BWW Reviews: IVANOV - Necessitating Human Connection

Trinity Repertory Company opens its 51st season: The Necessity of Human Connection with one of Anton Chekov's earliest works, IVANOV. Adapted by Artistic Director, Curt Columbus, IVANOV, explores a man struggling as his personal and professional worlds collide, and he appears to have no ability to control it.

The set, designed by Michael McGarty, is beautiful, set in the round, with some audience members literally sitting on the stage. The original music, composed by Ian McNeely provides the transition between acts. Actors play instruments and sing, the songs used to underscore the supposed comedic nature of the play. The costumes, by Toni Spadafora Sadler bring an historic element to the scenes.

As one would expect with a company like Trinity, the acting is solid. Joe Wilson, Jr. , playing Misha Borkin, Ivanov's distant cousin and manager of his estate, and Timothy Crowe as Pasha Lebedev, along with Ivanov's women, Rebecca Gibel, playing Anna, his wife, and Marina Shay, as his almost wife, Sasha, were standouts.

The pacing in Act II was slow, maybe to emphasize everyone's disdain for their world and the people in it. Everyone gossips about their neighbor and pretends they don't. Act III, set in Ivanof's study, was so similar to the Lebedev house in Act II that I had to check my program to see where it was.

All good acting aside, the play itself was irritating. This rich community of characters spends its time being bored-with everything. And the life of Ivanov, a man going through a mid-life crisis/depression/mental illness, borders on incessant annoyance. He is not a character one can love, continually pushing everyone away who tries to help him improve his work and his love life. Stephen Thorne plays his struggle flawlessly, but there is little to laugh about. The play has been described by The Guardian as "the comedic Hamlet," but the only comedic moments came with the entrance of the toothy rich widow, Martha Babakina, played by Angela Brazil or Count Matvey Shabelsky, Ivonov's Uncle, played by Fred Sullivan.

At the end of the final scene, one with a particularly dark ending, I turned to the woman seated next to me and she said, "Comedy." We laughed.

IVANOV runs through Oct. 5 at Trinity Rep, 201 Washington St., Providence. Tickets are $28-$68. Call (401) 351-4242, or visit trinityrep.com.

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