It’s no secret that I’m a big fan of the Miracle Theatre: They
generally do solid work, and they’re a valuable community organization.
So it’s in the spirit of tough love that I have to say that their
current production of Bodas de Sangre is just not up to their
usual standards.
Written by the poet Federico García Lorca, the show’s simple
storyline hinges on a young woman who runs away from her husband on her
wedding day, escaping into the woods with an old suitor, to whom she
feels a powerful and undeniable magnetism. The fugitive couple is
hunted down by the townspeople, and eventually both her lover and her
husband are killed.
The script is difficult, superficially simple and symbolically rich.
Recent productions at the Miracle Theatre have amply demonstrated the
ensemble’s uncanny ability to communicate profound themes with
immediacy and panache; unfortunately, that strength seems to have been
waylaid for the purposes of this production.
While the principles pull their weight, many of the supporting
actors seem to lack a connection to the material, so much so that those
who do fully inhabit their characters (most notably Mayra Acevedo as
the bride and Bibiana Lorenzo as the husband’s mother) seem downright
overblown in comparison. A sense of aimlessness is reinforced by Olga
Sanchez’s direction, which has actors milling about in the background,
cluttering up the stage to little effect. This is particularly
problematic when you consider that the show itself is in Spanish, with
English supertitles. The difficulty then, at least for English-speaking
audience members, is that it’s virtually impossible to simultaneously
consider supertitles above the stage, the primary action onstage,
and action going on in the background. Perhaps it’s unreasonable
to ask that Sanchez simplify her direction for those of us who don’t
speak Spanish, but it’s certainly worth considering that for many
audience members, this will pose a problem.
Even chalking some concerns up to logistics, the production strikes
an uncertain tone, somewhere between telenovela and Greek tragedy.
Where Lorca’s script should feel weighty, rich in blood symbolism, here
it mostly just feels tedious.