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Wednesday, December 05, 2007

Chekhov's Chicks

Though the individual scenes that Elizabeth Rosengren has pulled from Chekhov aren't much more than exercises in Scene Study, the way in which she makes their ideas about love collide is a insightful (and hopeful) study in the bittersweet life. These pieces also culminate in a much richer interpretation of The Bear that is usually found in the light farce; it makes the evening into a delightful reintroduction to Chekhov's harsh hopefulness. Simply directed by Jewels Eubanks, the work twists between a study of acting and a study of love, marrying the two into a love of Chekhov that survives even the cryptic lighting (a forlorn moon beaming intermittently against the window) and occasionally melodramatic surface readings of scenes from Three Sisters and Uncle Vanya.

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