The Present
I had high hopes for The Present . The Sydney Theatre Company production is a take on a lost Anton Chekhov play ( Platonov ) and stars the unparalleled two-time Academy Award winner Cate Blanchett (making her Broadway debut). While it was, indeed, a treat to catch Blanchett on stage, The Present is a middling play about a bunch of adults misbehaving. At rise, several old friends and lovers are gathered for Anna's 40th birthday. Anna (Blanchett, Blue Jasmine ) was married to The General; his second wife, the couple married when Anna was just 20, and The General died about 10 years prior to the present (set in the 1980s, it seems). Among the guests are Anna's step-son, Sergei ( Chris Ryan ), who's only about four years younger than Anna; Nikolai ( Toby Schmitz ), a life-long friend of Sergei's; and Mikhail ( Richard Roxburgh ), the boys' tutor and a perpetual flirting partner for Anna. Given the revelers' history, there's a lot of talk of the past. T...