Blank Canvas’ ‘Equus’ reins in pyrotechnics to reveal raw emotion Bob Abelman Cleveland Jewish News, The News Herald, The Morning Journal Member, International Association of Theatre Critics Peter Shaffer’s 1975 Tony Award-winning “Equus” focuses on a single, inexplicable and horrific crime: the blinding of six horses with a metal spike by a 17-year-old boy. The play largely unfolds through a series of lengthy confessional monologues by psychiatrist Dr. Martin Dysart (Russell Kunz) and – through flashbacks, dream sequences or under hypnosis – by the boy, Alan Strang (Antonio DeJesus), his distraught and devoutly religious mother (Claudia Esposito), and his strict and socialist father (Andrew Narten). Throughout the play, Dysart is attempting to discover the deeply rooted reason for this violent act, find the cause of the boy’s psychosexual fixation on horses, and rid him of his emotional and mental anguish. While doing so, he reveals his own personal and professional crises. He lives in a loveless marriage. He is unable to experience the same passion expressed by his young patient. And he fears that by stripping Alan Strang of his fantasies and immense pain, his cure will be removing the very things that make the boy human. Blank Canvas’ production of “Equus” is a good one. Should a more effective and engaged Dysart show up in subsequent performances, this will be a great one. For more of this article, go to www.clevelandjewishnews.com/columnists/.