REVIEW: CenterStage's 3 Sisters: Beautiful and Empty

            Much has been made this season of the fact that Baltimore's two resident Equity companies have reconfigured their spaces, and both (Everyman and CenterStage – the Head Theatre) have made successful use of that transformation.  Recently, CenterStage opened its season with a revival of the Chekhov classic, The Three Sisters.  And in CenterStage tradition, it puts its own spin on it, this time reportedly amping up the laughs, and making the translation, if not more modern, at least more accessible.  Were they successful?  Well, there were a good many chuckles throughout, though hardly the laughfest implied by local coverage, and the translation is easy to follow and understand, coupled with the lovely set that uses the new space well, bringing the action to us in the audience, instead of distancing us.  Most of the acting and the mostly interesting staging create a nice frame for Chekhov's artwork.  Unfortunately, no matter how you decorate the framework, lousy art is lousy art.  And this translation by Paul Schmidt is lousy art.

            It was a valiant fight to stay awake during the first act, lasting about an hour and half, but feeling three times as long.  I shifted in my seat (much to the chagrin of the folks in front of me – they moved, or left, after intermission – they were not alone), I thumbed through my program to make notes on the actors, but found an interesting article to read later, and I even kept tally of how many times the characters said these two lines in one form or another: "Moscow!  Moscow!  I must get to Moscow!" and honestly enough, "This place is boring."  That last line would garner a few chuckles late in the game from a knowing audience. I think my tally began about half way through the act, and the number of repetitions was staggering (late double digits in total).  Perhaps a critic shouldn't admit to such behavior, but I do think it my responsibility to at least remain awake until the final curtain.  And with the repetition and amazingly little action or story, it wasn't hard to follow.  Was it intentional that those two lines could also be a summary of act one?  Nothing happens – not a small fete considering there is a cast of 16 making grand entrances and exits throughout.  Act two, with much more action, though all of it offstage, is at least more interesting, what with leaves falling and entrances from the bowels of the Head Theatre.  Heck, there's even some blood.  But this "leap" in interest is ultimately tempered by the realization that the place will only get more boring now that the troops are leaving (the army men live in the town and have been reassigned), and the fact that no one makes it to bloody Moscow!  That Chekhov, laughs and all, is a real downer.

            Director Irene Lewis has, together with her designers Robert Israel (scenic design), Candice Donnelly (costumes) and Mimi Jordan Sherin (lighting), created a beautiful world in which the play takes place.  The gleaming light wood at once suggests a sterility and quiet beauty, not unlike the titular sisters.  And the dressing is uniformly elegant, if not a bit heavy handed – two clocks frame the stage and face mirrors to double our pleasure – as time marches on ever so slowly.  Mesmerizing and slowly.  The attention to detail in the props and the specificity of the gorgeous costumes are beautiful adornments to a terrifically staged affair.  Lewis creates magnificent, symbolic stage pictures, each perfect for a photo shoot.  That is to say it is stagy in an artistic, yet distancing way, odd considering the immediacy of the cast to a large percentage of the seating.  Still, visually, The Three Sisters is currently unparalleled on local stages.

 

           With the excellent evenness of the technical aspects and direction, and the dull evenness of the script, it is amazing that the cast fares as well as it does.  Truth be told, the cast goes about fifty-fifty, excellent to dull.  Each of the three sisters seems to have studied with three different acting coaches, and none of the three ever waivers from their style.  The result is interesting, because it sure points out that each of the three is a distinct individual, but it also is like watching three different plays.  Stacy Ross as the terminally spinsterish schoolmarm sister, acts like she is in a VERY DRAMATIC soap opera.  The character's chief complaint all through the evening is how tired she is, and how she never plans to be headmistress.  Even the slightest angst in a moment unleashes the classic soap actress – she's not just tired, she's TIRED.  Speaking through clinched jaw, and hilariously clutching a drink, and emphasizing each emotion with bizarre hands to face movements, Ross's Olga would find good company on One Life to Live perhaps.  As the youngest sister, Irina, Mahira Kakkar has the most to work with.  Her character goes through a complete cycle.  She is also saddled with that ridiculous Moscow line, and an odd British affectation (not unlike Madonna when she's being "serious").  At first I thought it was her real accent, which is fine, until it faltered later.  If, in fact it is her real accent, the affectation needs to be more even – she is, after all, acting.  And boy, does she ACT, in that melodramatic, Gone with the Wind kind of style, which might have worked, were the rest of the cast in the same play.  Need someone to throw herself down in a fake fit of emotion?  She's the girl you need.  And lastly, as the lead of the three, Christine Marie Brown as Masha, can't seem to get a handle on what she wants.  Her speech and cadence are decidedly modern and out of whack with the rest of her siblings, yet she struts and frets about the stage like Lady Macbeth.  At the end, I'll admit she is pretty effective when her heartbreaks – I was genuinely moved, but then she "healed" and in comes a modern actress – I'm thinking Sally Field was whom she was trying for.

            Similarly, the supporting cast is all over the place.  The actors range from the truly excellent – Willy Conley as the deaf soldier, and Andy Paterson as his "voice" and fellow soldier, Rohde, who are both a delight to watch and heartwarming, to the very good Matt Bradford Sullivan as the doomed and quirky Baron.  He is interesting to watch at all times and seems to really get the variety his character must convincingly convey.  Then there is the decent, Kristin Fiorella, who plays her family-encroaching wife role to the hilt, garnering a few gasps for her abusive treatment of the help, but who ultimately loses points for acting like Reese Witherspoon playing a bitch – WAY TOO MODERN.  And finally, the sadly ineffectual turn of Mary Fogarty, an aging servant played entirely for sympathy and getting none (she gasps for breath and limps around like an old servant might, but never like it is real).  The rest of the cast fits in between these extremes, alternately interesting and infuriating. 

The result is a mishmash of styles, none very good on their own.  The entire cast, it must be said, is fully committed to the script, and what a shame, since the script is really at fault for most of the production's ills.  Pretty to look at, at least in this case, is not enough.

 

 

PHOTO: (L to R) Stacy Ross, Mahira Kakkar, and Christine Marie Brown, courtesy of CenterStage.

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