Here Lies Henry: Damien Atkins is a whirlwind of menacing charm

3 Dec 2023 - Photos by Dahlia Katz

My name is Henry Tom Gallery. I am a liar. If we're going to talk about lies, you're in very good hands.

For this Here Lies Henry, we are indeed in very good hands and we eagerly anticipate whatever Daniel MacIvor (Let's Run Away, New Magic Valley Fun Town, Who Killed Spalding Gray?, Cake and Dirt, The Best Brothers, A Beautiful View, Arigato, Tokyo, His Greatness) is going to have Damien Atkins (Queen Goneril, King Lear, Caroline, or Change, We Are Not Alone, The Gay Heritage Project, London Road, Sextet, Mr Burns) talk, lies or not, about. A dramatic entrance is followed by a few hesitant bars of Louis Armstrong's "On the Sunny Side of the Street" and some fidgety gestures. Then Atkins warns us, "You don't want to get me started talking, I might never shut up." Then for a glorious, hilarious and harrowing hour and a bit, Atkins only shuts up long enough to perform, to CeCe Peniston's "Finally," awkwardly athletic dance numbers.

Henry Tom Gallery has just quit smoking, cold turkey, and perhaps that is where some of the nervous energy comes from. He reviews his life history, tells jokes (badly), offers life advice (questionable), muses on religion and truth, dissects the concept of love, gossips, and confesses, possibly, to a brutal murder that he may or may not have committed, and a destructive fire that he may or may not  have ignited. He is a mass of contradictions and conflicting statements, "I don't have a problem with being a homosexual. I just have a problem with other people's problem with my not having a problem, maybe that's a problem, I don't know." There is a lot that Henry Tom Gallery doesn't know but what he doesn't he'll happily make up. Because this is a MacIvor play, we go along with it, the ideas and wittiness carry us along and there is an assumption that it will all tie together in the end. And undoubtedly mean something profound. And that's another lie, while Here Lies Henry has lots of profound and thought provoking ideas swirling around, its actual definitive meaning is going to be up to the viewer, filtered through their own foibles and cherished lies.

That he "might never shut up" is not a threat when it is coming from Atkins. His interpretation of the text is rock steady and fervent, and he is a whirlwind of menacing charm expressing it. Emotional states traverse Atkins at a quicksilver pace. He is brazen, he is seductive, he is confident, he is frightened, sometimes all at the same time. And when the tsunami of thoughts and emotions bubbling out of him becomes too much, he shouts, "Let's have some music, let's have some fun," and dances across the stage. It takes a lot of dance training or innate natural skill to gyrate with such gangly gracefulness. Atkins works the entirety of the stage, hip thrusting, arm waving, crawling and even cartwheeling. It's a wonder that he has the breath control to continue his litany of lies without pause. It is a mesmerizing and volatilely entertaining performance that would be a Dora-baiting stunt if not so grounded in such a solidly erratic character. 

Atkins, lighting designer Andre Du Toit and director Tawiah M'Carthy (Sizwe Banzi is Dead, Maamomaa, My Brother, Obaaberima, Black Boys) do make one major alteration to MacIvor's original text and performance. The lights in the previous production I saw, slowly closed in on Henry, boxing him in, constraining his lies to a smaller and smaller space. t\This Here Lies Henry gives Atkins room to roam, .and even a certain command of the lights and effects. Atkins even references this in a Looney Toons moment as he prods at the rectangle of light on the floor with his bare foot. It is as if he is refusing to be confined or to obey the lie of the laws of theatre. Atkins is in dialogue, sometimes complementary sometimes conflicting, with the spotlight and the light at the end of life. In this Here Lies Henry, the light doesn't fade and blink out, it blazes brilliantly and painfully before crashing into darkness. A bravura finish to a ballsy bravissimo performance. Defiance instead of claustrophobic resignation. And there is no way of knowing if it is a radical reinterpretation or just another brazenly seductive lie.