Maya Rowe on Opulence and Joy at Writers Theatre
Maya Rowe as Sonya in Writers Theatre Natasha, Pierre and the Great Comet of 1812. Photo by Liz Lauren.
War and Peace staged seems like a tough fit for audiences, but fear not, Tony Award winning Natasha, Pierre and the Great Comet of 1812 is a musical adaptation of a single section of the book. Filled with struggle and opulence and apparently pop ballads, audiences at Writers Theatre current production will leave not overly tired after being served too much Russian drama, but will exit the theatre after a romp in good company. Maya Rowe, who plays Sonya, is making her Writers Theatre debut and fills us in on this joyous, lusty and youthful production.
Q. You're making your debut at Writers Theatre with Natasha, Pierre and the Great Comet of 1812, what has the experience been like to embark on Writers’ stage with such an award winning production?
A. Honestly, as cheesy as it sounds, it has been a dream come true. To be on a thrust stage looking at, breathing on, interacting with the audience in this show that requires intimate storytelling has been so refreshing. The audience really is our final cast member with which our characters get to narrate to & even consult in hard times, which makes it that much harder to say goodbye to them at the end of the show.
Q. The play is based on a section of Leo Tolstoy's War and Peace, a novel which in its entirety is a true heft of a book. What will Tolstoy lovers and those who knew they never had the stamina to read the book through, have to look forward to in this production?
A. The composer Dave Malloy has cleverly taken the most important sections of Part 8 and concentrated it into this really exciting multi-genre score. Where reading the book may get tedious at times, Dave harvests the most vital parts of the story with an exciting time signature and an unpredictable melody. I would say our production takes the best segments of Part 8, adds visuals and context and drills into you what may have been easy to scan over when reading. Whether we’re at the club dancing to a beat or mourning someone’s ruin in a pop ballad, it’s pretty impossible to get bored.
Q. You play Sonya, the good and measured character who has her cousin Natasha's back. Is Sonya the only one who isn't searching for something else?
A. What an interesting thought! In my mind, Sonya may not be searching at the beginning of the show, but by the end she is very much still searching. From my perspective, nearly every character in the show has a battle for belonging, and it’s their loneliness that causes them to wreak havoc or become a hermit or stir conflict in some way. While it may not be given in the context of the show, Sonya is an orphan and her whole life has been searching for an answer to that loneliness. She found the answer in Natasha’s friendship & family. When that friendship is threatened, Sonya is forced to search again. I think for Sonya, the comet represents something so much bigger than her that it, even just temporarily, extinguishes that loneliness. From an acting perspective, as most humans wake up each day and are searching for more, our characters always have to be searching. Searching is human and I think it’s what so many people are relating to in this show.
Q. The production looks as magnificently staged as one would wish for with a Russian aristocracy tale. What has been the best part of being set in such a frilly era?
A. The opulence! Nothing in life calls for these types of gowns anymore so to come to the theatre and put on the most decadent dresses and wigs is the greatest gift! It’s thrilling to walk into the theatre in flip flops and a sweatshirt and become royalty in 30 minutes. Peasant by day, princess by night. Us artists don’t always get to feel rich so we’ll take it where we can get it!
Q. How does the production tackle the moodiness of the characters and their hopes and wishes for their lives and the joyousness that is a musical?
A. Our director, Katie Spelman, has taken a cast of characters that could easily be traditional archetypes and added dimension to each and every person. Every character in this show isn’t just ‘good’ or ‘young’ or ‘hot’ (as stated in the opening number). They are fully fleshed out human beings we get to follow to the heights of their joy and the depths of their loneliness. Much like our own lives, this production honors the joy of youth, the excitement of lust, the weight of sorrow, the responsibility of friendship, and asks the age old human question ‘what’s it all for?’. Sometimes the search for that answer involves an introspective ballad and sometimes it involves a chaotic romp in the club! We can’t promise an answer, but we can promise some company along the way.
Natasha, Pierre and the Great Comet of 1812 is on stage at Writers Theatre until Oct. 27. For more information and tickets, visit writerstheatre.org.
