“Poetry makes nothing happen,” Archhibald Macleish famously wrote. But in Sotto Voce, Nilo Cruz wonderfully proves him wrong. His poetic play unites past and present. It subtly persuades us to uncover and learn from the past, to care about humans seeking asylum from evil, and to act on our knowledge. Poet-of-the-theater Cruz also presents us with romance renewed and, with it, life.
Background: the 1938 voyage of the Saint Louis carrying refugees from Nazi oppression to seek safety first in Cuba, then the U.S. Now-famous, German-born novelist Bernadette saw her lover Ariel and his sister Nina rejected and returned to Germany, with most fellow Jews, to death camps.
Living in New York City, Bernadette has effectively sent herself into exile. Sasquiel, a Cuban Jew researching the voyage as a study as well as to learn of his grandfather’s sister who died after the Cuban rejection, almost stalks Bernadette’s apartment to probe her memories. As his visa expiration presses, they communicate only by email and then phone . . . one might say, sotto voce. He struggles to explore memories that she’s worked hard to forget. Flashbacks inform their present.
Touching, intense Marcel Mascaro’s Sasquiel appeals not only to Bernadette but to Lucila (Hannia Guillen, commendable). From Colombia, she divorced an uncaring spouse and fled to the U.S. to escape violence for a better life. As Bernadette’s caring maid for a decade, Lucila protects her and brings things from the world outside. But she pleads for access by Sasquiel and shows him pertinent writings she rescued from Bernadette’s trash. Romances develop. Lucila and Sasquiel dance in each other’s arms--and hearts. Conversations turn into flirting between Bernadette and Sasquiel, who finally brings her back to her love for Ariel. In an overall stunning performance, Kathryn Hunter shines brightest in her moments of both physical renewal and spiritual reunion with the love of her life.
Melissa Kievman’s direction smoothly effects all of the play’s transitions. She doesn’t bury the political theme in the romantic motifs to the detriment of either. She should be proud that all three of her actors handle Cruz’s beautiful language so well.
The set is flanked with shelves of books and files, the top tiers of which are too high to be reached, and there is no visible ladder. One opening, used as a window by Sasquiel, is a bit too high for him to get to and down from easily. The best of the background projections shows sea waves with a (remembered) face imposed, establishing both fact and memory. Lighting varies to fine purpose, as do costumes.
Though the appearances of Ariel and Nina could well be strengthened plotwise, Nilo Cruz’s achievement shows him already in top form making poetry make things happen.
