Cate Blanchett in UNCLE VANYA

[Jordan Catalano]

Posted: 7/14/11 at 12:38pm

Is anyone else as excited for this as I am??

[Jay Lerner-Z]

Posted: 7/14/11 at 12:52pm

I would be if I could make it to the Kennedy Center.

Cate Blanchett is always magnificent - I've only seen her on stage once, but I'm so glad she does so much theatre.

[Play Esq.]

Posted: 7/14/11 at 1:38pm

Absolutely, cannot, WAIT!

I've added "Oklahoma!" to the itinerary for my brief weekend in DC.

...now all I need to do is chose an incredible restaurant to add to this potentially marvelous weekend.

[KChenowethfan]

Posted: 7/15/11 at 9:08am

I'm excited for this one. She was brilliant in Streetcar. I have tickets for a performance the first week of August.

[pwb]

Posted: 7/18/11 at 12:25pm

I'm looking forward this Sydney production at the Kennedy Center too - I'm going 9 Aug. I'm not familiar with the play, (maybe I did see the 'Vanya on 42nd Street' once, and seem to recall I liked it), so it will be a great way to expereince (or re-experience) it! I think it will hit a sweet spot.

Cate Blanchett always shines thru like a beacon. Even in things that don't always work - like films: 'Little Fish', 'Notes on a Scandal', 'I'm Not Here', etc. - she somehow always breaks thru. She's always intersting and seems to will performances to succeed.

I saw her Sydney Company 'Streetcar' here at the KC a few years back and enjoyed it. ...However I found some of the staging unfathomable and extremely frustrating - her back was turned TO the audience during the madness scene at the end! ...If Cate Blanchett is in the scene at a dramatic high point - you want to see her face!! That element was a experiment that didn't work and really detracted from the experience and an otherwise great production.

cheers,

[Vespertine1228]

Posted: 7/18/11 at 1:18pm

I can't believe that producers would be stupid enough to let the BAM situation happen again. I imagine someone must be bankrolling this for a limited run on Broadway.

[Play Esq.]

Posted: 8/6/11 at 4:14pm

Opens tonight...anyone see it yet?

[AC126748]

Posted: 8/6/11 at 4:16pm

Have tickets for next weekend.

[binau]

Posted: 8/6/11 at 6:10pm

I saw it in Sydney....didn't know anything about the play but thought Blanchett's role wasn't that large and didn't give her much to show off...

[sorano916]

Posted: 8/6/11 at 6:20pm

Saw it last night and it was wonderful. I'm not familiar with the play nor the playwright but I've been told that his work can be a bit boring, however, I found the performance quite the opposite. I especially loved the humor, out of the delivery of the lines or the stage direction.

And while Cate was good, I greatly enjoyed Richard Roxburgh as Vanya and Hugo Weaving as Astrov, the doctor. The scenes that the three have one another were simply fantastic.

The entire cast was great. If you have the chance, go see it.

[Play Esq.]

Posted: 8/6/11 at 9:22pm

I will...in two weeks and am very excited!

[Simon4]

Posted: 8/8/11 at 1:27pm

I saw the production on Saturday and wrote a review of it for MD Theatre Guide. The link is below.

Excerpt:
The late drama critic Richard Gilman once observed that in his plays, “Chekhov has found music’s verbal and gestural equivalents, its dramaturgical counterpart.” Under Ascher’s direction, Uncle Vanya becomes something of a scherzo, a musical joke. The production is full of unpredictable humor, playfulness, and passages of impressive virtuosity but is also marked by out-of-step cadences, forcible shifts in tone, cross accents, odd pacing, and flippant phrases.

Hugo Weaving, who plays Astrov, remarked in a recent interview that a crucial challenge in acting Chekhov is dramatizing the subtext of the dialogue, as “a lot of the characters’ impulses aren’t in the text.” Yet instead of drawing out the subtleties of Chekhov’s indirections, deflections, and implicit meanings, Ascher underlines the dialogue with distracting bits of stage business and moments of physical humor veering toward slapstick. Too often, laughter breaks the tension of a scene or robs it of emotional focus. The production’s insistent physicality drowns out the meaning of what is left unsaid, the notes that remain unsounded. What individual moments may gain in immediacy and visceral impact, the overall dramatic arc loses in shape and cumulative power.
Review of Uncle Vanya Updated On: 8/8/11 at 01:27 PM

[AC126748]

Posted: 8/8/11 at 1:28pm

Don't have time to link right now, but Brantley's review was a flat-out love letter.

[LesMiz24601]

Posted: 8/13/11 at 11:14pm

Just got back from this.

I felt the acting was UNIVERSALLY fantastic. Blanchett was great (of course).

I may be in the minority, but I unfortunately found that the play dragged, almost to the point of being slightly boring.

Having never seen a Chekhov play, I understand that this may just be part of his style.
While I respect the work, and am glad I saw it (there were some VERY emotional moments) overall I found myself waiting for SOMETHING to happen.

[April Saul]

Posted: 8/14/11 at 7:56pm

Saw this last night and wow, was it worth the trip down to D.C.! I found a subscriber ticket on Craigslist--2nd row center for $89--and it was definitely money well spent.

I'd seen Uncle Vanya at the Classic Stage Company in 2009, and appreciated the acting although I wasn't wild about the play. This production just blew that one away. It's hard to take your eyes off Cate Blanchett when she's on stage, Hugo Weaving and Hayley McElhinney were terrific, and I loved their treatment of it. For me, the humor and pratfalls they added only made the characters' despair more powerful.

At the stage door, I asked both Weaving and Blanchett separately about a possible NYC transfer. He seemed to be allowing for some possibility and mentioned Lincoln Center, while Blanchett cited three cast members having conflicts that would prevent them from doing it. Everyone sitting around me--even those who were subscribers and weren't familiar with Chekhov--seemed to love it, and it got a standing O for three curtain calls...would have been a fourth but I guess the cast decided there should be a limit and didn't come back for anther. But just absolutely wonderful...for me, it was the same caliber as the recent Seagull with Kristin Scott Thomas and Carey Mulligan, and that is high praise.

[pwb]

Posted: 8/16/11 at 1:57pm

Saw Uncle Vanya 9 August at the Kennedy Center in DC. Enjoyed it. Hugo Weaving and Hayley McElhinney really shone and came thru quite clearly and forcefuly as the Doctor and daughter. The others had trouble breaking thru to register with the audience as characters. Some of the humor works well (Weaver falling thru a window, the drunken party & a pillow fight), but some just falls flat in the serious context it is presented (Blanchette falling thru a door she was leaning on, the tryst before leaving, etc). Sometimes, especially later in the play, this humor feels false and forced - as if it's making up for (or overshadowing) some missing motivations for the characters to play. Then it obscures their motivations and detracts. Cate Blanchette is quite curious; she is throughly skilled and professional at holding your attention at all times, but sometimes really isn't communicating much. (This may be becasue there's not much there, or it isn't projected enough.) Richard Roxborough is good & absolutely heartbreaking in sections, but again he doesn't seem to be projecting into the theatre beyond the 10th row. He barely registers in the far reaches of the audience. The other characters' acting, again is OK to fine, if not made especially memorable. Although, the Mother's character is clearly drawn and projected (& this works really well with the desired comic effects).

Overall an 'A' for effort, imagination and commitment, but a 'B' (or even B-) for overall success & effectiveness. It's well worth seeing this production to see excellent Austrailian professionals on and off the stage at work, taking chances and offering new voices - even if not always a full success

Cheers,
pwb
Updated On: 8/16/11 at 01:57 PM