Go Away–Go Away
It’s often too easy to label a Russian work Chekhovian, but Kolyada invites the comparison. One character describes the play’s situation as “Uncle Vanya meets The Three Sisters,” and the action hinges on the protagonist’s desire to go elsewhere–not Moscow in this case but the Caucasus. It won’t spoil the end to report that ultimately she stays put, for here as in Chekhov the subject is not the outcome but the struggle. Most important, Kolyada’s characters face–or try to avoid–the issues that consume Chekhov: middle-aged people discovering that they’re headed in the wrong direction, and young people inevitably making the bad decisions that turn into midlife regrets.
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The play loses its focus at the start of act two, when Kolyada tries to move beyond Ludmilla and Valentin to Angelica and her soldier boyfriend, Yevgeny. Julie Paparella is both touching and terrifying as the mercurial daughter, so enraged by the limitations of her life that she keeps slapping Ludmilla, yet so fearful her mother will abandon her that she pretends she’s only trying to kill mosquitos. Tim Donovan brings a persuasive mixture of stupidity, cupidity, and romance to the peasant manque Yevgeny. But halfway through the script is too late for the audience to shift its sympathies: the play belongs to Ludmilla and Valentin, and Angelica seems a distraction no matter how poetic her reflections.
