Reviews

East of Eden

Steppenwolf returns to Steinbeck for a story of blood, brothers, and Biblical allegory.

A scene from Frank Galati's adaptation of East of Eden, directed by Terry Kinney, at Steppenwolf Theatre.
A scene from Frank Galati's adaptation of East of Eden, directed by Terry Kinney, at Steppenwolf Theatre.
(© Michael Brosilow)

The pedigree of Steppenwolf Theatre's East of Eden is flawless. The adapter is Frank Galati, whose 1990 adaptation of Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath won the Best Play Tony. The director is Terry Kinney, a veteran whose previous Steppenwolf shows (Streetcar Named Desire, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, A Clockwork Orange) were uniformly riveting. And the cast includes the great Francis Guinan, whose ability to morph into the world of any given character is rarely less than stunning. As for the source material, Steinbeck's East of Eden is no less than a Great American Novel. It's also a sprawling ensemble drama – the genre Steppenwolf sets the bar for. It's little wonder that the hugely anticipated show showed up on virtually every Chicago critic's must-see list.

The hype, as it turns out, was misplaced. East of Eden is three hours of disappointment. The problem lies in Galati's spare adaptation. Barely half of the novel made it onto the stage, and what remains plays out as a sketchy plot outline rather than the rich, vivid narrative of Steinbeck's novel. In paring the novel down, Galati removed all the crucial flashbacks that pepper the story, scenes that explain who the characters are, and why they act as they do. What's left are bland ciphers, people whose actions are both inexplicable and unbelievable. As for the sense of place that so firmly roots the novel – the vast farm and lush California valley where the story takes place is largely absent.

The drama centers on Adam Trask (Tim Hopper), who purchases a plot of Salinas Valley land with the dream of turning it into a farm. In Galati's adaptation, that purchase seems to rest entirely on a conversation with Samuel (Francis Guinan), a holy man who claims powers of divination and speaks in platitudes about life, death, and farming. In the book, the preacher is a dazzling mystic. In Galati's adaptation, he sounds like a new-age infomercial pitchman.

After Adam buys the land, his wife, Cathy (Kate Arrington), gives birth to twin sons, Caleb (Aaron Himelstein) and Aron (Casey Thomas Brown). Despite Adam's slavish devotion, Cathy is unhappy with life in Salinas and far from glowing with maternal instinct. But her explosive rage is so inexplicably intense, that it feels as if a scene of explanation missing that would allow the audience a window into the background of her extreme anger.

Kinney's cast works in a uniformly understated fashion. Dialogue is clipped and mannered even as characters struggle with volcanic emotions. Arrington's Cathy suffers the most from this odd reserve. Mrs. Trask's actions indicate she's got a ferocity that can't be tamed, but her tone of voice is that of a matron at a church tea.

In contrast with the brittle, reserved demeanor that defines the ensemble, Galati has inserted heavy-handed string interludes throughout. What the characters fail to express, the cello and harp hammer home. There's a jarring disconnect between Rob Milburn and Michael Bodeen's original music and the colorless tone of the dialogue.

Walt Spangler's set is dominated by a tree of massive, ancient girth. But that tree captures none of the rich, fruitful essence of Salinas during the early 20th century when East of Eden unfolds. The area was a vast horn of plenty but at Steppenwolf, it's reduced to a Waiting for Godot levels of bleakness.

In the end, East of Eden is a puzzle. Galati is a Steinbeck scholar. Kinney is a gifted director. But their collaboration leaves nothing so much as questions as to just how so much proven potential yielded so very little fruit.

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East of Eden

Closed: November 15, 2015