Written by: Allison Foat, Cape Town
Pictures by: Harold Guess
To call Jeremy Crutchley outstanding in I Am My Own Wife, is a major understatement. His portrayal of Charlotte von Mahlsdorf and several other characters in Doug Wright’s Pulitzer Prize winning play is nothing short of brilliant.
Crutchley is a multiple award-winning actor with 30 years of experience in the theatre. In this two-act play he presents von Mahlsdorf’s story, portraying the idiosyncratic Charlotte as a gentle and sensitive being who, as Doug Wright puts it, is larger than life. Crutchley’s delivery throughout the performance is superb. He completely draws in the rapt audience as he effortlessly switches from one character to another with great confidence. His German and American accents are faultless and in almost forty characterisations his mannerisms remain distinct and consistent. Crutchley brings to Charlotte tremendous warmth and an element of shyness that makes her very endearing.
Charlotte von Mahlsdorf was born Lothar Berfelde in 1928 in Berlin. As a child Berfelde displayed a fascination with girls’ clothing and so-called “junk”. These early interests laid the foundation for his later emergence as Charlotte von Mahlsdorf, the famous transvestite and collector of everyday objects. Von Mahlsdorf encountered a great deal of angst in her life- a violent father, incarceration in a psychiatric institution, persecution and abuse at the hands of the Communists and Neo Nazis, and more. Amidst the negative experiences however Charlotte found solace as she absorbed herself in her passion for collecting and preserving items that held historical and cultural value. Her extensive collection of furniture, gramophones and clocks, perhaps the largest of its kind in the world, eventually evolved into the Gründerzeit Museum that she opened in 1960 and that became well-known in cinematic, artistic and gay circles. Given the meagre resources at her disposal at the time, Mahlsdorf’s preservation efforts were heroic.
In 1992, ten years before her unexpected death at the age of 72, Charlotte published her autobiography, Ich bin meine eigene Frau (I Am My Own Wife). The title of the book comes from a conversation Mahlsdorf had with her mother who said, “as much as I like to have you with me, you are now really at an age to be married”, to which Mahlsdorf replied, “I am my own wife,”. This statement reflected her independence and self-sufficiency, as well as her identification with the feminine and Crutchley captures all of this with aplomb.
The success of I Am My Own Wife is due not only to the actor but to excellent direction by Janice Honeyman, the design by Dicky Longhurst, lighting by Mannie Manim, and props by Koos Marais.
Wright’s extraordinary play opened on Broadway in 2003 and went on to win the Tony Award, the Pulitzer Prize, and the Lambda Literary Award. I have no doubt it will be a frontrunner in numerous South African awards ceremonies in the near future.
I Am My Own Wife runs at the Baxter Studio Theatre until 8 August. Tickets are available via Computicket.
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