Photo via MRT Facebook.

Presented by Merrimack Repertory Theatre
Adapted by Jeffrey Hatcher from the novella Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson
Directed by Jenny Lavery
Featuring: Brent Charles, Sarah Danko, Herman Gambhir, André Martin, Amber Quick, Ed Swidey

October 14-November 1, 2026
Merrimack Repertory Theatre
50 E Merrimack St
Lowell, MA 01852

Critique by Diana Lu

Run time: 120 minutes, with 15 minute intermission

LOWELL, Mass. — Jeffrey Hatcher’s 2008 adaptation is an interesting departure from the Robert Louis Stevenson novella. The basic premise remains largely the same: set in Victorian London, respected physician and researcher Henry Jekyll (André Martin) explores the duality of good and evil in human nature. Like the good old masculine scientist trope that he is, Dr. Jekyll experiments on himself and develops a potion that transforms him into his darker alter ego, Edward Hyde (all but Danko and Martin). Stripped of all conscience and apparently his medical degree, Mr. Hyde rampages through the streets of London at night, causing all sorts of ruckus for Dr. Jekyll and his neighbors.

Unlike the original, Hatcher portrays several different Mr. Hydes, played by actors who double as other characters major and minor, representing the different shards of Jekyll’s Jungian shadow, and implying that all of us, even NPCs, contain multitudes. Hatcher also introduces a female love interest, Elizabeth (Sarah Danko) focusing on the destructive nature of self-denial, and less so on any homoerotic reads of the original. The result is a moody, liminal exploration of the nature of desire, darkness, suppression and connection. It feels more psychologically inquisitive and nuanced than the typical good vs evil conceit. I love when an adaptation thematically and artistically expands the original, like when a surprising cover completely reinterprets a song.

Merrimack Repertory Theatre’s staging of Hatcher’s Jekyll and Hyde effectively conveyed the essence of a dark, unsettling psychological drama in which identity is never quite understood and the boundary between self and other, shadow and light, is continually being negotiated. Michael Hoover’s scenic design transformed Merrimack’s intimate stage into an angsty charcoal set full of stairs and doors like an Escher drawing. Lighting designer Brian J. Lillenthal created the red door motif with foreboding red backlight that kept shifting doorframes, the way unstable memories or identities might.

Yao Chen’s inspired costume designs were my favorite production elements. Beautiful and colorful period pieces, they must have required considerable creative engineering, balancing historical elegance with the flexibility necessary for the actors’ impressive physical performances, including leaping the stairs and slow-motion fight scenes choreographed by Ansley Rizzo. The sequined red streaks across the abdomens of the actors portraying Hyde resemble licks of fire or open gashes. They are used narratively, revealed whenever the actors transform into Hyde. The red highlights of the costumes echoed the red doors of the set as thresholds between respectable exterior and dark hearts, heightening the visual coherence of the whole show.

I often felt that the physicality of the performers carried the show while the actual acting out of the script was sometimes too loud or melodramatic. There was a lot of screaming and breaking down sobbing that might be more suited to a larger theater. I felt that emotional turmoil at a ten but expressed at a two would have been more aligned with the Victorian setting and the stage.

I was particularly impressed by Brent Charles and Herman Gambhir. Charles’s physicality, facial expressions, and acrobatics often made me audibly gasp. Gambhir, who portrayed the main Hyde, grounded both evil and tender moments with subtle expressivity. I also loved Amber Quick as a Hyde, as well as her range of side characters. It is a great way to incorporate more women into the show. I greatly appreciated director Jenny Lavery’s choice to give Quick the most sexually violent  lines and blocking of the Hyde-Elizabeth scenes. Hatcher’s script uses violence against women as shorthand for moral corruption in his antagonists. This would be more triggering in the hands of a less sensitive director, but Lavery mitigates the impact with grace.

What I find most compelling about Hatcher’s adaptation is its complexity as a meditation on the psyche. Mr. Hyde is not merely the based splinter of an otherwise pure and good Dr. Jekyll. Hatcher gradually reveals Jekyll’s lust, Hyde’s tenderness, Elizabeth’s unconditional loyalty. What results is a gestalt, almost fractal philosophy of mind—even our shadows have shadows. And what is revealed by each character in turn is a fundamental desire for surrender, connection, and being fully seen. This framework fundamentally inverts the intent of the original. What Hatcher damns is not each character’s deepest human hungers, but the social order that forbids their expression.

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