Magic in ‘Ivanov’ Needs Little Translation

The Maxim Gorky Drama Theatre of Vladivostok is making its American debut at San Diego State University’s Dan Powell Theatre with a production of Anton Chekhov’s “Ivanov” in the original Russian, with simultaneous English translation through headsets.

With the very first image----a Jewish woman poignantly wailing “Hava Nagila” to herself--the company transcends the language barrier triumphantly.

The eloquence continues and deepens throughout Chekhov’s first great play of love and betrayal. Though crucial to following the work, the translator takes a decided back seat to the performers’ wondrous magic as they weave fully realized lives and passions, rendering the playwright’s universe exquisitely.

“Ivanov,” a difficult and brave choice, tackles Russian anti-Semitism through the tale of Nikolai Alexeivich Ivanov (Alexander Slavsky), a landowner who flouts his society by marrying a Jewish woman, Sara Ambramson (Svetlana Salakhutdinova).

To marry him, she has changed her name (to Anna Petrovna) and has given up her religion, her family and its wealth. Still, there is never a moment when the other characters--even those who like her!--don’t refer to her snidely as “the Yid” and blame her for Nikolai’s unhappiness.

It soon becomes clear that Nikolai is the one causing the unhappiness.

As the play begins, in the fifth year of their marriage, Anna is dying of tuberculosis. Not only does her husband fail to comfort her, but he cannot seem to stop himself from going out every night to romance Sasha (Olga Nalitova), the angelically pretty young daughter of the wealthy landowner next door. Anna’s doctor (Evgeny Veigel) warns him that his heartlessness is speeding her death.

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Portraying the prickly nature of Ivanov is one of the play’s chief challenges. How is one to understand or even care about a character so cruel to his sweet, dying wife? But Chekhov is, as ever, incapable of good guy/bad guy simplicity, and the Gorky company finds tender, insightful shadings as each actor fully explores the humanity of each character.

Slavsky finds the weary center of a man whose character is crumbling from without. We see flickers of the integrity that once defined Nikolai and that still keeps people loyal to him. When he reaches out for the young and ethereally lovely Sasha, it is as if he is making a last grasp for life itself.

Some evaluations of the play have dismissed the doctor as a prig, but Veigel suggests a deeply feeling man, desperate to correct the moral degradation around him before the deadly twin viruses of cynicism and hopelessness infect him too. Salakhutdinova is proud, intelligent and hauntingly passionate as the tall, dark and beautiful Anna Petrovna, and Nalitova’s diminutive, golden-haired Sasha is a sweet young thing who blindly sees herself as Ivanov’s savior.

Director Efim Zvenyatsky, who has been heading up the 63-year-old company for 10 years, has tackled the religious conflicts head on. The large, ornate painting of Jesus in Stepan Arefin’s set becomes a key symbol--a source of strength for Sasha, a symbol of fear for Anna.

Irina Elsheva’s eclectic costumes add to the fine shadings of the story--faded elegance for the count, somber browns for Ivanov, dark elegance for Anna, dreamy fabrics in the prettiest pastels for Sasha. It’s just one more aspect of the production that the company gets so resplendently right.

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A key aspect distinguishing Russian companies from most American ones is the permanent repertory company--42 actors strong in the Maxim Gorky. The actors’ familiarity with one another deepens the impression that these characters have known one another for the decades that Chekhov suggests.

The production, which continues through May 21, is a co-presentation of San Diego’s Blackfriars Theatre, which in 1993 became the first company from the United States to play Vladivostok, and San Diego State.

* “Ivanov,” the Don Powell Theatre, San Diego State University, San Diego. Today at 2 and 8 p.m.; Sunday at 2 p.m.; Wednesday through May 20 at 8 p.m.; May 20, 21 at 2 p.m. Ends May 21. $18-$22. (619) 594-6884. Running time: 2 hours, 23 minutes.

Alexander Slavsky: Nikolai Alexeivich Ivanov

Svetlana Salakhutdinova: Sara Ambramson (Anna Petrovna)

Alexander Zaporozhets: Count Matvei Semyonovich Shabelsky

Vladimir Sergiakov: Pavel Kirilovich Lebedev

Natalya Kulchikhina: Zinaida Savishna

Olga Nalitova: Sasha Lebedeva

Evgeny Veigel: Evgeny Konstantinovich Lvov

Larisa Belobrova: Marfa Egorovna Babakina

Evgeny Gorenko: Dmitri Nikitovich Kosikh

Nikolai Timoshenko: Mikhail Mikhailovich Borkin

Nadezhda Eisenberg: Avdotya Nazarovna

Vladimir Dubodel: Egorushka

Anatoly Khomenko: Gavrila

Tatiana Veigel: A deaf-mute

Vladmir Yaskin: Dudukin

The Blackfriars Theatre and San Diego State University present the Maxim Gorky Drama Theatre in a play by Anton Chekhov, directed by Efim Zvenyatsky. Sets and lights: Stepan Arefin. Costumes: Irina Elsheva. Sound: Irina Baigulova. Props: Natalya Zinchenko. Production manager: Loren Schreiber.