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World Premiere
Lost Land
At
Steppenwolf Theatre Company
(Steppenwolf Theatre Website)
1650 North Halsted Street
Chicago, Illinois 60614
312.335.1650
Martha Lavey: Artistic Director
David Hawkanson: Executive Director
By: Stephen Jeffreys
Starring:
Ian Barford, Katherine R. Foster, Max Grilly,
Isabel Guzmán- Barrón,
Christopher LaBove, Martha Lavey, Katrina Lenk,
John Malkovich, Yasen Peyankov
Director: Terry Johnson
Scenic Design: James Schuette
Lighting Design: Scott Zielinski
Costume Design: John Malkovich
Costume Design Associate: Ana Kuzmanic
Composers and Sound Design: Rob Milburn &
Michael Bodeen
Dramaturg: Edward Sobel
Choreographer: Rachel Rockwell
Fight Choreographer: Robin McFarquhar
Dialect Coach: Linda Gates
Violin Coach: Katherine Hughes
Stage Manager: Malcolm Ewen
Assistant Stage Manager: Alison Ramsey
Public Relations: William Nedved
Exclusive Production Sponsor: Sara Lee Foundation
Exclusive Inaugural Sponsor of Steppenwolf
Ensemble Initiative: Sara Lee Foundation
Susan Weinrebe
May 24, 2005
With the excellent hindsight of historical perspective, the audience can intuit what will happen to the characters and their country, Hungary, by the conclusion of Lost Land.
Imagine a time so innocent that people believed the war being fought, World War I, was “the war to end all wars.” It is towards the end of that war, which so far has not touched the Tokaji wine region of northern Hungary, that this tale of loss takes place.
The castle setting, on a raked stage, is placed ingeniously in a courtyard. It is walled off from the war, the peasants, the land itself, by a brick enclosure and iron gate. Separating the audience and the players, an earthen embankment representing fields or no-man’s land is a dark slice of dirt. Floor level grillwork leads to the wine cellar where the family’s most prized treasures lie.
Kristóf (John Malkovich) is the castle lord, seigneur to its peasants. Tolstoy-like idealism prompts his wish for land reform. He would “…create a model estate, a living example of what the 20th Century might be.” Ultimately he succumbs to the blandishments of a government representative who bids Kristóf to come to the aid of his country and lead a plan for land reform.
Duality is a dominant note in the characterization of the two social classes, ruling and worker. Ilona, Kristóf’s sister, (Martha Lavey) portrays a woman of ramrod bearing, cutting intelligence, and disdain for everyone around her. But these qualities are a Potemkin front. She is at the mercy of her brother’s decisions for her future, not to mention wine and carnal pleasures once experienced. Ms. Lavey’s Countess demonstrates the proper spinal steel requisite to running the estate with imperious command. When she falls from her lofty station, it is an echo of all the other losses played out.
Tamás, major domo of the estate, is a peasant whose loyalty shifts to best serve his desire to redeem the land Kristóf’s father stole years earlier. Ian Barford is quietly wonderful in the part. His size, demeanor, and craft create the quintessential peasant. Never sure whether to kneel before authority or stand, he takes his cuffs with the stolidity of someone used to them as his portion, while he waits for the day when he is in ascendancy.
Katrina Lenk’s Anna could be a template for women of her lowly station. Played with self-effacement and downcast eyes, Ms. Lenk sketches a real person. Though Anna is of low position, she is not stupid, and we yearn for her lot in life to be better. A pawn in the marriage/land negotiations between Kristóf and Tamás, and later the Colonel and Tamás, the “little Slovakian peasant” is easily jettisoned when she loses her value.
Yasen Peyankov, Miklós, is a foil for the Count and his world. He belongs to neither the elite nor the peasant class. Instead, he is a harbinger of change and the new order. Promising to preserve the estate while Kristóf leaves on government business, he turns out not to be the gentleman he was presumed to be. Miklós embodies his own description of Hungarians as a devious people. “The man who can enter the door behind you and come out ahead,” well describes his role. Sardonic, mellifluous, slick, Mr. Peyankov’s controlled power and physicality give him dangerous appeal.
John Malkovich, as the Count, is simultaneously filled with lassitude and coiled energy. No one explodes better than Mr. Malkovich, and no else uses their voice as seductively. His seigneur is eager and conflicted, tolerant and vengeful, lost and redeemed. It is a multi-layered performance, as one would expect.
Lost Land ends on an ambiguous note, echoing the uncertain future Hungary and other Eastern European countries faced for most of the 20th Century. From today’s vantage point, we can be retrospective and know that in the end, the only thing possible to possess is neither land nor even national identity, but “The future.”
John Malkovich & Katrina Lenk
Photo courtesy of Michael Brosilow
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John Malkovich & Yasen Peyankov
Photo courtesy of Michael Brosilow
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