of a particularly important proof, a mystery that is solved in the end; it is also, however, about the unravelable enigma of genius, and the toll it can take on those who are beset with it, aspire to it or merely live in its vicinity.
In that service, the play takes great pains to depict the study of mathematics as a painful joy, not as the geek-making obsession of stereotype, but as human labor, both ennobling and humbling, by people who, like musicians or painters or playwrights, can envision an elusive beauty in the universe and are therefore both enlivened by its pursuit and daunted by the commitment.
In this play, the discovery of a groundbreaking mathematical formula serves as a trigger to set off a psychological mystery surrounding its authorship. Unlike the play “Copenhagen” which introduces much scientific talk into its dialogue, Auburn seems to lean over backward to avoid techno talk in order to keep the play’s human issues in the forefront.
Most striking is Aubun’s sense of structure; at once imaginative and stringently coherent. Veering gracefully from past to present and from reflection to confrontation, the playwright traces the development of his characters and plot with a scientist’s preciseness and a poet’s lyricism.
Alex Keiper plays Catherine, who at 25 has spent the last four years caring for her father Robert (Bill Van Horn), a brilliant-minded mathematician who has made stunning math contributions in his early 20s and then
descended into mental illness.
Now he has passed away, and Catherine is left to confront her life, which doesn’t seem to consist of much more than taking mediocre care of the family’s Chicago house, nicely drawn from the perspective of the back porch in Andrew Thompson’s evocative set design.
Like her father, Catherine has a keen mathematical mind, and she’s able to trade flirtatious, math-laced barbs with Hal (David Raphaely), one of her father’s former students, who has been perusing Robert’s notebooks to see if they contain anything but the musings of dementia.
Quite early, the play also begins questioning whether Catherine may also have inherited her father’s mental instability. Her sister Claire (Krista Apple) thinks that’s the case and wants Catherine to move to New York so she can keep an eye on her.
Hal, who has professional ambitions of his own, isn’t exactly disinterested and may not be trustworthy; his sleeping with Catherine has also complicated the issue. The elusiveness of genius in general and the difficulty of a mathematical proof in particular here become metaphors for the uncertainties of love, trust, and personal integrity.
Proof represents back-to-basics theater. Auburn speaks in a modern voice but practices solid traditional playwriting. Skillfully plotted, this story is a family drama, offbeat romance and mystery yam. Theater buffs will also get an added kick from the shades of Arthur Miller – especially Catherine and Claire’s debate over their respective sacrifices during their father’s illness, echoing the showdown of brothers in Miller’s “The Price.”
Director Kate Galvin brings to bear her ability to draw from the actors genuine emotions. Apple, Raphaely and Van Horn bring fully human complexity to each of the roles. Their emotional tone can change, either subtly or dramatically, within a few lines. However, Keiper’s outbursts seem abrupt, even occasionally forced. Most amazing of all is Thompson’s scenic rendering of the play; at first glance appearing to be simple; yet it speaks volumes about the situation and its characters.
Without any baffling erudition – there isn’t a single line of dialogue you would find perplexing – the play presents mathematicians as both blessed and bedeviled by the gift for abstraction. Perhaps most satisfying of all; it does so without a moment of meanness. “Proof’ reaches into remote cerebral terrain and finds – guess what? – good people.
Proof continues at The Walnut Street Theater, Studio 3, 825 Walnut St. in Philadelphia through Feb. 5. Tickets $30. Information: 215-574-3550 or walnutstreettheatre.org .