STAGE REVIEW : ‘Uncle Vanya’ Unrolls Thread of Deception : Rancho Santiago College’s Professional Actors Conservatory stages a mostly effective production in a well-crafted environment.

Disillusionment is one of the threads that runs through much of Chekhov’s writing. In “Uncle Vanya,” it’s a thread that all but tangles up the title character.

The play, directed by Robert G. Leigh in a fine-looking, mostly effective production by Rancho Santiago College’s Professional Actors Conservatory, is set on its way by the arrival of Serebryakov, a professor who recently resigned a prestigious post to live on his country estate.

Vanya and Sonya, Serebryakov’s daughter by his first wife, Vanya’s sister, have dutifully run the estate for him, believing that he’s a brilliant man doing important scholarship. They’ve scrimped for several years, sending all their spare rubles to Serebryakov to help further his career.

But the professor soon reveals himself as an intellectual lout, self-centered, bullying and with only minor-league talent. Realizing he sacrificed so much for such a small man, Vanya sees his life as a waste.

Heaped upon this turmoil are the feelings Vanya has for Yelyena, Serebryakov’s young, beautiful and indolent wife. She provokes the love-struck uncle but doesn’t return his devotion; he, in turn, is throttled by his desire for a woman who’s prime value is her beauty. David Sikula’s Vanya gazes at her with a hopeless longing, unlike his angry stares at her husband.

Although Vanya is central to the play, he’s not the main element. Chekhov’s dramas and comedies use actors like members of an orchestra, with various instruments playing equally. Also holding our attention is the doctor Astrov, an idealist.

In his spare time, Astrov plants trees in the nearby forest and speaks passionately about the ecology. He’s also drawn to Yelyena. Phillip Beck plays Astrov as something of a fool, which doesn’t always click, but it’s a lively performance.

As the shallow muse to these men, Betsy Ferguson’s Yelyena is quaintly feminine and just oblique enough to be mysterious. Mark Bollinger’s Serebryakov is a barking, big-mouthed pedant, a satisfying target for everybody’s hatred.

E. Scott Shaffer, whose imaginative dungeon-like set was one of the few things recommending the troupe’s “Macbeth” several months ago, has created another clever, well-crafted environment.

He’s framed these interior scenes with four abbreviated walls, giving the stage an abstract, airy quality. David C. Palmer’s sensual lighting adds to the effect.

‘UNCLE VANYA’

A Rancho Santiago College Professional Actors Conservatory production of Anton Chekhov’s play. Directed by Robert G. Leigh. With Phillip Beck, Kim Shivers, David Sikula, Mark Bollinger, Elizabeth Gardner, Betsy Ferguson, Max Goldberg, James Rice, TerraCQ Shelman, Terry Ash, Jeffrey Hellebrand and Thea Torgerson. Set by E. Scott Shaffer. Lighting by David C. Palmer. Costumes by Karen J. Weller. Sound by Kristan Clark. Plays Friday and Saturday at 8 p.m. and Sunday at 3 p.m. at the campus’s Phillips Hall Little Theatre, at the corner of 17th and Bristol streets, Santa Ana. Tickets: $6 and $10. (714) 667-3163.