Uncle Vanya
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Anton Chekhov once suggested that “one ought to write a play in which people come and go, eat, talk about the weather, and play cards.” Try pitching that to Broadway investors. Like so many other unpopular but great playwrights–Lope de Vega, Racine, Strindberg–Chekhov has long been less admired on the Great White Way than “appreciated” in regional not-for-profit theaters. And with those theaters in increasing financial jeopardy, his seemingly plotless, monotonous, petty work may become rare there as well. Fortunately Apple Tree Theatre, like other Equity houses here, still occasionally banks on classic if challenging theater, and its handsome, balanced production of Uncle Vanya, directed by Mark Lococo and performed by an impressive cast, shows that taking Chekhov seriously offers something better than entertainment.
Moreover much of the humor evaporates, as in the opening scene of act two. Self-important retired professor Serebryakov, who’s visiting his daughter Sonya’s estate for the summer, is rubbing his gout-ridden legs and grousing to his young wife, Elena, “Being old is disgusting, and even more disgusting to everyone around you.” He should seem buffoonish. Perhaps he’s even trying to pass off his true feelings as a joke, leaving Elena in a typical Chekhovian corner with no way to respond. But Patrick Clear plays the scene as pure psychological trauma, Serebryakov’s disgust as imagined by Sam Shepard. The old man becomes merely unpleasant instead of pitiable, and no tension develops between him and his wife.
Where: Apple Tree Theatre, 595 Elm, Highland Park
