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Meeting of minds
"Legacy of Light' at People's Light
The play of ideas, in which the characters wrestle extensively with weighty philosophical or academic issues, has a long and honorable tradition in the theater, from George Bernard Shaw to Tom Stoppard. Legacy of Light, the Karen Zacarias play currently making its area debut at People's Light, isn't quite in the Shaw-Stoppard league, but it's a respectable addition to the genre.
Legacy concerns the lives of two female scientists of different eras. Emilie du Châtelet was a real 18th-Century French physicist and mathematician as well as Voltaire's longtime mistress and intellectual companion— a brilliant Enlightenment woman, unafraid to challenge the intellectual and moral principles of her time.
In the play, Emilie finds herself pregnant at age 42 by a young nobleman. Having nearly died during previous pregnancies, she rushes to complete her life's work, a translation of Sir Isaac Newton's Principia, before the baby's delivery.
The other half of the play deals with the fictional Olivia, an esteemed astrophysicist living with her husband, Peter, in present-day New Jersey. Olivia may be on the verge of discovering a developing planet in another solar system— a major breakthrough. Yet she and Peter feel a void in their lives because they're childless. Olivia has survived ovarian cancer and cannot give birth herself, so they decide to try in vitro fertilization and hire a 21-year-old girl as the surrogate mother.
Echoes of Arcadia
Legacy of Light veers back and forth between the two stories, which eventually begin to intersect. Structurally and thematically, it resembles Stoppard's 1993 play Arcadia, which also dealt with characters two centuries apart grappling with issues of the heart and mind.
Legacy lacks Arcadia's evenness: The action in the last act becomes somewhat frenetic and contrived. But most of the way through, Legacy of Light is a compelling examination of several themes and topics: scientific progress and gender equality, the nature of energy, and the relationship between past and present.
Aristocratic grace
Under the fluid direction of Abigail Adams, the cast members vividly bring Legacy's characters to life. Susan McKey conveys Emilie's formidable intellect and provides her with a veneer of aristocratic grace. Mary Elizabeth Scallen brings an edge as well as the right sense of contemporary angst to Olivia.
Stephen Novelli makes an appropriately arrogant Voltaire, and Greg Wood is likeably natural and ordinary as Olivia's schoolteacher husband.
Emilie Krause adeptly performs double duty as Emilie's daughter in the French scenes and the surrogate mother in the contemporary parts. So does Jefferson Haynes as both the father of Emilie's baby and the surrogate mother's disapproving brother.
Scenic designer James F. Pyne Jr. and lighting designer Dennis Parichy ingeniously use glass ornaments by artist Hank Murta Adams to suggest images of the night sky and the interconnectedness of the universe.
Legacy concerns the lives of two female scientists of different eras. Emilie du Châtelet was a real 18th-Century French physicist and mathematician as well as Voltaire's longtime mistress and intellectual companion— a brilliant Enlightenment woman, unafraid to challenge the intellectual and moral principles of her time.
In the play, Emilie finds herself pregnant at age 42 by a young nobleman. Having nearly died during previous pregnancies, she rushes to complete her life's work, a translation of Sir Isaac Newton's Principia, before the baby's delivery.
The other half of the play deals with the fictional Olivia, an esteemed astrophysicist living with her husband, Peter, in present-day New Jersey. Olivia may be on the verge of discovering a developing planet in another solar system— a major breakthrough. Yet she and Peter feel a void in their lives because they're childless. Olivia has survived ovarian cancer and cannot give birth herself, so they decide to try in vitro fertilization and hire a 21-year-old girl as the surrogate mother.
Echoes of Arcadia
Legacy of Light veers back and forth between the two stories, which eventually begin to intersect. Structurally and thematically, it resembles Stoppard's 1993 play Arcadia, which also dealt with characters two centuries apart grappling with issues of the heart and mind.
Legacy lacks Arcadia's evenness: The action in the last act becomes somewhat frenetic and contrived. But most of the way through, Legacy of Light is a compelling examination of several themes and topics: scientific progress and gender equality, the nature of energy, and the relationship between past and present.
Aristocratic grace
Under the fluid direction of Abigail Adams, the cast members vividly bring Legacy's characters to life. Susan McKey conveys Emilie's formidable intellect and provides her with a veneer of aristocratic grace. Mary Elizabeth Scallen brings an edge as well as the right sense of contemporary angst to Olivia.
Stephen Novelli makes an appropriately arrogant Voltaire, and Greg Wood is likeably natural and ordinary as Olivia's schoolteacher husband.
Emilie Krause adeptly performs double duty as Emilie's daughter in the French scenes and the surrogate mother in the contemporary parts. So does Jefferson Haynes as both the father of Emilie's baby and the surrogate mother's disapproving brother.
Scenic designer James F. Pyne Jr. and lighting designer Dennis Parichy ingeniously use glass ornaments by artist Hank Murta Adams to suggest images of the night sky and the interconnectedness of the universe.
What, When, Where
Legacy of Light. By Karen Zacarias; Abigail Adams directed. Through November 7, 2010 at People’s Light & Theatre Company, 39 Conestoga Rd., Malvern, Pa. (610) 644-3500 or www.peopleslight.org.
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