The Harry Harlow Project

James Saunders’ one-man play is a mesmeric exploration of a fascinatingly cruel episode in the evolution of Western science and thinking.

Many of us have heard of Harry Harlow during high school, or first year psychology at university. He was the author of the ‘Cloth Mother’ experiments, in which infant rhesus monkeys were removed from their mothers and put in a cage with one of two substitutes: a ‘wire mother’, a vaguely monkey-shaped frame of wire; or a ‘cloth mother’, the same object rendered slightly more tactile by a cloth skin and a vague approximation of a face. Harlow documented that those baby monkeys with a cloth mother to whom they could return for comfort grew faster and showed better-adjusted development than those with the wire mother, or with no ‘mother’ at all. In doing this, he provided evidence to support the notion that human babies depended on their mothers not just for nourishment but also for love, and that love is equally essential for their healthy development.

It seems one of those propositions so commonsensically obvious that you can’t fathom why someone would have set out to prove it, especially in such a barbaric manner. However, as the first scientist to use the word ‘love’ in a scientific paper, Harlow is recognized for revolutionising psychology. The apparent conflict between his commitment to science and enlightenment and an inexplicable blindness to the pain he inflicts provides substantial motivation.

Saunders’ performance is remarkable, portraying a man driven to achieve by what we imagine to be his deep and hopeless disconnection from his family and human companionship. Only someone incapable of feeling love and affection, we think, could be capable of this emotional torture of intelligent animals. Under direction by Brian Lipson, Saunders veers masterfully from lecture-theatre mode to engaging talk show guest to anguished monologue.

Martyn Coutts’ video design is unobtrusive yet breathtakingly effective, conjuring heartrending phantom monkeys and parallel versions of Harlow himself; while Kelly Ryall’s hypnotic sound design evokes a state of suspended disbelief – or maybe suspended outrage?

The set and lighting design shift the audience between lecture theatre, science lab and the scenes of Harlow’s inner desolation. (The lighting design in particular provoked a heated debate after the show with my companion, who took exception to the frequent use of stark fluorescent lighting; however I maintain that while the experience may have been unpleasant, this lighting was remarkably effective in creating the sort of disorientating confrontation you might imagine the monkeys themselves felt.)

Rating: Four and a half stars

The Harry Harlow Project
Written & Performed by Luke Saunders
Directed & Designed by Brian Lipson
Composer: Kelly Ryall
Video Artist: Martyn Coutts
Dramaturg: Kate Sulan
Presented by Adelaide Festival Centre and Mobile States

Space Theatre
August 24 – 27