Theatre review: "In the Next Room or the vibrator play" from PICT

Pittsburgh Irish and Classical Theatre has started its new season with a play that’s neither Irish nor classical. It’s by a much-admired American, Sarah Ruhl. In The Next Room or the vibrator play, is definitely a period piece, although the year is not indentified in the program book. Ruhl wrote about a specific time and its mores, customs and practices, specifically Victorian era attitudes towards the role of women, women’s sexuality being the main theme. 


The drama, sometimes promoted as a comedy, narrows in on one of many wonders of the dawn of the electrical age, the vibrator. Ruhl evokes real history in that, initially, the device was used by some doctors to deal with female “hysteria,” while actually causing  what was not immediately recognized as an orgasm, given that women were not expected to enjoy sex.


Certainly such a subject on stage could provoke laughter, some of it nervous, some of it from being amused by the naïveté of the times. Director Alan Stanford adeptly has his cast play this sincerely and convincingly rather than deliberately funny.


Dr. Givings worships Thomas Edison and that inventor’s discoveries. Among Givings’ patients is previously disoriented and listless Sabrina Daldry, who, after intimate contact with a vibrator, is stimulated into new life. Meanwhile, the doctor’s wife, Catherine, feels her femininity diminished, unable to breast-feed her infant and missing personal and physical intimacy with her husband. She becomes curious about what transpires in her husband’s home office. Then, after hiring a wet nurse, a black woman named Elizabeth, a second new element enters the controlled environment: lively, worldly young English painter Leo Irving.


Ruhl develops and fills out her major points exceptionally well. But she spends too much  time repeatedly dwelling on people getting stimulated into orgasms. You’ve got to hand it to the actors, though, who make those seem genuine, despite being partially clothed under sheets.


Ruhl also ably evokes the period and develops some of the characters. For example,  Catherine seems almost obsessively chatty while, by contrast, Elizabeth is more verbally contained but, being outside the mainstream of society, her emotions are less disguised. Ruhl writes Irving best with eloquent, expressive, articulate dialogue. Note too an inference that he is Jewish and, therefore, like Elizabeth, outside the mainstream. Leo is more thoroughly alive than the other white people, a fine contrast, another example of being natural rather than controlled. Here and in the lovely closing scene, Ruhl has written insightfully, meaningfully.


Yet Sabrina, Mr. Daldry, Dr. Givings and his assistant Annie look like stereotypes.


CMU acting major Denver Milord stands out wonderfully as Irving, creating an appealing presence, thoroughly conveying the man’s intelligence and vitality. Plus director Stanford and Jessica Frances Dukes excellently bring out Elizabeth’s compound dimensions even when not spoken, conveying significant meaning.


As for the rest of the cast, their portrayals tell the story clearly but don't give the characters enough discernable personality. Five of them seem like shades of black and white appropriate to their repressed society. You'd think, given developments, that new color would eventually come into their cheeks when they discover more and more about themselves, as if new lights went on. That's when the glow of confined, indoor lamps is replaced by the brightness of nature outside the rooms. 


In the Next Room or the vibrator play continues through May 5th at the Charity Randall Theatre, Stephen Foster Memorial, 4310 Forbes Avenue, Oakland. 412/ 394-3353 or www.picttheatre.org