Bernard Pomerance’s 1979 Tony-winner The Elephant Man is a wisp of heart-tugger but it does tug at the heart, even if groaner dialogue like “Sometimes I think my head is so big because it is so full of dreams” also has an mild effect on the stomach. Strawberry Theatre Workshop’s new staging manages to be touching without flagrant assault but, like the play, it errs on the side of “decency”.

It’d be difficult not to feel something for Joseph Merrick, now erroneously known as John thanks to some flubbed memoirs later written by his savior, Dr. Frederick Treves. Born with a debilitating and horribly disfiguring congenital disorder in 19th-century England, Merrick (MJ Sieber) grows up unloved after his mother’s death leaves him to London’s notoriously vicious workhouses then to life as a tormented sideshow freak. A chance encounter with Treves (David Pichette) leads to permanent residence in London Hospital, which gives the city’s high society a chance to applaud its own munificence.

The play, which shares the same subject as but was not the source material for David Lynch’s 1980 film, dabbles in a little gush about how innocently wise people with disfiguring congenital disorders can be. Merrick was, in reality, a thoughtful soul but his ability here to go head-to-head (forgive me) with Treves in moral debates seems the stuff of sentimental fantasy. Pomerance intriguingly questions the “normalization” of Merrick and recognizes the insulting condescension of London’s ugly-people-are-human-too embrace—we watch as a roster of Britain’s finest shows up to grant Merrick gifts and casual company—but can’t help engaging in a smidge of both himself.

This production’s director, Julie Beckman, and her ensemble fortunately don’t push things further into mawkish schmaltz. At just over an hour-and-a-half, the show moves like a British panto, a delicate fairy tale full of silhouettes behind scenic designer (and artistic director) Greg Carter’s sliding curtains. Beckman guides the material with quiet grace; even the cruel sideshow barker (Rob Burgess, in a fine turn) is allowed his humanity without caricature.

Pichette responds wonderfully well under these circumstances, delivering a thoughtful, looser, more spontaneous performance than I’ve seen him give in years of local roles as clenched Englishmen (I feared he’d break a blood vessel as Higgins in the 5th Avenue’s My Fair Lady some seasons ago). But Beckman may have been delicate to a fault with Sieber. Although his vocal understatement deserves praise (he keeps Merrick’s speech impediment at a gentle sputter), he isn’t asked to reach for any great physical transformation to complement his tender rendering of Merrick’s soul. A loin cloth and twisted limbs sufficed for Broadway’s Merricks (including Billy Crudup in the recent revival) but we don’t really see Sieber’s body here, and seeing Merrick—sharing his (and the actor’s) naked vulnerability while acknowledging our own discomfort or titillation—is everything.

Modesty also blunts the best scene. Pomerance constructed his play almost entirely of vignettes that top themselves off just when they might be getting at something. He gave himself more room in Merrick’s interactions with a famous actress, Mrs. Kendal (Alexandra Tavares), whom Treves smugly hires to give his patient a fabricated social thrill. The savvy Kendal soon realizes that the Elephant Man is, indeed, a man, and establishes an honest rapport that eventually inspires her to show him her nude form as a sign of mutual trust. Beckman has her “disrobe” out of our sight.

It’s a mistake.

Tavares exudes a sensuous warmth on stage; she’s the best thing in the show. You miss her when a shocked Treves shuttles her character off and out of the play. By assuming that even Kendal’s lovely body requires discretion, Beckman inadvertently suggests that Merrick, too, should remain in shadow. If we can’t look at each other without embarrassment, how in hell can we look at ourselves?