‘Rigoberta’ hangs back in the shadows

The psychological debris from decades of war and political strife in Nicaragua is the subject of “La Casa de Rigoberta Mira al Sur” (“The House of Rigoberta Faces South”), at UCLA’s Freud Playhouse.

It’s not a pretty picture. And it’s not much more than just a picture. The imagery is haunting, but details are sketchy about who these people are, what exactly happened to them in the past and what might happen to them now.

The two ostensibly living characters are a man and a woman, presumably married. She (Lucero Millan) can’t forget their dead daughter, while he (Rene Medina Chavez) is unsuccessfully trying to adjust to the present, post-revolutionary era. They spend most of their time hurling accusations and recriminations at each other, and their postures and movements reflect a rigid entombment in the past.

The other two characters are both dead, but they’re more animated than the living. The couple’s deceased daughter Rigoberta (Veronica Castillo) retains much of the physical exuberance of youth as she romps through her parents’ thoughts -- and across the stage. Rigoberta’s garrulous grandmother (Alicia Irene Pilarte) is a baby-sitter for Rigoberta even in death, answering the girl’s ruminations with her own and sometimes accompanying the girl’s almost gymnastic activity with percussive little clicks.

Speaking of percussion, the play snaps to attention whenever Rigoberta grabs a snare drum and marches in measured little steps around the stage while beating it -- she’s reminiscent of the child who did the same in “The Tin Drum.” It would indeed be hard to overcome the heritage of a girl who is sending a drumbeat into your brain.

But most of this production from Nicaragua’s El Teatro Justo Rufino Garay isn’t nearly as riveting as the drum scenes. Yes, author Aristides Vargas and his co-director, Charo Frances, succeed in depicting the unrelenting circularity of dreams. But a 75-minute piece that does very little else begins to drag.

We never learn the precise cause of Rigoberta’s death, which is a piece of the past that might impart some gravity to the production.

The only evident forward movement is that Rigoberta feels she is gradually losing parts of her body as she lingers in limbo, or wherever she is, but this development is not especially well visualized in this murkily lighted production.

The women’s roles are well-cast and powerfully performed, within the constraints of the text, but Chavez looks too young to be the father of someone who would today be 28 if still alive.

This is a co-presentation of UCLA Live, Highways and FITLA -- the International Theatre Festival of Los Angeles. Performances are in Spanish with English supertitles.

Another play by Vargas, from his own Ecuadoran company Malayerba, opens tonight as part of FITLA at the smaller [Inside] the Ford space. It’s possible that “Rigoberta” might have worked better in the more intimate space. The Freud’s wide stage isn’t well suited for a play that tries to convey a claustrophobic sense of the unyielding grip of past sorrows.

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‘La Casa de Rigoberta Mira al Sur’

Where: Freud Playhouse, UCLA, Sunset Boulevard and Hilgard Avenue, Westwood

When: 8 p.m. today-Saturday; 2 p.m. Sunday

Ends: Sunday

Price: $28-$40

Info: (310) 825-2101

Running time: 1 hour, 15 minutes