When all you hear at intermission is people wondering what the original play is like, you can be pretty sure the translation isn't going over. Then, too, when a play and its author have been hyped as much as these have been, people may be forgiven for wondering why it's so disappointing. My theory: the characters are not involving because they relate poorly to each other and are often unbelievable or stereotypes. Moreover, they begin more like tragic figures, even as their foolishness makes us laugh at them, since the comedy plays down its serious socio-economic elements.
Set in winter in a small industrial Russian town near Moscow, the graffiti-laden backstage of a movie house is where an interpreter confronts a motley group of women answering an ad to participate in a talent contest run by Japanese businessmen. Winners, they expect, will get a trip to the East (turns out to be Bangkok) to entertain (as they finally learn, in men's "pleasure clubs" -- probably dancing naked). The ad failed to mention that contestants should be young, pretty, with good figures and without attachments, particularly marital.
Except for two young prostitutes (and even they'd need their mother's blessing), the women don't qualify.
You might wonder why a series of slides of successive Russian 20th Century leaders precedes the introduction of the women, but maybe the point is that in the new Russia, despite surviving all those men, the women are not needed either. The most dynamic, however, is the oldest, Varvara Volkova (vivacious Melissa Teitel). A former geologist (hard to believe!), she's survived by the train station selling bootlegged vodka by the glass from the inside pockets of her oversized coat (as illustrated). She is also the mother who seemingly doesn't know at first how her alienated two daughters (realistically raunchy Sarah Stockton and Lesslie Crane) are making their way in the world. This despite blatantly come-on clothing (and lack of it). But then, seemingly none of the women know about Thai adult entertainment. Tamara (subtly played by Devon Peters) brings her accordion to show her talent, having spent all her money having her hair dyed blond and styled.
Flashily outfitted redhead Olga (properly haughty Deanna Gibson), formerly a magician, disdains the others. Former teacher Nina, who with her husband claims "three degrees among us" but does a terribly funny snake dance from her school days, spouts travel-book knowledge about Japan. Mary Lipple is (like most of the student actresses) too young to convey Nina's pathetic condition, but you have to give her credit for keeping in character throughout. It can't be easy to portray having degrees from old Russia and still be so naive and dumb.
Using their only strength, the ability to defy, the women insist on their right to be screened for the competition. That brings in the two most believable characters: Albert, the translator who needed the job but not the hassle (nicely realized by Ken Ferrigni), and Tedsudzin Aoki, the Japanese businessman who has to audition them. (Smiling, stiff Ross Kidder's satiric portrait is remarkable.) Aoki's reactions as voiced by Albert come off better than any of the other aimed-for comedy.
To resolve the problems of the married women, in come their husbands. The scholar Boris (Terry Small, of whom only his beard seems authentic) and the equally unemployed former union worker Vasily (hulky Terry Small) spar with their wives. It takes the magician's estranged husband, Victor, a successful Mafia man ably played by Arlyn Mick, to become the unlikely deus ex machina for all to be saved. Maybe the beginning slides had a point, after all: every bad Russian leader led to a better one. Of course, you don't know yet about Putin and who'll follow him, but for the misfits in the play who represent real Russian people today, Victor -- as old Varvara says -- represents hope. And yet, in that same spirit of hope, she sends her girls off...
