Anastasia

The program notes for Anastasia point out that only Smirnoff vodka is used on stage. This is one of the few touches of realism in the whole play, for playwright Marcelle Maurette has written most of the lines in an allegorical exposition of Europe's reaction to American aid and a prophecy of Europe's future. "I don't need your pity now," Anastasia, representing the Europe of the future, defiantly exclaims, and Prince Bounine (America) can only stand with his mouth agape, as his materialistic plot is foiled.

Anastasia pretends to be a highly dramatic play, relating the romantic story of an exiled Russian princess, supposedly shot in the Revolution, who suddenly appears in Berlin nine years later. Discovered on the brink of suicide by a White Russian general, Anastasia at first refuses to admit her identity, then suddenly decides to fight for recognition from her grandmother, the Dowager Empress.

Admittedly the romance in the play is well done. Eugenie Leontovich, as the Dowager Empress, carries her role of the Russian aristocrat with dignity and verve. When wit is called for, she displays a convincingly restrained emotion. Although Dolly Haas, who plays Anastasia, is forced to carry on in a heart-straining tremulo throughout the whole play, she manages to keep it from being tiresome. With her grandmother and her two muzhik, admirers she can even be exciting, while her portrayal of a psychotic soul returning to normality seems accurate, wherever it is allowed to peep through the rest of the hash in the play.

Unfortunately, however, the highly competent performances of the two leading ladies and the psychological possibilities of Anastasia are virtually smothered by the play's strong allegorical themes. The audience is always conscious of the materialist General lurking on stage, and Anastasia must continually spout lines about the glory of the past and the new glory of the future.

Director Alan Schneider very mistakenly points up this allegory by overdoing the buffoonery of the characters which the playwright satirizes, Prince Bounine, the materialist, acts like a cross between Robert Taylor and a crafty mogul out of Executive Suite. He seems too typically the European conception of Americans, and his two flunkies are just ludicrous. Prince Paul, played by Robert Duke, is merely innocuous, which may or may not imply what the French think of England.

The trials of unthroned royalty seems a banal topic, but Anastasia might have had possibilities, especially in a portrayal of the renewal of a wartorn psyche. Instead, Marcelle Maurette has choosen to emphasize the pure romance of the story and, even worse, clouds the romance with her allegorical reflections. For this reason, Anastasia is dramatic, but, on the whole, not worth the trouble.