Heartwood Regional Theater, under the Direction of Griff Braley once more brings a new vision to an old, old story. Sarah Ruhl’s play “Eurydice” is unique in its approach to the Orpheus myth. Here it’s told from the seriocomic angle of Eurydice — who usually plays second fiddle to her ardent musician-husband.

      Stark, heavy stones make up the set of Heartwood’s “Eurydice.” They loom above and around the play, cavernous maws that house and engulf the fragile human spirits in their shelter. This weighty darkness contrasts with the delicacy of the newly arrived human in the subterranean chamber by the River Styx.  Director Griff Braley has used his eye for a ‘picture’ and the skills of his talented crew to tune in to the play’s insistent heartbeat, its subterranean feeling and its strangely potent imagery. 

      The story of Orpheus and Eurydice dates back to the poet Ovid and his “Metamorphoses” written over 2,000 years ago. It's one of the greatest love stories of all time. This inventive reimagining by playwright Sarah Rhul casts this Eurydice and her Orpheus as a modern couple— charming and rapturously happy. Gina D'Arco (Eurydice) and Austin Olive (Orpheus) are delightfully childlike and playful in the opening scenes.

      On their wedding day, Eurydice wanders off, enticed by a letter from her deceased father, only to find she is reunited with him in the underworld. Eurydice must re-learn human language in order to remember all she left behind and, ultimately, choose between two worlds in this whimsical and breathtaking story of the power and fragility of love.

      How Eurydice arrives in the underworld, the way her father creates a room for her where are there are no rooms, and the use of a clear bubble umbrella are all Braley touches that must be seen to be appreciated.

While Eurydice is learning that her father is not a tree and that one does not read by standing on a book, Orpheus goes on a rescue mission for his beloved venturing into the underworld to retrieve her by charming the gods with his sweet music.

      Three talking stones (played by Joseph Lugosch, Mary Boothby and Thalia Eddyblouin) greet newcomers to the underworld with a capricious touch. Their demeanor suggests that this may be the fate of those who bathe in the river of forgetfulness too often. They are sometimes moved to weep, but more often just stand eternally blank. They seem to say that caring hurts too much and that the only way to pass eternal boredom is by simply not caring. They are a Greek chorus for the tragedy but with more personality and sometimes hilarious but always wry and sardonic comments.

        Steve Shema makes his appearance as a deliciously rapacious little devil who later courts Eurydice from the seat of his tricycle. He adds a note of burlesque that is a relief and yet is still menacing as the Lord of the Underworld or “Nasty/Interesting man/ Child of Hades.”

       A central character new to the story is Eurydice’s Father (Clifford Blake). Father creates the central conflict of this play.  Eurydice’s return to the world of the living is less dependent on decisions made by Orpheus than on whether or not she chooses to leave her father’s world and join her husband in his.

           The most moving moments in the play are wordless and involve Father. There is a tender, wrenchingly sad sight as he walks his daughter down the aisle on her wedding day in his imagination. From the underworld below, he wraps her hand in the crook of his arm, nods proudly at the guests on either side, gives her an encouraging smile and offers her up with a mixture of resignation and worry and joy. He is utterly alone onstage. This small vignette is a desolate but moving moment. In a brilliant reprise, later on he walks with Eurydice in the underworld with each movement identical to the imagined ones earlier.

            Forgetting life after death is a theme that has been seen before on the Heartwood stage. In “Our Town” the dead watched passively on as the living grieved. In Eurydice, there is the second bath taken in the river of forgetfulness at the conclusion of the play .Father, having created a world for his child, believes he has lost her as fathers do, to her future, and to her lover/husband. Sometimes losing someone twice is just too much to bear.

           The idea that one might be saved or save a loved one from a dire fate if only they did not ‘look back’ is also familiar even to those not versed in Greek poetry. Lot’s Wife in the Old Testament turns into a pillar of salt when fleeing Sodom and Gomorrah when she looks back at her home.  So it is (sort of) with Orpheus who loves his new wife to distraction. When she dies Orpheus is so bereft the gods take pity and give him a chance to rescue her from the Underworld but only if he does so without glancing back at her. We all know how that works out. But sometimes love isn’t enough to make a story happy in the end, sometimes stories, like real life, can be tragically predictable.  

       Still though that may seem sad, this play is not a traditional tragedy. It has a comedic aspect that finds the audience laughing at moments that might otherwise be hard to bear.  This is partly because Ruhl’s script is charming but primarily because the actors in this production do a superb job with an unusual piece of theater. “Eurydice,’ in the hands of Braley, his cast and crew, is approachable and highly enjoyable. It is the kind of production that can be enjoyed by most ages and that will spark conversation afterwards. While this is not a review in the strictest sense, this watcher highly recommends this delightful love letter to fathers and daughters, young lovers and dreamers to local theatergoers.

  Performances frequently sell out at Heartwood at the Poe theater  in Newcastle so  reservations are strongly recommended by email at info@heartwoodtheater.org or by phone, 207-563-1373.  Dates: April 27-30, May 4-6.  Times and pricing available at www.heartwoodtheater.org