Slav-er-iffic!

SLAVS!: THINKING ABOUT THE LONGSTANDING PROBLEMS OF VIRTUE AND HAPPINESS

Directed by Jeremy McCarter

At the Loeb Ex

Through August 22

When the Harvard-Radcliffe Dramatic Club presented Angels in America: Millennium Approaches--Tony Kushner's award-winning and highly controversial play--on the Loeb Mainstage last year, rave reviews and consistently sold-out performances greeted the production. Perhaps with that victory still in mind, the Harvard-Radcliffe Summer Theater's publicity department has tagged the posters of their latest production, Slavs!, with a prominent line that states, "From the Author of Angels in America." Tourists, summer school students and other people who were not around to witness the latter play's performances last fall may or may not be drawn into the theater by that information. However, those of us who were here and who were impressed will probably at least think about going, if we haven't bought tickets already.

Granted, the two plays cover extremely different subject matters--Angels deals with the pain of the AIDS epidemic combined with the fear of the millennium’s end; while Slavs! pokes fun and raises questions about the state of the former Soviet Union during the late '80s and early '90s. In addition, the latter play doesn't contain the painful and poignant emotional turbulence that the former is famous for. To try to compare them any further would be useless. But rest assured that, if you were genuinely moved by the powerful presence of Angels last fall, you will probably enjoy the bizarre Slavs! this summer.

With a stage that utilizes the Loeb's cramped quarters in one of the best and most spacious manners that this reviewer has ever seen, Slavs! begins by tackling Russian politics in a tumultuous era with absurdity, vicious humor and a great concern for both the individuals and the masses. The opening scene immediately draws in the audience--even those completely ignorant of Russian history--with a flurry of fake snow and a lively political debate going on between two babushkas. These sprightly women, however, quickly turn into the mindlessly smiling grandmothers they are supposed to be as soon as Vassily Vorovilich Smokov (Jim Augustine '01) and Serge Esmereldovich Upgobkin (Paul Siemens '98) enter the scene. These minor female characters' highly-charged dialogue is hysterical by itself, but the combination of ironic political statements and the bizarreness of the situation is pure comic genius. Translation: even if you don't know a Bolshevik from a Menshevik, you'll still laugh.

While both Augustine and Siemens give excellent and highly amusing performances, Erik Amblad '98 quickly steals the scene as Aleksii Antedilluvianovich Prelapsarianov, or, as he claims to be, "the world's oldest living Bolshevik." Although Amblad's monologue grows a bit monotonous after a while, he still brings the essence of Aleksii, and of all of Kushner's characters--knee-slapping irony and witticisms combined with genuine emotional depth--to life. He leaves the audience giggling uncontrollably with lines such as "You're practically bugging me," spoken to the closely-following and nearly-blind Serge; and "God is a Menshevik! God is a petty bourgeouse!" in a predeath revelation.

When the uptight Ippolite Ippopolitovich Popolitipov, or "Popo" (Chuck O'Toole '97), and the fidgety Yegor Tremens Rodent, or "Rodent" (Matthew Johnson '99), enter just after Aleksii's speech, one's feelings become torn. It is obvious that the two men are going to destroy both Aleksii and Serge--and they do, both morally and literally--but their coldness and ludicrous idiosincracies just make them all the more hilarious to watch. Johnson displayed his great versatility as an actor in last spring's Catch 22, and he does so again in Slavs!. Rodent, a stuttering likeness of Nathan Lane, captivates the audience as he slowly transforms from being Popo's measly sidekick into a government official caught wide-eyed in his web of lies.

But it is O'Toole who is the real star of the first half of Slavs!. Popo brushes off the whining Rodent and barely sniffs when both Aleksii and Serge die right in front of him, and then runs off to...play his beloved girlfriend a love song on his guitar?!? O'Toole brings facial and vocal expression to hilarious limits, but without ever falling into the trap of acting crass or melodramatic. His sharply calm, no-nonsense voice melts faster than the Chernobyl reactor in the presence of his sweetheart, the cruel and mocking Katherina Serafima Gleb (Sara Yellen '00). She, in turn, kicks him and his desperate advances to the floor and screams, "I'm a lesbian!" with such defiance that, as with most of the characters, you don't know if you want to hate or love her. The chemistry between the sparring couple is superb, and perhaps the best in the entire play. The sight of Popo's adoring eyes as he strums the same guitar chord over and over, with Katherina trying to glare him down, is alone worth the price of admission.

However, Katharina and her kindly lover, Dr. Bonfila Bezhukhovna Bonch-Bruevich (Marisa Echeverria '00), also make for an intriguing couple. Bonfila's sincerity and maturity don't match up particularly well with Katharina's crass horniness, but one can sense the sparks in their "opposites-attract" relationship, thanks to a surprisingly passionate lighting and musical love sequence. Plus, their prayers for vodka to a sanctified picture of Lenin--an act of hilarious blasphemy in itself--give Augustine the chance to bust into the scene as a hormonally-charged babushka with a bottle of liquor tucked into "her" panties, a moment so completely off-tempo with the rest of the act that one can't help screaming with laughter.

The second half of Slavs! begins exchanges dark humor for just plain darkness, but the exchange is an important one. Jessica Shapiro '00, playing a "mutant" little Siberian girl named Vodya who cannot speak due to radiation poisoning, gives a haunting performance without saying a word--one that resonates in your head for days. Erin Billings '99, as Vodya's mother, laces her character with such hostile helplessness that one wants to both hug her and run far away from her. Her poisonous glares at Rodent and her razor-sharp words chill the entire audience to the bone; yet one cannot help but wonder if, should one be in her situation, one could act any differently.

But it is the play's finale that is both the most obscure and the most disturbing scene in the entire production. Aleksii and Serge play cards in heaven and try not to look down on the former Soviet Union to see what's going on. Once they are joined by Vodya, who has ironically enough gained her voice (which makes her even more frightening than when she was silent), they all contemplate the purpose of one's existence and the use of fighting for beliefs in a world that, ultimately, leaves almost all of its inhabitants asking, "What is to be done?" Leaving that question hanging in the air, Amblad, Siemens and Shapiro stare at the audience for a good while before leaving the stage, and thus ending the play. To be smacked in the face with such despondency--and the proof that it is unfortunately universal--leaves a bitter taste at the end of the otherwise absurdly delightful Slavs!. But what is truly frightening is the fact that, out of the entire production, the only part comprised of reality--the reality that the audience members have to face when they get up and leave the theater--is the also one that disturbs them the most.