Actor Gerald Dickens riveted a roomful of diners with a flawless performance of “Mr. Dickens is Coming!”, his one-man show portraying Charles Dickens’ life and work through quirky appearances by various personalities from Dickens’ life and works.

In his narrator stance Gerald spoke factually of Charles Dickens, tossing in a good dose of cheek and levity.

“Dickens the actor created Dickens the writer,” he said. “His first love was always performing a one-man show. How arrogant and conceited can you possibly get?”

Slipping smoothly into character as a smarmy lawyer from David Copperfield, Gerald took on Uriah Heep’s oily voice with such grotesque writhings that people were inching back in their chairs to escape Heep’s clammy, grasping fingers.

Seconds later Gerald had thrown off Heep for a narrative voice and was explaining Dickens’ strange relationship with Queen Victoria. Gerald portrayed how Dickens, while on theatrical tour later in his life, refused to perform for Her Majesty, saying “I do not perform for mere individuals.”

Sweeping in and out of a myriad of characters, historical and fictional, Gerald created a multi-faceted view of Charles’ Dickens the man that intrigued, perplexed and amused the captive crowd. In his grand finale Gerald spoke as Dickens’ son, who described watching his aged, failing father perform the infamous “Sykes murdering Nancy” cameo from Oliver Twist just weeks prior to his death. Dickens’ only audience was a flowerbed.

The dinner theater event drew about 50 people and raised $2,200 for the Orcas Arts Education Project, a joint venture by Orcas Center, Orcas Schools, and the Orcas Island Education Foundation. The project has provided dance and theatre instruction to K-8 grade students in Orcas Schools classrooms over the past three years. The project has received funding this year from the Washington State Arts Commission, the Education Foundation and private donors.