Uncle Vanya (review)

Spoilers ahoy!

On a personal note, Uncle Vanya by Anton Chekhov is my favorite play by this author.  One might expect some negative reaction upon viewing an "adaptation" (by Neil LaBute) of this masterpiece.  However, to my own mind art is open to interpretation, must remain so.  Each time one produces a play, one ends up adapting it, not least in the choices each production brings forth--decisions by actors, directors, designers, and many more.  The real issue focuses upon the result.

City Garage's current production of Uncle Vanya offers what I most desire in such a thing--a reimagining that feel utterly true yet re-sets how I perceive the play.  What a gift, and I thank everyone involved from the depths of my heart!  

I know many regard Chekhov as a difficult playwright (true), full of subtleties (true), given to traps of falling into the presumed "mood" (also true).  Frankly I've seen plenty of productions fall over themselves, tripping into seeming traps of expectation.   Like the belief these are terribly serious dramas.  Chekhov himself called them comedies, which to our minds means a series of jokes.  But with Chekhov humor is simply part of the flavor, an equal blend of tragedy, pathos, hope, fear, melancholy, comfort, and yes at the same time comedy.  "No we are not ever going to be happy" in this context becomes funny.  Because what else is laughter for, save to cope with and ward away despair?

The title character (Troy Dunn) is a middle-aged man falling into old age and feels that fact in every cell of every bone.  He and his niece Sonya (Anabela Nguyen) run an estate in rural Russia sometime towards the end the 1800s.  We can call them the leads, not least because of the title--and of course no one else calls Vanya "uncle."  For decades they have been working, drawing out every single kopek they can to send to Sonya's father the Professor (Andy Kallok) who has been famous and esteemed.  Until now.  Forced into retirement by time and age, the Professor has come to the estate to try and live there.  Once a dazzling lecturer and author, now a frail old man full of complaints and demands.  With him has come his new, young, very beautiful wife Yelena (Angela Beyer). 

Together they proceed to disrupt this household in almost every way, without trying to do anything of the kind.  Vanya falls head over heels in love with Yelena, a fact she enjoys but does not like that she enjoys it.  She wants to be friends with Sonya, who cannot help but bewail her own lack of beauty, yet finds comfort as she learns her stepmother is unhappy.  Doctor Astrov (Taylor Lee Marr) , the well-learned but alcoholic local physician starts to visit more often.  He is Vanya's friend.  More, he is the unrequited target of romantic adoration by the lonely Sonya--who btw should be considered quite a catch, since she is kind and helpful, hardworking and technically owns this big estate.  But she is not beautiful.  Her surface does not attract.  Worse, Yelena's own beauty fiercely attracts Astrov!  Worse still--at least for Vanya and Sonya--she herself feels strong attraction to Astrov.  Too bad for him she absolutely will not violate her marriage vows.   

What an emotional patch of hard ground and entrenched weeds!

Hence we continue to see these plays, and especially I think Uncle Vanya.  It makes for a horror story, really, a catharsis for what we all fear life truly might be.  Full of despair and mistakes, missed chances, yet not that much cruelty when you think on it, just lots of foolishness.  One gets the impression these folks could get their lives together if they tried.  No one is evil.  In fact I found myself liking all the major characters, even the Professor for all of his curmudgeon ways.  All fools of course.  But aren't we all?  None are fools about everything, but they fail to support one another, almost as if they don't know how.  Alone, none of them really feels like enough, and together they never do more than enough to keep things functioning.  

I suspect the visit by the Professor and his wife might genuinely be the last chance for any of them.  They do not rise to that possibility, which proves equal parts heart-breaking and also understandable.  

All this works because the cast, directed by Frederique Michel (honestly this is one of the best things I've seen from her) without exception bring all these characters to surprising, bittersweet life.  Including Telegrin (Ralph Radebaugh) who hangs around the estate his family once owned, the elderly un-imaginative but competent maid Marina (Geraldine Fuentes), and finally Maria (Strawn Bovee) who is Vanya's mother yet dismisses all his pain and Sonya's amidst her worship of the Professor. She is the only character I did not like, incidentally.  

Uncle Vanya plays Fridays and Saturdays at 8:00pm, Sundays at 4:00pm through March 29, 2026 at the City Garage 2525 Michigan Ave. Building T1, Santa Monica, Ca. 90404.

  

Richard III (review)

 Spoilers ahoy!

Fessing up--Richard III is my favorite play by William Shakespeare.  So I have seen many, many, many productions including the famous film versions starring Lawrence Olivia and Ian McKlellan respectively as hunchbacked king.  A Noise Within's production of this play, directed by Guillermo Cienfuegos and starring Ann Noble in the title role, frankly is the best live action version of it I myself have ever seen.

A big factor amid all this is the cast, which encompasses over thirty characters (this is an early play and is technically a bit rough around the edges).  Most versions I've seen have proven hard pressed to get enough uniform quality in the cast.  Not this time!  Particular standouts include Lynn Robert Berg as the Duke of Buckingham, Veralyn Jones as the Duchess of York, Samuel Garnett as Lord Hastings, Randolph Thompson  as Catesby, and Erika Soto as Lady Anne (a criminally under used character, but like I said, this was an early play).

With the kind of wild sets and costumes and lights (as well as music) to really go to town, this Richard is set in some version of the 1970s, and with that in mind some wonderfully weird details emerge.  Like the startling fashion range, up to and including the strangely groovy look and body language of our central character.  Likewise the women become over time more and more frumpy, not because they are but it seems natural in such an England dominated by a Duke then King who kept remind me of the Kray Brothers in some odd way, or the character Scorpio in Dirty Harry.  Men as malevolent peacocks seemed part of the "look" here.  Likewise one could see a deliberate attempt to make our hero Richmond (Wesley Guimarães) as least posh, least upper class and least preening as feasible.  It helps make him an individual, rather than a cookie cutter Prince Charming as he is often portrayed.   

That to me highlights was is best about this specific Richard III, how every character comes across as an individual, with individual senses of humor, sources of confusion, rhythms and world views.  Nothing generic here.  I offer much credit to the entire cast in that regard--Lesley Fera, Trisha Miller, Alex Neher, Tony Pasqualini, Sean Umeda, Brendan Burgos, Vic Crusaos, Dominick Jaramillo, and Micah Lanfer.

Here we have one of Bill's most famous and most challenging plays, a popular show with a great villain--the Hannibal Lecter of Tudor Theatre, although we only do Shakespeare's version.  The reasons are many, but the big one is that Richard in this play is a human being, not a cardboard cutout of some storybook bad guy.  

And the result makes this probably my second favorite I've ever seen at A Noise Within!

Richard III plays Thursdays, Fridays, Saturdays @ 7:30 p.m. / Saturdays & Sundays @ 2 p.m. through March 8, 2026 at A Noise Within, 3352 E Foothill Blvd. Pasadena, CA 91107.