THEATER REVIEW : Taper Brings the ‘Demon’ Back to Life

In 1899, Anton Chekhov wrote to a would-be publisher of his then-10-year-old “The Wood Demon”: “I despise this play and am trying to forget I ever wrote it. . . . It would be a severe blow if anyone tried to revive it.”

Too bad, Chekhov. The Mark Taper Forum has done the deed you so feared. The play lives. And in the hands of the Antaeus Company, the Taper’s new classical ensemble, the play thrives in most of the first three acts, becoming forced only in the fourth.

Actually, many of its characters have lived over the intervening century in Chekhov’s “Uncle Vanya,” which borrowed so much from the earlier play that it’s easy to see “The Wood Demon” as a rough draft. These unhappy Russian gentry were even spotted at the Taper--back in 1969, when Harold Clurman staged “Uncle Vanya” there.

Once again, crotchety Prof. Serebryakov and his young, bored second wife Yelena are living on the country estate of the professor’s late first wife. The deceased’s brother (here named Zhorzh instead of Vanya), who also lives there, still has an intense and unrequited passion for Yelena.

The offspring of the professor’s first marriage, 20-year-old Sonya, is still fascinated by a country doctor and ardent environmentalist (here named Khrushchov instead of Astrov but usually called “The Wood Demon”). Vanya/Zhorzh’s mother still lives with the family, and they still have a garrulous neighbor nicknamed Waffles.

Less focused than “Uncle Vanya,” “The Wood Demon” gives four additional friends and neighbors plenty of lines, mostly for comic relief. More characters mean more roles for members of the 69-actor Antaeus Company, but it also translates into a longer sit--including its two intermissions, this “Wood Demon” lasts three hours and 10 minutes.

Most of that time is well spent. The agonies and ecstasies of these people are keenly expressed in this spirited new translation by two Antaeus members, Nicholas Saunders and Frank Dwyer. Only one quibble comes to mind--Zhorzh insults Professor Serebryakov by calling him a perpetuum mobile . An earlier translator used “non-stop writing machine,” which might work better for a non-Latin-speaking audience.

The company worked on this project for three years--about 10 times longer than the time spent on most Taper projects. Each role has been cast with at least two actors, so the composition of the cast is likely to change at each performance. Dwyer’s staging never appears wayward or uncertain. The talk is punctuated with brief bursts of physical comedy and telling non-verbal details, as when Serebryakov keeps eating his lunch while everyone else is paying rapt attention to the Wood Demon’s save-the-forest speech.

For the first time, the Taper has become an arena stage, with a small section of seating on the north side. At first, from a vantage point on the south, this added the intended intimacy, which is also encouraged by D Martyn Bookwalter’s canopy of greenery covering the entire hall.

But during the last act, from a seat on the new north side, there were problems with sight lines--most notably when the entire cast looks at the light from a distant forest fire, with backs turned toward those of us on the north. Instead of faces, we saw the lights, busily creating the fire effect for the other spectators. Some of the other sight lines might be improved if the north seats were simply installed at a sharper rake.

The ending of the play has other problems, too. “The Wood Demon” is touted as lighter than “Uncle Vanya,” with a supposedly happy ending. This is misleading. One of the “Wood Demon” characters succeeds at suicide. In “Uncle Vanya,” the same character tries only to shoot someone else--and twice misses, turning the episode into a grim joke.

Furthermore, two of the three couplings at the end of “The Wood Demon” will surely result in less happiness, not more. One of these matches, between two minor characters, is especially contrived, and yet Chekhov gave this couple the final scene in the play, where it seems especially superfluous.

This is not to slight the actors, however. The cast at the press preview was superb. And it was tantalizing to read, for example, that Nike Doukas, who was playing Sonya, also plays Yelena--in many ways Sonya’s opposite. The value of maintaining an ongoing classical company at the Taper has never been more apparent.

* “The Wood Demon,” Mark Taper Forum, 135 N. Grand Ave., Los Angeles. Tuesdays-Saturdays, 8 p.m.; Sundays, 7:30 p.m.; Saturday-Sunday matinees, 2:30 p.m. Ends May 22. $28-$35. (213) 365-3500, (714) 740-2000. Running time: 2 hours, 45 minutes. Because the cast changes nightly, a second review concerning casting will run in Calendar at a later date.

Dakin: Matthews Aleksander

Lorraine Toussaint/Nike Doukas: Yelena

Nike Doukas/Rose Portillo: Sonya

Anne Gee Byrd: Mama

Lawrence Pressman/Dan Kern: Zhorzh

Raphael Sbarge/John Walcutt: Zheltoukhin

Janellen Steininger/Marsha Dietlein: Yulya

Nicholas Saunders: Godfather

Eric Allan Kramer: Fedya

Mark Harelik/John Walcutt: Wood Demon

John Apicella/Jeremy Lawrence: Waffles

Donald Sage Mackay: Vassili

John Achorn: Semyon

Jeremy Lawrence: Sergey/Yefim

Mary Stark: Maids

Anton Chekhov’s play in a translation by Nicholas Saunders and Frank Dwyer. Directed by Dwyer. Set and lights by D Martyn Bookwalter. Costumes by Holly Poe Durbin. Sound by Jon Gottlieb. Music by Theo Saunders. Production stage manager Jill Ragaway.