UNCLE VANYA: Scenes from a Country Life

UNCLE VANYA by Anton Chekhov, adapted Emily Mann, directed by Timothy Near. California Shakespeare Theater (Cal Shakes), Bruns Amphitheater, 100 Gateway Blvd., Orinda. Call (510) 548-9666 or go to www.calshakes.org. August 6-31, 2008.

CHEKHOV’S UNCLE VANYA AN EYE OPENING COMEDY??

Forget what you have heard about Chekhov’s plays being wordy, dull, boring and treat yourself to a comedy, although a tragicomedy, with a star studded cast under superb direction by Timothy Near on a marvelous Erik Flatmo set at the Bruns Amphitheater in Orinda. Yes, Chekhov is wordy and he inserts monologs directed at the audience but Emily Mann’s adaptation mines the humor in complex human relations keeping the pathos intact.

Using the word “tragic” as part of the play’s description is inappropriate since the characters are hardly greater than life and their downfall involves ordinary people. All the characters, with the exception of Marina (venerable, charming Barbara Oliver) the nanny, are failures in the game of life. Without exception, their failures lead to inner turmoil, confrontation and depression.

The scene is a 19th century family estate in rural Russia. Professor Alexander Serebryakov (James Carpenter) and his young trophy second wife, Yelena (Sarah Grace Wilson) have returned to live there. Living at the estate, along with Marina, are the Professor’s 25 year old daughter Sonja (Annie Purcell), 47 year old Ivan “Uncle” Vanya (Dan Hiatt), her grandmother Maria (Joan Mankin) and former land owner neighbor Ilya Telegin (Howard Swain). Sonja has inherited the estate after her mother’s death. For years, she and Uncle Vanya, with Maria’s insistence, have sacrificed the profits from the estate to support her father’s academic ambition. The intrusion of the professor and Yelena into the household upsets the balance of daily life and leads to semi-chaos.

Chekhov displays his interest in conservation, creating Dr. Astrov, who bemoans the destruction, and is dedicated to restoring, the forest. But he has his own internal angst and drinking problem (“I need nothing, I love no one.”). He foreshadows what is to come in his opening monolog to Marina, “. . . existence is tedious . . . it is a senseless, dirty business, this life goes heavily. Everyone about here is silly . . . and . . . (one) grows silly oneself.” The inevitable starts to unravel.

Uncle Vanya seethes with resentment for wasting his life supporting the Professor and becomes smitten with Yelena. Sonja yearns for Astrov who loves Yelena. Yelena is disenchanted with marriage and falls in love with Astrov. Yelena comes to realize she has wasted her youth and beauty. The Professor continues to write, hoping to procure Fame that will live on after his death and is unaware, “For twenty-five years he has been masquerading in false clothes and has now retired, absolutely unknown to any living soul. . .”

The cast, under Near’s tight direction, mix comedy and disillusionment in equal proportions rejuvenating Chekhov for new audiences. Surprisingly, Hiatt successfully creates Uncle Vanya as an ineffectual buffoon eliciting empathy with his pathetic hang-dog look when he observes Astrov and Yelena kissing. One criticism leveled by audience members is the overstepping of the fine line between comedy and slapstick when a Keystone Cop routine is inserted during the episode when Vanya attempts to shoot the professor. Annie Purcell invests the role of Sonja with heart breaking realism erasing any previous humor with the final line, “You have never known what it is to be happy, but wait, Uncle Vanya, wait! We shall rest. We shall rest.”

Yelena’s attraction to Andy Murray’s strong, virile, magnetic personae of Astrov makes her desire for him palpable. James Carpenter’s perfect control as the domineering, haughty, yet whining personality of the professor is a reflection of what we have come to expect of him . . . complete sublimation into the characters he has played. Howard Swain’s underplaying of the gentle Ilya Telegin matches the few plaintive notes he strums on his guitar.

With the single repetitive line “They have gone.” Chekhov brings finality to his play but leaves the lives of his characters in shambles.
Running time 2 hours and 25 minutes
Kedar K. Adour, MD
Courtesy of TheatreWorld Internet Magazine