Reviewed by Judy Richter
Anton Chekhov is said to have considered "Uncle
Vanya" a
comedy, but few productions manage to find anything funny about his
stuck-in-a-rut characters who spend much of their time complaining. Directing
for California Shakespeare Theater, Timothy Near and her superlative cast elicit the play's comic aspects
while allowing the characters to maintain their dignity. It's a fine line that
all negotiate with ease. A graceful adaptation by Emily Mann assists their journey.
Erik
Flatmo's raked
set with grasses in back, along with Jeff Mockus' sound, makes clear from the
start that the characters are on a working farm in the Russian countryside, far
from any intellectual or artistic centers. Indeed, Chekhov subtitled the play
"Scenes From a Country Life." The farm belongs to Sonya (Annie Purcell), who has been running it along
with her Uncle Vanya (Dan Hiatt), the brother of her late mother. They have been sending
most of the earnings to her father, Alexander Serebryakov (James Carpenter), a retired professor who has
recently arrived from the city along with his young, beautiful wife, Yelena (Sarah
Grace Wilson).
Vanya has little regard for Alexander, whom he regards as a pompous
pseudointellectual and who does little except complain about his gout and treat
everyone like a servant. Vanya is deeply infatuated with Yelena, who spurns him
despite her loveless marriage.
She
also tries to spurn Mikhail Astrov (Andy Murray), a doctor and frequent visitor
who also is infatuated with her and who seems unaware of the unhappy Sonya's
love for him. Also part of the household are Marina (Barbara Oliver), the family's practical old
nanny; Maria Voynitsky (Joan Mankin), Sonya's grandmother, who has activist aspirations that
she never acts on; and Ilya Telegin, also known as Waffles (Howard Swain), an impoverished landowner
who's almost unfailingly cheerful and unfailingly clueless. Swain's guitar
playing highlights several scenes.
Although
Astrov despairs at the ignorance, filth and disease he encounters daily, he
also tries to make the future better by planting and tending to trees. In a
remarkably prescient speech that Al Gore might have channeled, he talks about the
environmental damage, including climate change, caused by deforestation. In
another contemporary moment, Waffles talks about having remained faithful to
his wife even though she ran off with another man on the second day of their
marriage. He says infidelity is treason, a line that drew laughs on opening
night, just a day after former presidential hopeful John Edwards admitted to an extramarital
affair.
Hiatt
uses his skill at physical comedy to show how ridiculous Vanya can be as he
pursues Yelena. However, he overdoes it in his desperate confrontation with
Alexander. All of the other actors excel. Raquel M. Barreto's costumes help to define the
characters just as York Kennedy's lighting helps to set the scene and interactions.
Chekhov's
characters don't seem to get very far with their lives, but Near and her cast
bring out their essential humanity and allow the audience to feel sorry for
their unhappiness.