Crime and Punishment
Reviewed by Stephen Fife
Working Barn Productions
Through May 26
In her publicity release for the adaptation of Dostoievsky’s Crime and Punishment currently running at the Edgemar in Santa Monica, publicist Lucy Pollak uses this quote from a New York Times review of an NYC production: “It will banish any bad memories you may have of trying to struggle through Dostoievsky’s book.”
To which I say, Shame on you, New York Times! Shame!
Crime and Punishment isn’t just a “classic,” it isn’t just a brilliant piece of writing — it is a foundation block of modern thinking, modern culture and modern psychology, and it needs no apologies or juvenile remarks about its complexity.
Which of course is the problem with any attempt to adapt it. While this would be the case with any great novel, it is especially so with Crime and Punishment, where most of the significant action is internal. Most of the novel takes places inside the mind of Raskalnikov, a university-educated Russian in late 19th Century St. Petersburg. He has lost his teaching position and given himself over to anguished ponderings on the meaning of life and Nietschean ideas of Good and Evil. This has led him to commit the brutal double murder of two old women. (Not a spoiler! As director Peter Richards has said, this is a “whydunit,” not a “whodunit.”)
Adapters Marilyn Campbell and Curt Columbus have made some intriguing and intelligent decisions in boiling this 400-page novel down to a 90-minute play performed by 3 actors. They have framed the play as a face-off between Raskolnikov and the police interrogator, Porfiry. As in the book, Porfiry is much more than just a detective. He is a father confessor, a priest and perhaps an emissary of God, concerned not just with legal issues but with spiritual ones. Brian Wallace does an excellent job of conveying this, to the point that he sometimes seems more like Raskolnikov’s conscience than a separate person — which, again, is faithful to the novel and highly effective.
Michael Trevino plays Raskolnikov, and he’s more of a mixed bag. He has the character’s intensity, and many of the surface attributes that might be right for this philosophy student gone wrong. But that’s also the problem — his performance is all surface. To bring Raskolnikov to life, we need more than facial tics, vacant stares and snarky sarcasm. It’s too easy for me to point out that most of Trevino’s credits are on CW TV shows, and that his stage acting feels a lot like his TV acting — but it’s kind of accurate. A great performance would grow larger and deeper as the play progresses. I didn’t feel that with Trevino. Everything he’s going for seems to come out in the first scene. Then again, maybe his performance will deepen as the run continues.
The third significant character — Sonia, the prostitute next door — is played by Lola Kelly, a beautiful actress who is totally miscast. A healthy-looking and curvy American, she has none of the ethereal spirituality required by the role, none of the Russian wildness, none of the outcast’s hopelessness. And her double-casting as the murder victims is completely unconvincing.
Director Peter Richards has had the idea to position video cameras that project a live feed of the actors on a screen at the rear of the stage. This works well for the opening scene’s confrontation between Raskolnikov and Porfiry, giving us a vertiginous sense of the murderer trapped in a cage. But it also sets up an expectation that the rest of the play fails to live up to. In general, this 3-actor gimmick doesn’t pan out; the mesmerizing intensity of the opening scene diffuses as the play goes on, as Richards has found no way to hold our interest. There is, however, some noteworthy and nuanced work from lighting designer Derrick McDaniel and from sound and video designer Mark Van Hare.
I would recommend this show as an introduction to Dostoievsky’s world. By all means, go see it — then read the novel and realize how much bigger this story is than what you’ve seen here.
Edgemar Center for the Arts, 2437 Main St., Santa Monica; Fri.-Sat., 8 p.m.; Sun., 4 p.m.; through May 26. 323-960-7822 or www.OnStage411.com/Crime. Running time: 90 minutes with no intermission.
