Behold the Man Who Is a Bean
Mr. Bean is the intersection between myth and reality, the following is an argument as to how and why.
How?
How, oh, how, did this come about? Rowan Atkinson mistaken for Mr. Bean. Mr. Bean being someone’s uncle Rowan. Rowan being told “you’re the absolute spitting image of that Mr. Bean (1),” all the while being Mr. Bean. Or is he? In 1990 Mr. Bean appears on our screens. Rowan Atkinson began portrayals and appearances while completing his PhD at Oxford while completing his doctorate in Electrical Engineering, a good place to start (2).
Engineering and the sciences have exposed man to an ever expansive knowledge base and lexicon. This lexicon is smeared across various mediums be it text, video, audio, television, love letters, laptops, iPads, VR goggles, etc. For the scope of this essay, television as a medium shall suffice so as to evade what may risk becoming a separate subject entirely. Television, according to the New American Oxford Dictionary, is a system for transmitting visual images and sound that are reproduced on screens, chiefly used to broadcast programs for entertainment, information, and education (3). In this light television can be viewed as just that - light. Via LCD or CRT display technologies, light becomes a tool that allows one to reconstitute reality. Cutting and pasting it in such a manner as to simulate sensation successfully. As images scroll by at a rate just short of your brain registering how disparate the images in fact are, motion emerges. With an audio channel integrated noise emerges and suddenly this box of sum, plastic and wire, is alive. The possibility of a television having a life of it’s own is seemingly absurd, however, as a wave of thinkers from Baudrillard to Lacan have incessantly affirmed, the opposite may be the case. They remark instead, the overwhelming success television (and other such media) have had in not just reconstituting reality, but coming to replace it entirely (4).
So imagine, with this as a premise, continuing the long standing legacy of the buffoon. The character of Pierrot takes multiple persons, and tours European stages and conversations. Mr. Bean, on the other hand, engulfs Rowan Atkinson and circulates global media and minds. Pierrot takes his mask off and calls it a day. Rowan Atkinson walks on stage introduced as the man behind [Mr. Bean’s] mask (5).”
Why?
Now begins the why -oh why- does Mr. Bean represent us so? In Rowan’s own words. “it’s the comedy of nothing happening (5).” And here we hear echoes of Godot, going down the existential rabbit hole. Yet quite a bit happens. Mr. Bean shops, goes to the dentist, plays mini-golf, goes on dates, even celebrates New Year’s. Nothing special, but much like everyday life, his simple tasks evolve into chaos. Even what begins as a simple shopping trip doesn’t begin as a simple shopping trip. In the episode “Do it Yourself Mr. Bean,” Mr. Bean embodies many modern values. Cutting a line ahead of senior citizens, popping his proxy, and proceeding to go shopping.
Mr. Bean represents is the chaotic navigation of man against meaning. What is interesting is the manner in which the portrayal effectively costs Rowan Atkinson his identity and, in contrast, provides Mr. Bean an existence. In the 20th and 21st century, Euclid’s world of infinitely straight lines, circular ellipses, spherical cuboids - transition - to a world to our reality of rigid lumps, bold bumps, and infinitely small clumps. Benoit Mandelbrot, pioneer of Chaos Theory says simply: “clouds are not spheres, mountains are not cones, coastlines are not circles, and bark is not smooth, nor does lightning travel in a straight line (7).” All of a sudden, Mr Bean’s means of navigation no longer seem so absurd all of a sudden.
It must also be mentioned, Mr Bean is essentially mute. Wise, perhaps he’s read some Wittgenstein, if that’s even possible. As Wittgenstein explains in the Tractatus (1.1 or does he since the Tractasus at it’s onset states nothing truly can be explained for every word is merely the shadow of it’s own meaning. 1.2 With every word being related by their being unrelated, the probability itself of my using a word in English applicable to a subject is immediately 1 ÷ 171’476 = 0.00000583...(wow that’s small...) ) 1.3. But that’s enough Wittgenstein, and disregard of conventions within this written assignment. One can only wonder what Mr. Bean would have to say about all this? Probably not much - blame the deconstrucitvists.) (8).
Small and insignificant; a bean is all one is. But as Chaos theory suggests, perhaps even something as small as a butterfly’s wings has it’s ramifications? To reiterate, Mr. Bean and Rowan Atkinson, represent an intersection between man and reality. How, a man may be split by his society merely due to an appearance upon their silver screen. Why a man mustn’t resist the absurdity that is life because, “what is life,” is a question that is tremendously technical to misunderstand; test it. If one asks themselves who they are, where they’re going or what they’re doing perhaps Mr. Bean offers a soft solution.
Bibliography:
Rowan Atkinson, “The Graham Norton Show,” interview by Graham Norton, British Broadcasting Company (5 October 2018)
Encyclopaedia Britannica, s.v. “Rowan Atkinson” (https://www.britannica.com/biography/ Rowan-Atkinson)
American Oxford English Dictionary, s.v. “television”
Jean Baudrillard, Cool Memories, New York, Verso, 1990
Rowan Atkinson,”Talkshowet,” interview by Jarl Friis-Mikkelsen, Denmark Radios (1993) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1mdpz6lvZc0 (0:30, 6:55)
Do It Yourself Mr Bean. (2010). Mr. Bean. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IqFGj837W9A&ab_channel=MrBean.
James Gleick, Chaos, New York, The Viking Press, 1987
Ludwig Wittgenstein, Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, London, Rutledge & Keegan Paul Ltd 1922
By Maxime Mballa-Tagny.