Oh, man. This play.
This is a one-man play, and it is definitely not for everyone. I’m still trying to decide if I liked it or not. I think I did, but then I also think that might make me a bad person. Oh well!
Harry Clarke doesn’t exist. Not really. He’s a character that Philip creates for himself at the tender young age of eight. Philip, a born-and-raised Indiana boy, only feels like himself when he speaks with an English accent. So he does, to the dismay of his father. (And my first reaction to hearing Philip’s “English accent” was that it was awful.) So Philip has an English accent, but Harry Clarke has a Cockney accent, and the two are different. Harry gets put away, though, and Philip eventually moves to New York, English accent and all. He tells people he’s from England, or lets them assume, and never tells the truth.
Philip decides to follow a stranger around New York for a bit one day, just for the novelty of it. He follows him into shops and a cafe, and listens to his conversation, and when the stranger enters a hotel Philip lets it go, and doesn’t really think of it again. But one night, a few months later, he sees the stranger again, and when the stranger (Mark) asks for his name, Harry Clarke comes out. And Harry Clarke and Mark become friends. And as Mark introduces Harry to his family and friends, Harry becomes essential to Mark, with a few gaps in the timeline.
Harry Clarke is a wish-fulfillment character. He is everything Philip is not: successful, confident, sexy. He’s comfortable in any situation. And Harry Clarke is a bit of a scam artist. He lies and cheats and takes advantage. But other than nudging situations about and lying, he never really does anything awfully wrong to Mark, as far as he knows. I mean, Harry does some very bad things, but he probably makes Mark’s life better. And Mark makes his own bad decisions. So in the end, you’re left asking yourself not if Harry deserves what he got, but was he really wrong in taking it?
(This came with another play that I started listening to and then gave up on.)