This work by Cuban exile Nilo Cruz shares some themes with his more recent Pulitzer Prize–winning play Anna in the Tropics. They are passionate and sometimes political theatre pieces concerned with the power of language and its turbulent effects on people. And in each drama the act of reading aloud inflames dangerous emotions. Both plays vividly illustrate the almost magical ability of the written word to preserve and convey overpowering thoughts and feelings. In Anna, reading a Tolstoy novel ignites an irresistible sensual spark between a man and a woman. In Two Sisters and a Piano—torrid and dolorous in the Old Globe production directed by Karen Carpenter—erotic ignition occurs when an unscrupulous man, the Fidelista Lieutenant Portuondo (Philip Hernandez, tragic-eyed and imperious), reads intercepted love letters from her émigré husband aloud to a lonely, persecuted woman, Maria Celia (Socorro Santiago, noble and sensuous), a novelist under house arrest for her rebellious outspokenness in Castro's Cuba. (The playwright's inspiration for this story was the case of similarly confined Cuban poet Maria Elena Cruz Varela.)
Sharing Maria Celia's isolated punishment is her boy-crazy sister, Sofia (played with vital giggly candor by Gloria Garayua), who communicates her own unsatisfied longings through the medium of a jangly old square piano, serviced by Victor Manuel (appealingly portrayed by Jesse Ontiveros), a shy and nervous state-certified piano tuner. These incidents are set in 1991, when the simultaneous occurrence of the Pan-American Games in Havana and the attempted coup against Gorbachev in the crumbling Soviet Union affect the course of events.
The emotionally and mentally subversive power of words and music is a concern as old as Plato, who strictly regulated poets and musicians in his imaginary micro-managed republic. Bearded Lieutenant Portuondo's domination and emotional manipulation of Maria Celia no more proves to be a firm basis for love than state control of everything from writing fiction to tuning pianos makes for a healthy relationship between a government and its people. The play ends sorrowfully and inconclusively for the sisters, suggesting the parallel unresolved plight of the Cuban nation under a repressive and inherently unstable one-man rule.
Paul Peterson's sound design excellently fosters the sonic illusion of the out-of-tune piano (secretly played by Karl Mansfield). Charlotte Devaux's costumes are subtly exotic, ranging from the drab to flashes of finery. And Kris Stone's scenic design, darkly and broodingly lighted by Chris Rynne, is stark with surreal details, including a floor plastered like a wall with windows in it.
"Two Sisters and a Piano," presented by and at the Cassius Carter Center Stage, Old Globe Theatre, 1363 Old Globe Way, Balboa. Tue.-Wed. 7 p.m., Thu.-Fri. 8 p.m., Sat. 2 & 8 p.m., Sun. 2 & 7 p.m. Mar. 11-Apr. 11. $19-47. (619) 234-5623.