Eugene O’Neill’s Pulitzer Prize-winning “Strange Interlude,” at the Shakespeare Theatre Company, may not be familiar to most theatergoers, as it is not often performed. Written in 1928, it is magnificent and definitive O’Neill, full of the poetry long associated with America’s first major dramatist. Yet it contains themes and stylistic innovations that pose insurmountable challenges to many directors.
Fortunately, Michael Kahn, the director of “Strange Interlude,” is not included in the category of “many directors.”
“Strange Interlude” begins in New England in 1919 in the home of Professor Leeds, whose 20-year-old daughter, Nina, has had a nervous breakdown after learning that her fiance has been killed in the war. Blaming her father for not letting her marry her fiance before the war, Nina tries to find consolation in a series of sexual flings. The intricate plot of “Strange Interlude” spans the subsequent 25 years.
| Onstage |
| ‘Strange Interlude’ |
| Where: The Shakespeare Theatre, Sidney Haran Hall, 610 F St. NW |
| When: Through April 29 |
| Info: $20 to $100, special discounts are available for military, students, seniors and patrons ages 35 and under; 202-547-1122; shakespearetheatre.org |
Soon after Scene One, Nina has settled down in an unexciting marriage to Sam Evans. Then she begins an affair with Sam’s best friend, Ned, with whom she conceives a child. Nina and Ned continue their secret affair until their son is grown.
In the STC production, Francesca Faridany plays Nina. “She’s extremely intelligent and so brilliantly ahead of her time,” Faridany said. “She doesn’t know a lot until she loses the love of her life, and then she really tries to understand how to be happy. Of course at the time he wrote this play, O’Neill was struggling with his religious ideas.”
Nina voices some of those religious ideas. “She says, ‘I need to believe in something … I don’t care what it is. Don’t you think it would be better if we believed in God the Mother?’ ” said Faridany. “Nina tries so hard to comprehend life.”
Faridany’s role is not an easy one. The passionate Nina deals with many intricate issues, among them love, honesty, aging, fidelity and guilt. “Nina thinks that she’s born with guilt,” Faridany said. “She’s forced to find ways to relieve herself from it.”
And in “Strange Interlude,” O’Neill was also exploring the important issue of sacrifice. “To this day, women must give things up for their families, for the men in their lives, for people around them,” Faridany said.
“It’s the deal that you make with your pride and your honor. It’s a deal that you make based on the happiness of the people around you. Nina is driven to figure things out in her quest for happiness and to find peace.” Viewed this way, Nina is a thoroughly modern heroine, and “Strange Interlude,” with its message of personal integrity, still speaks to contemporary times.
