Toner Poem

The invention of the photocopier - who'd have thought this would be a suitable topic for a performance? And yet Shea's narrative inexorably draws us forward in our seats, as though we were the first witnesses to Chester Carlson's grand creation. Throughout the evening, Shea's folksy manner grows on us as we watch this bow-tied, bespectacled figure in gray flannel repeatedly sigh, "Oh, my . . ." as he buckles beneath the weight of life and its capriciousness. There is a pathos about him that recalls John Dos Passos' melancholy passage on Luther Burbank in The 42nd Parallel, the sad realization of a life spent creating a miracle that no one had ever missed before its appearance but that no one could live without afterward.

Within weeks of Xerox's first demonstration of Carlson's copier, the newly renamed Haloid Xerox Corp. was swamped with orders, and a machine soon sat in the White House. One of the funny things about the appearance of the Xerox copier is that, against the expectation of Carlson and his colleagues, people didn't confine themselves to making one or two copies of documents as needed, but dozens - hundreds. (In those days the company rented its machines and charged by the copy.) When success came, it made Carlson a millionaire 200 times over. It also made him superfluous - a prematurely old man beset by infirmities, he had nothing to do but occasionally tour the Xerox lab or go to the movies for the eight years remaining of his life. He did, however, remarry in the late '40s, this time to a woman who believed she was psychic, and the two spent their lives meditating and happily investigating the paranormal.

Carlson's final wish was to die poor; he anonymously donated millions to humanitarian causes, as well as giving money very publicly to the scientific study of out-of-body experiences, ESP and other manifestations of what Shea's character calls "the other side." Much of this aspect of Carlson's life is not in the show proper, but emerges in a post-play question-answer session that Shea conducts with the audience. It's a shame this couldn't have been incorporated into the performance, one ably directed by Martha Stevens but that could benefit from some technical fireworks. It would hardly cheapen the show to duplicate a few of the images and blinding bursts of light Carlson must have seen during his life. After all, isn't imitation the highest form of flattery?