The Double is TheatreRUN’s clever adaptation of Dostoevsky’s eponymous 1846 novella about an office clerk, Golyadkin, who finds himself in competition for his own identity when he is confronted with a stranger who is his exact lookalike. It takes identity theft to a whole other level. First staged last year at Factory Theatre, this version has been further developed at Tarragon, where it runs until Nov. 24.

TheatreRUN’s artistic director Adam Paolozza and his team stick pretty close to the source material at first, but Dostoevsky’s Kafkaesque story and the loose screws of Golyadkin’s mind lend themselves to some theatrical off-roading.

The music and the language start off sounding stately and sober, but things gets jazzier and more contemporary as Golyadkin, always feeling like an outsider, and always worried about the impression he’s making, starts to lose his grip.

Dostoevsky’s The Double has been compared thematically to Gogol’s The Overcoat, the stage adaptation of which wowed Toronto audiences a few years ago. But TheatreRUN’s adaptation focuses on the absurdness of Golyadkin’s predicament rather than on the darkness of the character’s anguish. There is definitely a Wile E. Coyote vs. Road Runner aesthetic going on here.

In class-conscious 19th century St. Petersburg, Golyadkin is troubled by social anxiety, and is of two minds about everything — how to dress, where to go, what to do. His “decisions” are often prompted by the narrator. His limbs sometimes go where he is not ready to follow. As the story unfolds, he encounters his self-assured double who audaciously begins to displace him. No one but Golyadkin is perplexed when this doppelgänger, identical in appearance and name, is hired to work in the same department. The only difference between them is how each interacts with other people.

Whereas the film adaptation that premiered a few weeks ago at TIFF has Jesse Eisenberg playing both “our hero” and his double, TheatreRUN represents the double of Golyadkin in a number of ingenious ways, demonstrating the distinction between theatre magic and movie magic. Golyadkin is played masterfully by Paolozza, who also directs. Impeccably complementing Paolozza’s performance is Viktor Lukawski, who plays Golyadkin’s disrespectful man-servant Petrushka, and innumerable other characters, imbuing each with striking individuality.

Paolozza and Lukawski, both of whose training bears the watermark of the venerated École Internationale de Théâtre Jacques Lecoq in Paris, make their clowning look easy, but they are virtuoso physical performers. On the double bass — for two hours! — is up-and-coming actor Arif Mirabdolbaghi (of Juno-nominated band Protest the Hero), who holds his own as the narrator.

Set and props are sparse, which means that lighting (by André Du Toit) is the main tool to help the actors convey place. The style of performance is unapologetically raw storytelling, and it works. The first act flies by, the pace and energy pulling like big puppies on a short leash. The second act builds to a comedic frenzy and you feel, like Golyadkin, that reality is slipping through your fingers.

Solid, zany fun!

The Double, Tarragon Theatre, runs until Nov. 24

Evan Andrew Mackay is a Toronto playwright and humorist who writes about culture and social justice.