Silent Sky
Reviewed by Iris Mann
Theatre 40
Through April 17
Playwright Lauren Gunderson is reportedly one of the most produced playwrights in the country, although she has not had any of her works done on Broadway. Gunderson is known for mixing the scientific and the historical with the personal in her plays. Accordingly, her Silent Sky tells the true story of Henrietta Leavitt (Abigail Stewart), an aspiring astronomer in the early 20th century, along with the personal and professional challenges she faced. Somewhere in the writing there is a play, because the work deals with important themes of interest to women, and the protagonist’s love for the heavens gives rise to some truly lyrical passages. But the script’s potential is not realized in this lackluster production.
As the action begins, Henrietta tells her sister, Margaret (Tammy Mora), that she is leaving their Wisconsin home to work at the Harvard Observatory. She assumes that she will be using the telescope as a full-fledged astronomer, but when she arrives, she learns from a student, Peter Shaw (Dalen Carlson), that only the men are allowed near the telescope. The women, he tells her, are used as “computers,” meaning they compute, or make charts of the stars from photographic plates shot by the men.
Henrietta finds herself working alongside computers Williamina Fleming (Amy Tolsky) and Annie Cannon (Marie Broderick). In the course of her work, Henrietta becomes fascinated by Cepheids, stars that repeatedly glow and then become dim, and she is certain that there is a design in this repetition.
In time, a romance develops between Peter and Henrietta, which is interrupted when she returns home for an extended stay because her father is ill. Before Henrietta goes back to Harvard, Margaret plays a musical piece she has composed. Suddenly Henrietta realizes that there is a kind of musical pattern in the alternating brightness and dimness of the stars that will make it possible to measure distances in space.
When she arrives back at Harvard, Peter is excited by her discovery, which is published. However, she is not allowed to join the research that ensues. One conclusion emanating from the research is that, contrary to what was believed at the time, ours is not the only galaxy in the universe. Indeed, there are innumerable other galaxies. Henrietta Leavitt’s discovery led to the Hubble telescope and many other advances.
The weighty issues that the play raises include the dearth of women holding important positions in the sciences, the discrimination against and the devaluing of women, the early suffragette movement, and the conflict for women between a career and family obligations.
It is particularly disappointing that the production doesn’t excite or move the viewer, given that director Ann Hearn Tobolowsky is exceptionally talented and has done such excellent work, both as director and actor, in the past. Here she has not extracted the kind of performances from her cast that a play like this demands.
Stewart performs the lead role with little or no shading or variation in her approach. In Henrietta’s romance with Peter (a fictional invention by the playwright), there is no chemistry between Stewart and Carlson, so that their onstage relationship seems forced.
As with Stewart, Mora and Tolsky could well find more varied colors in their performances. The most believable work comes from Broderick, who begins as rather an officious supervisory computer, then warms to Henrietta and finally conveys an ardent devotion to the suffragette movement.
Compliments must be rendered to Fritz Davis for his rear projection design, which exhibits images of the sky and the stars, sometimes over shimmering water, giving us a sense of the grandeur of the universe.
Theatre 40 in the Reuben Cordova Theatre, 241 S. Moreno Drive, Beverly Hills; Thu. – Sat., 8 p.m.; Sun., 2 p.m.; through April 17. 310-364-9535 or www.theatre40.org; Running time: 90 minutes with one intermission.
