Comedy, good comedy, walks a razor’s edge, ready to teeter into tragedy at any moment.
“Uncle Vanya,” now onstage at The Rogue Theatre, is good comedy.
Really good comedy.
It’s sometimes hard to see the humor in an Anton Chekhov play. Though he always insisted his works were comedies, many directors embrace the darker, drama-heavy side of his works.
Not so the Rogue’s Joseph McGrath. He has set the play in the time it was written — pre-revolutionary Russia — and allowed both the humor and the drama to emerge organically.
The result is a clean, mesmerizing production of “Uncle Vanya,” one where the comedy comes easily, and the tragedy becomes punctuated because of that.
“Uncle Vanya” is not an easy play to do. Heck, just pronouncing the Russian names is a challenge.
Chekhov, who called it “scenes from a provincial life,” has brought together characters who have these in common: A terrible restlessness, an extreme ennui, and deep disappointment.
The Rogue’s cast has embraced all that without ever neglecting the humor, which is dark and frequent and much needed.
They all are together in a country estate, where they wander from room to room and wallow in their exhaustion and boredom with their lives.
Vanya has long cared for the estate with his niece, Sonya. The nanny Marina and Vanya’s mother also live there.
They had been just fine as they slogged through their daily chores never really acknowledging or caring about the tedium that defined their lives.
But then Professor Serebryakov and his beautiful young wife, Yelena, move in. Passions are aroused, jealousies explode, dissatisfaction wafts over and settles on them with a thud.
There is much to celebrate about this production, and at the top of the list are Matt Bowdren, Ryan Parker Knox and David Weynand.
Bowdren is the alcoholic Dr. Astrov, who comes to the estate to see to a few of the professor’s many ills. He is an infrequent visitor there, but once he meets the beautiful Yelena, he finds a reason to come by almost daily. The character’s passion for forestry, his exhaustion with caring for patients, and his constant introspection, wrap around Bowdren like a rich cloak. Because of him, we know Astrov, we ache for him, laugh at him.
Vanya’s weakness for Yelena, his desperation about a life not well lived and deep longing for some purpose, become palpable in Knox’s hands.
Weynand’s professor is full of aches and self-importance. We dislike him. We are amused by him. We are horrified by him. Weynand is riveting.
Grace Kirkpatrick’s Yelena is beautiful and icy, but it is also clear she has doubts and vulnerabilities.
Sonya, nearly crippled by her longing for an oblivious Dr. Astrov, is given an aching portrayal by Holly Griffith.
What was gripping about this cast was its ability to easily access the humor in the play without ever sacrificing the tragedy of characters who love but are not loved, live but do not have life.
If you want to laugh, catch a cat video on Youtube. If you want your comedy with nuance and depth, see the Rogue’s “Uncle Vanya.”
