Category Archives: Joseph Lavy

SeattleActor.com Reviews Uncle Vanya

  By Akropolis Performance Lab • March 25, 2014 - 5:21 PM , , , , , , ,
As Marina, Zhenya Lavy is ever present on stage... generally in the background. With Joseph Lavy (Vanya) and Margaretta Campagna (Sonya) | Uncle Vanya (2014) | Photo: Annie Paladino

As Marina, Zhenya Lavy is ever present on stage… generally in the background. She’s really spinning yarn and really knitting socks! With Joseph Lavy (Vanya) and Margaretta Campagna (Sonya) | Uncle Vanya (2014) | Photo: Annie Paladino

 

Although Jerry Kraft gives a lot of respect to APL overall, he didn’t think our Uncle Vanya worked and would have preferred for us to have approached the text with more traditional Realism. On the bright side:

 

The staging is extremely simple and highly theatrical, the focus and intention of the performers obvious and the ambition admirable.

 

For the acting, Carter Rodriquez gets good mention for a realistic portrayal of Astrov, and “Zhenya Lavy as the old nurse, Marina, was successful at occupying a substantial presence in the background of this production, but she was not a leading character.”

 

Full review is here: “Uncle Vanya” by Jerry Kraft, SeattleActor.com, March 24, 2014

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1st Vanya Review Filled With Superlatives!

  By Akropolis Performance Lab • March 24, 2014 - 12:19 AM , , , , , , , , , , ,
Marina (Zhenya Lavy) and Telegin (Sean Patrick Taylor) tearing it up with a rousing “Когда мы были на войне.” | Uncle Vanya (2014) | Photo: Annie Paladino

Marina (Zhenya Lavy) and Telegin (Sean Patrick Taylor) tearing it up with a rousing “Когда мы были на войне” is just one of the reasons Uncle Vanya is the first production in APL’s history to be interrupted midstream by audience applause. | Uncle Vanya (2014) | Photo: Annie Paladino

Congratulations, to the entire company of Uncle Vanya!

We had a highly successful opening weekend, with both our evening shows sold out during pre-sales and enthusiastic audience response.

The first review is a great one. Read it here:

“Uncle Vanya – Brilliant new translation by Zhenya Lavy” by Marie Bonfils, Drama in the Hood, March 23, 2014

Among the highlights:

Akropolis Performance Lab deserves the highest theatre award known to mankind for their production of Uncle Vanya….

 

…this version of Uncle Vanya was not another fossil in a museum, but a vibrant play propelled by psychic movement.

 

It was a stroke of genius to stage Uncle Vanya in The Garden House-The Washington State Federation of Garden Clubs.

 

The Music was to die for!

 

Doubling as the director, Joseph Lavy delivered a stunningly brilliant performance as Vanya, which was humorous, sad, and deeply moving.

 

Margaretta Campagna as Sonya, was superb…. She has a commanding voice and presence on stage which made her plight as a plain girl of marriageable age all that more tragic.

 

All in all this is the best production of Chekhov I have ever seen.